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The article reports on an educational law passed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in California. According to the law, California students with disabilities who are scheduled to graduate in 2006 will not have to pass the state's high school exit test. Under the law, students with an individual education plan who have met all other state requirements for a diploma, and received remediation for the test if the help was available, will be able to graduate whether or not they've passed the exam. The law was seen as an opportunity for the state to improve instruction for those with disabilities.

This article discusses various issues related to the legislation for the handicapped in the public schools of California. The U.S. Office of Education reports that forty-one states, the District of Columbia, and the Territory of Hawaii now have laws authorizing or requiring local school districts to make provisions for the special education of exceptional children. California is representative of a few states which have been very active in the field. A Bureau of Special Education has been established, in the State Department of Education, with the primary responsibility of working with the public schools in implementing programs for the handicapped child. The legislation makes it permissible for local school districts to establish special classes for physically handicapped persons under twenty-one years of age. The term "physically handicapped" is defined broadly and includes the orthopedically handicapped, the cerebral palsied, the blind, the partially sighted, the deaf, the hard of hearing, the speech defective, and children with lowered vitality. Local districts establishing classes for the physically handicapped receive excess cut payments not to exceed $400 per child, in addition to the minimum of $120 per pupil which is paid for each child in average daily attendance.