To Segregate or to Separate? Special Education Expansion and Divergence in the United States and Germany

Over the past two hundred years in the United States and Germany, special educational systems have been institutionalized to facilitate access to learning opportunities for children with disabilities, difficulties, and disadvantages. Originally heralded as innovative, the positive views of these mainly segregating and separating educational facilities have been increasingly challenged. Despite a multitude of local, national, and international reform initiatives, Germany continues to serve the vast majority of children with special educational needs (SEN) in segregated special schools, whereas in the United States nearly all children with SEN are integrated in general schools, though most spend part of their school day outside the general classroom. This institutional analysis compares the genesis, expansion, and persistence of special education as a multitrack, separating system in the United States and as a dual‐track, segregating system in Germany.