May 6 - 8, 2002
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Providing Culturally Competent Disability Services
to Persons Born in other Countries May 6 - 8, 2002 |
Refugee school based services
Jou, M.K.
School Liaison
International Institute of Buffalo
Buffalo, New York USA
mjou@iibuf.org
Abstract
School 45 is The International School in Buffalo, New York, and serves children who speak over 52 different languages. Bilingual classes are offered in Arabic, Cambodian, Lao, Russian, Somali and Vietnamese. Forty percent of the students are English Langu age Learners (ELL). Through a partnership with The International Institute of Buffalo, (a local refugee resettlement agency), the school has been able to offer many services to their students. One of the greatest challenges at the schoo l is meeting the needs of Bilingual Special Education students. How to differentiate between language proficiency and learning disability, using the bilingual special education assessment process, will be described, as well as the cultural barriers that s low the process. Many of our students are refugees who have never attended school before; their special needs will be discussed, also. Information will be provided about how to overcome obstacles that arise when so many different languages and cultures ar e present in a school, and will highlight strategies that have proved most successful.