Over 300,000 U.S. students carry the 'emotionally disturbed' label, typically educated in separate classrooms. Reporter Laurie Stern follows Walt, a Black student from a low-income family with severe trauma, through high school to reveal how this disability category simultaneously provides support and severely limits future prospects, trapping students in a cycle of segregation that makes behavioral improvement harder, not easier. Students labeled emotionally disturbed are three times more likely than other disabled students to be educated outside regular classrooms, creating segregated learning environments that persist through their entire K-12 education.