This series on ethnicity and 2e takes a closer look at how twice-exceptionality intersects with ethnic stereotypes, often adding another layer of “difference” to students. Also see “Taming the ‘Tiger Mom’ Stereotype” and “To Be Gifted, Learning Challenged, and Black.”
Identifying giftedness or twice-exceptionality is always challenging. A language and cultural barrier makes it more so. Conversations about neurodiversity can overlook additional barriers to gifted services that exist for ethnically diverse students. According to a 2016
New York Times article, white students are twice as likely to be identified for giftedness (or twice-exceptionality) as black and Hispanic students.
However, when non-verbal IQ tests were administered to Hispanic children in Broward County, Florida, between 2005-2010, the percentage of those students identified as gifted tripled. But this program was discontinued due to budget cuts. In 2012, officials implemented a modified version relying more on verbal ability but failed to produce the same results.
One reason the non-verbal tests were effective in discovering the hidden gifts of Hispanic children, according to the
Times, is that they tried to neutralize the cultural and language discrepancies. These tests also do not rely on teachers’ expectations of those children, which tend to be low.
“Many schools will wait for students to be English proficient before they test for giftedness,” said Dr. Joy Esquierdo, a professor of bilingual literacy and giftedness at the University of Texas—Rio Grande Valley. While some schools may test in Spanish, that approach has its own complications. “Unless the child is getting educated in their native language, that may not be the best source. That child will have social skills in their first language, but if they’re getting educated in English, they may not have the academic language development in Spanish. Giving them an achievement test in Spanish is not giving them an accurate test of their academic knowledge.”
Esquierdo advocates for dual-language testing but warns that even this wouldn’t address all of the issues relating to identifying giftedness in bilingual children.
“It’s difficult to remove cultural biases from these evaluation tests,” said Esquierdo, noting that even with non-verbal assessments, directions may be given in English, which “automatically makes them more difficult for Spanish-language dominant students.”
Indeed, the overall focus on bringing English Language Learners up to speed can be detrimental to efforts to identify them as gifted or twice-exceptional.
“Many times, schools get so focused on teaching students English that they don’t allow the students to demonstrate all their potential or they don’t recognize other learning challenges or disabilities,” Esquierdo said. “Overly focusing on English language skills can mask a student’s twice-exceptionality.”
For the Latino population, potential obstacles exist beyond the possibility that some students aren’t native English speakers. Resources such as accurate test-giving and teacher support are not as available for many Hispanic students due to socio-economic barriers as well.
According to a report from the National Task Force on Early Childhood Education for Hispanics, “linguistically disadvantaged students typically have families with low socioeconomic status, parents with low levels of education, less access to educational resources and activities at home, bigger schools with higher concentration of minority students, and teachers with lower levels of credentials, qualifications, and experiences.” This creates multiple disadvantages that puts students “at substantial risk for school failure.”
[perfectpullquote align=”left” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]”Many times, schools get so focused on teaching students English that they don’t allow the students to demonstrate all their potential or they don’t recognize other learning challenges or disabilities. Overly focusing on English language skills can mask a student’s twice-exceptionality.”[/perfectpullquote]
When Rene Islas, former head of the National Association for Gifted Children, was growing up in Tucson, Arizona, he was labeled an English Language Learner. “That meant a watered-down curriculum and I was not exposed to learning opportunities,” he told NPR. “It wasn’t until my mother moved me to a more affluent, white neighborhood school that educators recognized that I had more potential than people at my previous school recognized.”
“The consensus out there is that you need multiple measures [verbal and non-verbal] to identify gifted students with language disadvantages,” Islas said.
Islas benefited, in a sense, from his mother’s intervention. Indeed, parent advocacy is seen as one of the most important elements of gifted and 2e children being properly identified and supported. But advocacy can be challenging. For some Latinos, the language and cultural hurdles are as steep for children as they are for parents, who need to “understand the system” in order to effectively advocate for their children, Esquierdo said.
“When a child doesn’t get identified as gifted or as 2e the traditional way, through teacher nomination, parents have the option to appeal, but very few Latino parents ever appeal,” she said. “That’s a huge challenge. When you look at first-generation parents, they just don’t understand the process. What are the first steps? It’s the responsibility of the school to build relationships with the community and to inform the parents in a way that makes sense to them. Parents want to know, but they don’t know how to ask.
“Giving parents more information empowers them to ask more questions. Unfortunately, there aren’t a lot of schools doing that kind of work.”
The problem is compounded for undocumented residents. Although schools are not supposed to be looking at whether a child is documented or not documented, the fear of severe consequences is strong in many Latino communities.
“If a child comes from a family that is not documented, then the family tends not to make too many waves at school,” Esquierdo said. “The chance of those parents attending parent meetings or advocating for their child to be put in a gifted or special ed class are very slim. The school may tell them that they don’t check status, but they still feel they are in a very vulnerable situation.”
Esquierdo is working on a better screening processes specifically for bilingual students to determine giftedness and twice-exceptionality — which may start with further recognizing that some standard methods are ineffective for these populations. For example, questioning authority and rushing through work are sometimes seen as predictors of giftedness in white, middle class societies. But in other communities, according to Esquierdo’s research, there is more value put on collaboration and deliberation. In this context, some students could feel that being gifted is at odds with their cultural values.
This is an unfortunate perspective. Esquierdo, a fifth generation American of Mexican heritage, is raising her two sons in a bilingual household and community. She is making a conscious effort to revive her Spanish language skills and preserve her rich Mexican-American culture. In identifying and supporting gifted students, schools would be well served to apply such deliberate attention to the importance of multiculturalism.
“The field of giftedness has some work to do when it comes to cultural relevance,” she said. “We need to look at curriculum and the services that schools provide and make sure they are culturally relevant. Culture is very intertwined with language. When there’s not a conscious effort to preserve it, it definitely fades out over the generations.”
