Hawaiʻi Is Failing Special Education Students. Federal Cuts Could Make It Worse

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Mai Hall expected that her oldest child would automatically receive special education services for her autism, dyslexia and ADHD when she enrolled in a Kaimukī elementary school 10 years ago. But the school said Hall’s daughter didn’t need any additional support, insisting that she earned good grades and got along with her friends. 

It was only after Hall received training from a federally funded parent information center that she was able to successfully advocate for her daughter — and later, her son — to get the support services they needed.

Parents of students with disabilities have long struggled to ensure their kids have the resources and support they need in public schools in Hawaiʻi, which ranks among the worst states in the nation when it comes to academic outcomes for special education students.

Today, Hall’s daughter is attending college and her son is receiving the accommodations he needs to feel supported and happy at school. But Hall and other families are worried that potential cuts to federal funding and efforts to shutter the U.S. Department of Education will result in fewer services and learning opportunities for special education students.   

“We really don’t need to worry about our children’s education any more than we already are,” Hall said. 

Education advocates and families say federal funding and regulation have played a key role in strengthening protections for special education students in Hawaiʻi, but it’s unclear what oversight will look like moving forward. President Donald Trump cut the U.S. DOE’s staff by nearly half last month, resulting in the closure of seven civil rights offices dedicated to processing student discrimination claims, including those related to disabilities.

A recent executive order from the administration also aims to dismantle the U.S. DOE, and the administration has proposed shifting special education programs to the Department of Health and Human Services. But the health department doesn’t have the staff or expertise to hold states accountable for following federal special education laws, said Meghan Burke, a professor at Vanderbilt University.    

A reduction in federal oversight may make it harder for Hawaiʻi families to receive support and resources for their children, said attorney Keith Peck, who leads the Advocacy Project providing legal representation to families seeking special education services. 

Federal funding is currently tied to Hawaiʻi’s compliance with special education laws, Peck said, but he’s worried the new administration may provide states with more flexibility and less accountability on how the money can be spent.   

“If the funding is no longer linked to allowing the parents to assert their rights and dispute against the Department of Education, if the (Hawaiʻi) DOE no longer has to comply with those protections, then nobody will have any protections,” Peck said. 

What’s At Stake? 

Hawaiʻi’s education department enrolls over 18,000 special education students and receives $50 million from the federal government each year to educate those children. To access the money,  Hawaiʻi must submit annual data reports and comply with federal laws requiring schools provide special education students with necessary services, from physical therapy to one-on-one aids. 

Teachers, families and educational specialists work together to determine the specific services students with disabilities should receive in schools. 

But Hawaiʻi has fallen short of meeting federal benchmarks for the quality of special education services for the last decade, according to annual evaluations from the U.S. DOE. 

Hawaiʻi’s special education students rank among the lowest in the nation in reading and math proficiency and learn in traditional classroom settings at lower rates than their peers on the mainland. 

Researchers and families say including students with disabilities in general education classrooms provides them with important opportunities to interact with their peers and raise their academic achievement. 

Leah Yim said she’s lost count of the hundreds of meetings she’s attended over the years to advocate for her two children with special needs. 

Yim’s 6-year-old daughter currently receives speech therapy for her autism spectrum disorder, while her 15-year-old son has a nurse and aid accompanying him in class. He also receives services like physical and occupational therapy as part of his treatment after having a stroke in utero. 

Yim said she hasn’t heard of any changes to her children’s services so far, but worries that federal funding cuts could reduce the number of educators and specialists in schools, which already face a shortage of special education teachers. 

“My worry would just be the amount of caseloads that they’re carrying, and then how that would affect their quality of services one-on-one with our child,” said Yim, whose family also filed a lawsuit against the state education department in 2023 accusing a teacher at Kaiser High School of sexually abusing their son. 

While the U.S. DOE plays a key role in protecting the rights of special education students, the agency has limited enforcement powers.

In the most extreme cases, the U.S. DOE can take away special education funding if states aren’t complying with federal law, said Nathan Stevenson, an associate professor at Kent State University. In most cases, he said, the federal government steps in with grants or training to support states in areas where they’re struggling. 

In Hawaiʻi, the federal government has provided a variety of aid, such as training sessions teaching staff how to resolve disputes with parents over special education services and collaborations with national centers to expand access to preschool for students with disabilities, said department spokesperson Krislyn Yano. The department declined an interview for this story. 

The U.S. DOE also has a regulatory branch, the Office of Civil Rights, dedicated to processing complaints from students who file claims of discrimination based on gender, race, age or disability against their schools. As of January 2025, Hawaiʻi had 32 pending cases in both public schools and universities, 17 of which had to do with students’ disabilities. 

JD Hsin, an assistant professor at the University of Alabama, said recent staffing cuts to OCR and the closure of seven regional offices will make it much harder for the remaining employees to handle families’ complaints and ensure states are providing special education students with the services they need. As of January 2025, OCR had over 12,000 pending cases that could take years to close and required in-depth investigations involving families, schools and federal attorneys.  

Now, with fewer staff on board, Hsin said, he’s worried that many cases will be left unresolved, leaving families with no answers about the support their children should receive in school. 

“Those are kids’ lives,” Hsin said. “These are just kids who want an education.” 

Reduced Oversight And Enforcement 

At the Hawaiʻi Disability Rights Center, Executive Director Louis Erteschik said he’s most concerned about what accountability will remain if the U.S. DOE is dismantled and special education is moved to the Department of Health and Human Services. Already, he said, many students with disabilities aren’t receiving the education they deserve under law. 

In 2019, Erteschik filed a complaint with the Office of Civil Rights arguing that students with disabilities weren’t receiving adequate services because they were suspended at three times the rate of the rest of their peers. 

While Trump has proposed shifting special education oversight from the U.S. DOE to the Department of Health and Human Services, the move would require an act of Congress, said Jennifer Coco, interim executive director at The Center for Learner Equity. But there are ongoing worries that the federal government could reduce funding for students with disabilities, she said, adding that the U.S. DOE is already underfunding special education in schools and has consistently fallen short of its promise of covering 40% of the costs of providing services. 

Currently, the funding Hawaiʻi receives from the U.S. DOE makes up roughly 10% of what the state spends on special education. 

U.S. Rep. Jill Tokuda said the state would have to fill in the funding gaps if the federal government reduces its support for special education. But, she said, the uncertainty around the future of federal funding makes it hard for state lawmakers to plan on how they’ll meet special education students’ needs.  

“I have great fears that we will go backwards in terms of actually providing the appropriate and adequate education to our special needs students,” Tokuda said.  

Federal funding for Hawaiʻi schools should remain roughly the same from this year to next year, according to a presentation Superintendent Keith Hayashi is slated to give to the Board of Education on Thursday.

Peck at the Advocacy Project said he’s most concerned that the federal government won’t enforce the mandates that have historically accompanied its special education funding to states. With the administration’s efforts to dismantle the U.S. DOE, the federal government will lack the staff and expertise needed to oversee states’ compliance with special education law, he said. 

Hawaiʻi has a state equivalent of the federal special education law that also requires schools to meet the needs of students with disabilities, providing families with an extra layer of protection if the federal government stops enforcing its laws. But the state still needs an external source of enforcement to keep schools accountable, Peck said.    

It’s unlikely the Hawaiʻi education department will take on the added responsibility of strengthening oversight over its schools, Erteschik said, adding that states don’t have the same familiarity with special education law and requirements compared to the federal level. 

“The state can’t oversee itself by definition,” he said.

This story was originally posted on Honolulu Civil Beat.

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