Race, Education and Disability Post-Reading Questions

There are quite a few factors to misdiagnosed students.  First off, part of the blame is to fall on those doing the diagnosing.  How willing  is the doctor or teacher to really figure out what it that is wrong with the student?  Or is the overseer just going through the motions? At the end of the day, it comes down to what is expected of the child through the eyes of those judging him. If there person diagnosing him cannot see themselves working with the child, they may that much quicker to write them off as disabled. Race also plays a factor in how the child is diagnosed.  If the child was white, maybe the teacher or doctor, would spend a bit more time really finding the root of the child's learning difficulties.

If a white child has a hard time learning, maybe they're just need a bit more time with the material.  If a black child has the same issues, he may be more likely to be written off.  Perhaps because he is not expected to rise to anything greater, his disabilities are almost expected.

Depending on the ethnicity of the teacher, race can be a huge bias in terms of  how the student is diagnosed.  A white child may seen as more capable, and thus, a disability is seen as less likely to be attributed to said child.  A black child may be seen as already lesser, and thus, lesser learning capabilities are almost expected.

Race an LD are seen as pegs down in society.  In other words, once someone hears that you have a disability they already will begin to think differently of you even if they havent even met you.  Race, as we have seen, has this same inherent effect on people.  People may beging to form thought about your skills and potential even if you havent really done anything.  Stereotypes are all the same.  If you're dyslexic, then you can;t read at all.  Just like if you're black you steal.  They are stereotypes all the same.

Medicine can be seen as a scape goat to many of the problems we see.  Perhaps a child of color is very creative and has a massive imagination.  Something of this magnitude should be capitalized, and yet, if a teacher goes on to misdiagnose the child, he can be restricted to Adderal to keep him quite.  A potential artist is now confined by drugs to become normal.  A true waste of human potential.

Race and LD can interlock because they can be seen by outsiders as equal parts to a dovetail.  If they are colored, they are lesser, and thus more prone to disabilities of sorts.  This mistaken thinking can really overload the LD system and under equip people of color for the upcoming future.  Thus the vicious cycle repeats itself.
  
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