Public, free and cited, for every state and district
Special Education Data by State
Federal data for every state and district, what the people doing the work report about their caseloads, and the evidence leaders need to fund and staff special education well.
Caseload counts students. Workload counts the week.
Federal data counts positions. It cannot see a week. The Workload Census asks the people who deliver special education what their weeks hold: students served, IEP minutes, evaluations, meetings and the hours they are paid for. It takes four minutes, it is anonymous, and you see right away how your week compares with others in your role and state.
Evidence you can bring to a board meeting.
From Caseload to Workload
A response to the Council for Exceptional Children’s July 2026 position on caseload and workload, and a measurement model that says what a workload percentage is a share of.
Published · Read the paperThe Measurement Gap
Why special education keeps failing the people who deliver it. The field has measured compliance in exhaustive detail for fifty years and the sustainability of its workforce almost not at all. Introduces the Capacity Gap and the Sustainability Maturity Model.
Published · Read the paper
The people behind the numbers, in their own words.
Short, signed pieces from providers, teachers, directors and families about what the data cannot show. Every piece is reviewed before it is published, and none names a student.
Write a field noteShort lessons from the field, in plain language.
- 10 min · captioned · with a self-assessmentThe Measurement Gap in Six MinutesDistricts measure compliance in exhaustive detail and almost never measure whether the people delivering services can do the work in the hours they are paid to work. This short lesson names that gap, shows what it costs, and gives you a four-stage way to place your own district.
National data, read by the people who know the region.
Regional partners publish their own editions of the Observatory for their members, review findings before they are released, and host the conversations that follow.
- Educational service agenciesESCs, BOCES, intermediate units and cooperatives. More than 500 across 45 states, most delivering special education directly.
- School study councilsSuperintendent councils that already publish data for their members, several based at universities.
- Professional associationsState units of special education administrators and the associations of the providers the Workload Census counts.
- Universities and researchersFaculty who review the methods, use the open data and publish with it.
Take the evidence where decisions are made.
Every state and district page exports to the formats leaders actually use, with the citations attached.
- Board slidesYour state’s page as a short, cited slide deck for a school committee.
- One-page briefA printable summary for budget hearings and community meetings.
- Letter to your legislatorsYour state’s special education figures in a letter you edit and send yourself.
- Open dataEvery table as a download, with sources, years and suppression rules.
How the Observatory stays honest
Join the Observatory.
New state data when it is released, the Workload Census results for your role, and From the Field, Eric’s newsletter. Free. Unsubscribe in one click.