Dual Identification? The Effects of English Learner (EL) Status on Subsequent Special Education (SPED) Placement in an Equity-Focused District

Oct 15, 2026

This study examines how English Learner (EL) status affects subsequent Special Education (SPED) placement in an equity-focused district. Using a research-practice partnership, it links student demographic data and initial English proficiency assessment scores across seven cohorts and tracks EL and SPED participation over 7 years. Regression discontinuity estimates at the English proficiency margin show no effect of EL status on SPED placement, while subgroup and grade-level analyses indicate modest underidentification for SPED, especially for Spanish primary language students.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages25

Reading Time1 h 3 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Research Design and Contributions

Findings and Implications

Research Article Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis June 2023, Vol. 45, No. 2, pp. 311–335 DOI: 10. 3102/01623737221121786 Article reuse guidelines: [sagepub.com/journals-permissions](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)[ ](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)© 2022 AERA. [https://journals.sagepub.com/home/epa](https://journals.sagepub.com/home/epa) Dual Identification? The Effects of English Learner (EL) Status on Subsequent Special Education (SPED) Placement in an Equity-Focused District Mark Murphy University of Hawai’i at Mānoa Angela Johnson NWEA This study examines the effects of English Learner (EL) status on subsequent Special Education (SPED) placement. Through a research-practice partnership, we link student demographic data and initial English proficiency assessment data across seven cohorts of test takers and observe EL and SPED programmatic participation for these students over 7 years. Our regression discontinuity (RD) estimates at the English proficiency margin consistently differ substantively from positive associations generated through regression analyses. RD evidence indicates that EL status had no effect on SPED placement at the English proficiency threshold. Grade-by-grade and subgroup RD analyses at this margin suggest that ELs were modestly underidentified for SPED during Grade 5 and that ELs whose primary language was Spanish were underidentified for SPED. Keywords: English Learner, Special Education, educational policy, equity, evaluation, bilingual/ bicultural, quasi-experimental analysis, regression discontinuity, descriptive analysis Introduction The effectiveness of educational support services holds tremendous influence on the academic success of millions of public school students in the United States (Thurlow et al., 2006) . When such services meet students’ needs for linguistic or disability support, indicators of student success can improve (Berkeley et al., 2010; Morgan et al., 2010; Schwartz et al., 2021; Wang & Lam, 2017). Conversely, when needs are unmet, student success can falter (Morgan et al., 2010) . Persistent achievement gaps between student populations who are eligible for services and those who are not suggest that there is substantial room for improvement nationwide (Albus & Thurlow, 2013; Pasternack, 2014; Schwartz et al., 2021). Furthermore, some students rely not solely on English Learner (EL) services or Special Education (SPED) services, but rather on supports for both a disability and developing English proficiency. We refer to these students as dually identified students (i.e., identified for both EL and SPED), and they are a central focus of this study (Carnock & Silva, 2019; Umanskyet al., 2017) . Despite a substantial body of descriptive and qualitative research on the relation between EL Murphy and Johnson and SPED placement, little is known about the causal link between the two. Prior work has highlighted disproportionate representation of EL students in SPED using descriptive regression and hazard analyses (Morgan et al., 2015, 2017, 2018; Umansky et al., 2017) . This work has found grade-level heterogeneity with EL students’being underidentified for SPED in elementary grades, but overidentified for SPED in secondary grades (Umansky et al., 2017) . However, a clear evaluation of how EL status affects subsequent SPED placement has not yet been conducted. Previous studies on this topic noted that to thoroughly examine disproportionate representation, student-level data are necessary (Morgan et al., 2017) . Through a research partnership with a large, urban school district in California, we employ student-level data across seven cohorts of kindergarten students to examine the relation between EL status and SPED placement. We principally leverage a regression discontinuity (RD) design to generate credibly causal estimates of the effects of EL status on subsequent SPED placement for students near the English proficiency margin. However, we

FAQs

What does the study investigate about English Learners and Special Education placement?

The study investigates whether English Learner (EL) status affects subsequent Special Education (SPED) placement, focusing on students near the English proficiency threshold.

How does the research estimate causal effects?

It primarily uses a regression discontinuity (RD) design to generate credibly causal estimates by comparing students just above and below an English proficiency cut point.

What are the main RD results regarding EL status and SPED placement?

RD findings indicate that EL status largely led to proportionate representation of EL students in SPED at the English proficiency margin, with no effect at the threshold in pooled evidence.

Oct 15, 2026

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