Can we talk? A correspondence study to examine responsiveness of physical educators to requests for a phone call from parents of children with disabilities

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (2004) mandates that parental input be considered when making educational decisions for children with disabilities, including in physical education. However, parents of children with disabilities often report suboptimal communication experiences with physical educators. The purpose of the current study was to examine if the initiation of a parent–physical educator relationship is influenced by whether students have a disability or not. An online message correspondence study methodology was used to detect potential disparities in the responsiveness of a sample of 320 physical educators to electronic message requests for a phone call to discuss physical education service from hypothetical parents of a child with a visual impairment (VI), autism spectrum disorder (ASD), Down syndrome (DS), or no disability. Parents of children with ASD had reduced odds of receiving a positive response as compared to parents of children without disabilities (15.8% vs 26.9% RR = .57). Similarly, parents of children with DS had reduced odds of receiving a positive response as compared to parents of children without disabilities (15.2% vs 26.9%, RR = .59). Strategies to promote parent–physical educator relationships are urgently needed, especially for parents of children with ASD and DS.