IncreasED: How Court Rulings Impact Special Education Identification

Healthcare services outside of school can impact the likelihood of receiving school-based special education identification and services. Using Massachusetts administrative data on public school students, this paper employs the difference-in-differences method to examine the impacts of expanded Medicaid coverage for mental and behavioral healthcare resulting from the Rosie D. lawsuit of 2009. Rosie D. caused a 0.3 percentage point (15%) increase in emotional disorder (ED) identification among low-income grade 9–12 students. After Rosie D., students with ED were more likely to be Black or multiracial. Students were also more likely to have experienced suspension or chronic absenteeism before ED identification. Finally, students with ED in grades K–8 were educated in less inclusive settings.