Strategies for Success: Disability Determination of Students Who Are English Learners

English learners (ELs) are students whose first language is not English and who do not communicate fluently or learn effectively in English (Li et al., 2018). Teachers and administrators face multiple roadblocks when trying to help ELs. One issue is that teachers are often unable to distinguish between ELs with learning disabilities and ELs who have not adequately acquired academic English. Another concern is that many teachers are not adequately trained to help EL students. These problems often result in ELs being incorrectly identified as having a specific learning disability or a speech-language impairment (Klingner et al., 2006).