Governing.com

Over the past decade, the number of students with disabilities in American schools has exploded. In San Diego County, the trend has been particularly acute.

In 2015, La Mesa Spring Valley Schools, for example, served 1,424 students with disabilities. By 2025, that number had increased to 2,225. That striking increase came even as the number of overall students in the district dropped significantly. Over just a few years, more than one in five students had become legally entitled to special education services in the district. The same trend has played out countywide. Since 2015, local schools have lost tens of thousands of students. But over the same period, the number of students with disabilities has increased significantly.