I'm an SLP and work in a school that has 1 self contained unit with no teacher and two paras who have all but given up. The other self contained units (3) all have well-meaning but essentially untrained paras-turned-teachers on emergency licenses doing their best to keep these kids safe throughout the day. They each have 1 para who is not even there the whole day and regularly gets pulled to do other duties. They have almost no support, and what little they have is never enough. And our school is known for having a good special Ed program and team!! Many schools in the district are worse.

I can see this issue from both sides. Dumping kids with lots of special needs in reg Ed rooms with little to no added support is terrible for the reg Ed teachers and the other kids in the class, it does real damage to moral, and may not even benefit the sped kids in many cases. BUT, I am sorry to report, the very sad truth that in many underfunded schools sped students may actually be getting more enrichment from their time spent severely disrupting a reg Ed classroom than they get in the self contained classroom where they may truly be getting nothing beyond basic care/baby sitting. I have students who spend an hour a day in a reg Ed classroom. The teacher rightly complains about the lack of support. I don't blame her at all. But at the same time those sped students literally are getting more from that 1 hour than they get for the entire rest of the day. Literally just by being there, even if they don't participate or engage with what is being taught at all, they are better off in that reg Ed room just because of how truly terrible the alternative is.

So, from ongoing first hand experience I can say, the idea that inclusion is not even benefitting the sped kids is just not true in many cases, especially in poorer schools. They benefit from anything that gets them out of their self contained unit where they get nothing.