Is It the Language, the Disability—or Are We Asking the Wrong Question?

September 2, 2026 · Tyesha West

Central question

Who is responsible for knowing the whole child when everybody is responsible for only one piece?

I keep coming back to that question.

A student can be a multilingual learner and have an IEP. They can be struggling with attendance, meeting with a counselor, learning how to navigate a new school system, dealing with something at home, and trying to figure out where they belong.

The school may see EL. IEP. Attendance. Grades. Behavior. Counseling. Family communication.

The child experiences all of it at once.

They don’t become a different person when they leave my classroom and walk into math. Their disability doesn’t disappear when they enter ESL. Their language needs don’t disappear during an IEP meeting. Whatever is happening at home doesn’t politely wait outside the school doors either.

Yet we have created systems where different people often hold different pieces of the same child.

Sometimes I wonder if schools are actually organized around what children need, or if children have simply gotten really good at navigating the way we’ve organized the adults around them.

Is It Language—or Is Something Else Going On?

As an ESL teacher, when one of my multilingual students was struggling, I didn’t immediately assume I knew why. I started looking.

I looked at ACCESS scores. I looked at the IEP if there was one. I looked at past grades, current performance, and whether what I was seeing showed up everywhere or only in certain areas.

Metrics give us information. I use them. But metrics only get you so far.

You have to know the student.

I need to know their weaknesses, but I also need to know how they learn. I need to know where they’re confident and where they shut down. If they’re making the same mistake over and over again, that tells me something. If they’re doing really well in one area and consistently struggling in another, that tells me something too.

And sometimes what looks like an academic problem is tied to relationship.

A student who doesn’t feel comfortable with a teacher may not participate or practice because being wrong in front of other students makes them vulnerable. When that relationship is there, I have found that students are much more likely to seek out the help they need.

So if the student doesn’t perform for one teacher but does for another, what exactly are we measuring?

Their ability? Their English? Their confidence? The environment?

Probably some combination of all of it.

This is also where the difference between conversational and academic English matters. Jim Cummins’ BICS and CALP framework gave educators language for something many of us see in the classroom: a student can sound fluent socially and still need significant support with the academic language required to analyze a text, explain reasoning, understand specialized vocabulary, or write an argument.

That student can fool us because they “sound like they speak English.”

Struggle can fool us too.

I’ve seen situations where a child was assumed to have a learning problem when the student didn’t fully understand the language. I’ve also seen the reverse. Concerns were raised and weren’t always taken as seriously as they could have been because the child was still learning English.

Both mistakes cost the student something.

What If the Answer Isn’t Either/Or?

We don’t want multilingual students overidentified for special education because language difference has been mistaken for disability. But we can’t solve that problem by going so far in the other direction that legitimate needs are dismissed with, They’re still learning English.

There are too many other things that could be happening.

Maybe this is a Newcomer or SLIFE student whose education has been interrupted. Maybe nobody ever taught them the skill we’re testing. Maybe they’re literate in their first language and maybe they aren’t. Maybe they’re learning English while simultaneously trying to figure out how American schools work.

Trauma can affect concentration, memory, participation and trust. Age matters. Educational history matters. First-language literacy matters. How long a student has actually had access to consistent instruction matters.

And yes, maybe the student has a disability.

Several things can be true at the same time.

That’s why I don’t think one test, one assignment, one classroom, or one adult should be expected to explain the whole child. We need to know what the student knows, what they’ve actually been taught, what they can demonstrate with the right language support, and what happens when we change the conditions around the learning.

First-language ability is a big piece of that for me. What can this student read, write, understand, and explain in a language they already know? That tells me something very different from only asking what they can currently demonstrate in English.

Instead of only asking, What can’t this student do?

I want to know, Under what conditions can this student do it?

What Happens to the Child While We’re Figuring It Out?

This is the part that bothers me.

While the adults are meeting, testing, referring, reviewing, documenting, waiting for the next meeting and trying to decide what’s happening, there is still a child sitting in a classroom.

Sometimes that child is caught in limbo. They’re confused, but still hopeful that eventually somebody is going to figure out what they need.

Other times the child keeps getting pushed back while everyone in the system is trying to “fix things.”

How long do we expect them to wait?

At some point, skipping class can feel easier than sitting there confused every day. A student stops asking for help. They withdraw. In some cases we lose them from the class, and sometimes eventually from school altogether.

When we lose a child because of process, systemic red tape, or because we refused to step in at the crucial point, the damage isn’t only academic.

That child can lose trust in us, in the system they’re told to trust, and eventually in themselves. That’s the part that scares me.

When language becomes unreachable, trust becomes unattainable.

And rebuilding trust is a lot harder than checking another box.

This Isn’t a Small Group of Children

The numbers make this conversation harder to brush aside.

In August, the National Clearinghouse for English Language Acquisition reported that during the 2023–24 school year, English learners made up 11.9% of K–12 enrollment. Of students ages 5–21 identified as having a disability under IDEA Part B, 15.5% were also identified as English learners.

Another NCELA demographic release puts the growth into perspective. The EL population increased from about 4.85 million students in 2012–13 to more than 5.83 million in 2023–24.

Those numbers don’t surprise me as much as they concern me.

Because the question isn’t just whether we have enough EL teachers or enough special educators. I’m wondering how many people in our systems genuinely understand what happens where those areas meet.

Knowing special education isn’t the same thing as understanding language acquisition. Knowing multilingual education isn’t the same thing as understanding disability. Having both professionals in the same building doesn’t mean they have the time, systems, or authority to work together the way they should.

Are we building expertise at the intersection, or are we expecting two separate systems to somehow meet in the middle?

Everybody Knows Something. Who Knows Everything?

Take one student.

The EL teacher knows what happens when language is scaffolded. The classroom teacher sees how the student performs against grade-level expectations. The special educator understands the disability, goals, services and accommodations. The counselor may know what’s happening socially or emotionally. Attendance staff may see a pattern. The family knows the child’s history and true pain points in a way the school may never completely see.

And the student knows what it feels like to actually be the student.

How often are all of those people in the same conversation?

In my experience, not very.

That’s one of the ways I felt siloed as an ESL teacher. My expertise could suddenly become relevant when something was considered an “ESL issue,” but my students didn’t stop being multilingual when they walked into math, science, special education, counseling or an administrator’s office.

Curriculum decisions affect them. Policy decisions affect them. Grading decisions affect them. Decisions made in rooms where the EL teacher isn’t considered “need to know” can eventually land directly in the EL classroom.

That has always bothered me.

If my expertise matters after a decision affects a multilingual student, why didn’t it matter while the decision was being made?

I don’t need to sit in every meeting in the building. But anything that affects curriculum, policy, student support or major changes in how we educate children should have the voices of the people closest to those children represented somewhere in the process.

The students should be there too.

We give students surveys. We ask what helps them learn. I just don’t always know how seriously those responses are taken after the survey closes.

Then we wonder why students feel unheard.

We study the disengagement after it happens without always studying what happened before it.

We Keep Updating the Students Without Redesigning the System

This is where history matters.

I don’t think we can talk seriously about redesigning education without acknowledging what we’re redesigning.

The public school system we have today wasn’t built all at once for the students sitting in our classrooms now. Rights and protections had to be fought for, legislated, litigated and, in many cases, forced into systems that weren’t originally built around the people demanding access to them.

In 1954, Brown v. Board of Education declared state-sanctioned racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional. The Supreme Court said educational opportunity, once provided by the state, had to be available on equal terms.

Think about what that means historically.

It took a Supreme Court decision to say Black children could not legally be separated from white children in public schools on the basis of race.

Twenty years later, Lau v. Nichols confronted another version of access: giving students the same books, teachers and curriculum wasn’t necessarily equal treatment when students couldn’t understand the language of instruction.

Then disability rights changed the conversation again. The Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975—the law that would eventually become IDEA—established major federal protections around access to public education, individualized education programs and procedural safeguards for children with disabilities.

That’s not ancient history.

Ruby Bridges is still alive.

Think about that for a minute.

We have people alive today who personally walked through the doors of schools that had to be compelled to admit Black children, and yet we sometimes talk about inequity in education like we’re discussing something the country settled generations ago.

We didn’t.

We’ve been expanding who the system is required to recognize.

Black students.

Students with disabilities.

Multilingual students.

Immigrant children.

Girls.

Students whose cultures, families, identities and learning needs weren’t represented by the people who originally held institutional power.

The people have evolved. Our understanding of children has evolved. The laws have evolved. The research has evolved.

But sometimes I look at the underlying structure and wonder how much we’ve actually redesigned.

We add departments.

We add programs.

We add specialists.

We add mandates.

We add interventions.

We add another piece of technology.

Then we tell the child to move between all of it.

Maybe we haven’t rebuilt the house.

Maybe we’ve just kept adding rooms.

And now we’re surprised that nobody can find each other.

Can Everybody Do Their Job and the System Still Fail the Child?

Absolutely.

That’s probably one of the biggest problems I have with the state of education right now.

Everyone can do exactly what their job description says and a child can still fall through the spaces between those jobs.

The EL teacher provided language support. The special educator handled the IEP. The counselor checked in. The administrator reviewed the metrics. The parent received the paperwork.

Everybody did something.

But did those things make sense together?

Did anybody notice something another department missed?

Did anyone ask the student?

Did anybody call the parent before the situation became a problem?

Or did everybody complete their piece and assume somebody else was holding the rest?

Procedure and outcome aren’t the same thing.

A school can be compliant and a child can still be confused.

The boxes can all be checked and we can still fail the student.

That’s what happens when we become more loyal to the process than to the reason the process exists.

At some point we have to allow teachers to teach again and build the rest of the system to support that work instead of constantly asking teachers and students to bend themselves around the system.

Now Put the Parent in the Room

Now imagine being the parent of that student.

Special education is complicated when English is your first language. IEPs. Evaluations. Eligibility. Accommodations. Services. Goals. Progress monitoring. Procedural safeguards. Acronyms on top of acronyms.

Now do it in a language you don’t fully understand.

If this were my child, I would want everything explained.

I would want a guide I could access on my own time and come back to later when I needed it. I would want the information scaffolded and broken down into small chunks. Give it to me in writing. Explain it verbally. Show me visually if that helps. Most importantly, give it to me in a language I understand.

And then give me access to somebody who actually understands the subject well enough to answer my questions.

I need to know what this means for my child. How do the IEP and accommodations work together? Why are you recommending this? What else did you consider? What protections does this give my child? What does this mean for their future? What rights do I have as the parent? What happens if I don’t agree?

Translation and understanding are not the same thing.

Translation takes a word from one language and offers it in another language in hopes of equal meaning.

Understanding gives me the ability to make choices that directly benefit and protect my child. It gives me enough information to participate instead of just being present.

Those are very different things.

You Don’t Know What You Don’t Know Until You Find Out You Didn’t Know It

Someone once told me that, and it stuck.

The problem is that sometimes by the time you find out what you didn’t know, it’s too late.

How does a parent disagree with something they don’t understand?

How do they ask about an option they don’t know exists?

How do they advocate using rights nobody explained?

Then add culture.

Some parents come from educational systems where teachers and administrators are authority figures you don’t question. Disability can have completely different cultural meanings. Saying “I don’t understand” may feel embarrassing. Direct disagreement with a school official may be considered disrespectful. Even the way we use eye contact, ask questions, disclose family problems or talk about disability can change across cultures.

We cannot look at a quiet parent and automatically decide that parent agrees.

And we definitely can’t look at a signature and decide that parent understood.

To me, informed participation means the parent can tell me, in their own words, what is happening with their child. They know why we’re recommending something. They know what will change. They know there were alternatives. They know their rights. They know who to call when they have another question three days later.

And they know they’re allowed to disagree with us.

I’d also like to know whether anybody bothered to ask the child what they think.

If a parent can understand every translated word but still doesn’t understand what the school is proposing for their child, did we really provide language access?

No.

And I think this happens far too often. Then when something goes wrong, everybody gets held accountable except the system that was supposed to make sure the family understood in the first place.

Supports Should Layer, Not Compete

A child shouldn’t have to become less multilingual because they receive special education. And a disability doesn’t disappear because the child is learning English.

Those supports have to work together.

Special education does not mean a child can’t learn something difficult. A disability can change the kind of access, instruction or support a student needs. It does not tell us the ceiling of what that child is capable of learning.

That’s an important distinction.

Accommodations and language scaffolds should work hand in hand. An accommodation can change the way a student accesses information or demonstrates what they know. A language scaffold supports the student in accessing and using the language required for the lesson.

Neither one should automatically mean, Make the work easier.

Teachers have to keep asking what we’re actually measuring.

If I’m trying to figure out whether my student understands science, am I measuring science? Or did I accidentally turn English proficiency into the entrance exam for showing me what they know?

Access and lowered expectations are not the same thing.

I want that student pushed. I want them supported. I want the curriculum to meet them where they are without deciding that where they are today is where they’re capable of ending up.

Sometimes the inequity isn’t that we forgot to provide support.

Sometimes we provided plenty of support and quietly stopped expecting the student to do anything with it.

What Would We Build If We Started With the Whole Child?

This is where my brain always goes.

If what we have isn’t working well enough, what would I build instead?

A multilingual student with a disability enters school.

Before we start deciding things about them, ask them something.

What do you need?

How do you learn?

What makes learning difficult for you?

What helps?

What are you good at?

What do you want us to know?

Bring the family in from the beginning. Explain how the IEP, accommodations, services and language supports work together. Give them the information in their preferred language, but don’t stop at translation. Scaffold it. Break it into small chunks. Give it verbally and in writing. Give them something they can go back to later when they’re sitting at home and realize they have another question.

The EL teacher needs current, accurate information about the student.

The special educator needs to understand enough about language development to recognize how language can affect what the student is able to demonstrate.

The general education teacher should not have to search through five systems to figure out who just walked into the classroom and what that child needs.

And counselors shouldn’t only become important after something has gone wrong. Bring them in from the start as a cushioned support around the child.

Then there is leadership.

Yes, somebody has to look at the metrics.

But I don’t want people with degrees sitting behind a screen staring at numbers and believing the numbers are the children.

Go downstairs.

Talk to the teacher.

Talk to the parent.

Talk to the student.

Find out why the number looks like that.

Leadership should be responsible for making sure all of these people aren’t just doing their individual jobs but actually coordinating around the same child.

A dashboard can’t know a child.

Then We Can Talk About Technology

I’m building in education technology, so this part matters to me personally.

I believe technology can help.

I also think we get ourselves in trouble when we build the technology first and then try to rearrange people around whatever we built.

Start with the human process.

Then ask where technology can make that process better.

Can it organize the right information so teachers aren’t hunting through disconnected systems? Can authorized staff see the accommodations and language supports relevant to their role? Can we track whether those supports are actually happening? Can families receive information in their preferred language and in a format they understand?

Can a teacher see what they need without seeing information they have no business accessing?

Can the system notice a pattern humans haven’t put together yet?

Can we stop making a student tell the same painful story to five different adults because none of those adults knows the child already told somebody else?

Those are things I want technology doing.

Organize.

Connect.

Notice.

Communicate.

Make the humans better at helping the child.

But I don’t want it diagnosing the child.

I don’t want it deciding special education eligibility.

I don’t want it determining placement.

I don’t want an algorithm deciding whether the problem is English or a disability.

And I definitely don’t want technology deciding how much potential a child has.

Technology can help us put pieces together.

It should never become the person responsible for the whole child.

So Maybe We Are Asking the Wrong Question

We started with:

Is it the language or the disability?

I understand why we ask it. I’ve asked versions of it myself.

I just don’t think it’s big enough anymore.

I want to know what the child needs.

I want to know what they already know and what they’ve actually been taught.

I want to know what happens when we change the conditions around their learning.

I want to know what their family sees that we don’t.

I want to know what the EL teacher knows, what the special educator knows, what the classroom teacher knows, and whether any of those people have ever actually had enough time to sit together and compare notes.

And before we decide anything major about that student, I want somebody to ask them what they know about themselves.

Because the student isn’t an EL on Monday, a special education student on Tuesday, an attendance concern on Wednesday, and somebody’s child when their parent walks into the building on Thursday.

They’re the same kid.

They’ve been the same kid the entire time.