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Google search....."Services remained primarily custodial, with provision of basic residential and medical needs, until the initiatives of President John F. Kennedy in 1961. President Kennedy assembled a panel of advisors from numerous diverse fields such as special education, social work, psychology, and medicine, who made recommendations which were eventually translated into the Intermediate Care Facility for the Mentally Retarded (ICF/MR) program of 1971. Under the ICF/MR program States were then able to access matching federal funds by conversion of their existing institutions for the mentally retarded to" ICF/MR" facilities. This conversion required that services be directed by an “interdisciplinary team” with a new emphasis on "training" in order to achieve behaviors which would make the resident as independent as possible.Under this new “Habilitation Model” physician services in institutions were redefined to focus primarily on certification issues and legal requirements rather than implementation of innovations in health service delivery. Under the Habilitation paradigm, institutions were dramatically downsized as thousands of people with mild and moderate disabilities moved to community settings. "

I don't know that this was the part that mainstreamed spec. ed students, though. Maybe Carter built that onto the initiative....

JFK was certainly interested in helping the mentally handicapped. I think the sister who was is Rosemary? Anyway, he did have initiatives (and it could be that Special Olympics came about during his Presidency. Certainly the family does support that)

recommendations which were eventually translated into the Intermediate Care Facility for the Mentally Retarded (ICF/MR) program of 1971.

That's obviously long past his Presidency.
It was Carter who closed the mental hospitals.

institutions were dramatically downsized as thousands of people with mild and moderate disabilities moved to community settings.

No, they just closed the mental hospitals. Many of those people are now the homeless. Their disabilities are severe enough that they can't manage on their own.

Carter essentially closed the mental institutions and turned the patients out into the world - most to end up on the street because he felt they 'had rights" -

never mind that they can't take care of themselves - about the only "help" they can get is to be picked up as vagrant and get a warm night and meal in jail...

and then Carter let 100's of thousands of Cubans be boat lifted to the US - Castro laughed, emptied his jails and insane ayslyms and put them on the boats...

(Carter and Castro are still good buddies.)