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TRANSFORMING YOUR LANGUAGE TO CHANGE THE CLINICAL NARRATIVE OF YOUTH WITH COGNITIVE AND COMMUNICATION

DISORDERS

WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?

To effectively advocate for youth with increased risk of being placed at-risk for delinquency and involvement in the justice system, clinicians must become equipped and prepared to accurately discuss

and use terminology that is void of biases, violence, prejudice, and negative perceptions. Although clinicians may not be aware of the presence of this language in their writings and clinical discussions 75% of the time,

it is present, and the clinician has not been made aware of its impact on combatting the school-to-confinement pipeline.

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WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT: RACIAL AND ETHNIC DISPARITIES

Students of color enter schools and are greeted by more police and metal detectors annually than any other race

But few, if any speech-language pathologists qualified and knowledgeable to address the needs of the youth placed-at-risk for delinquency are present

harsh “school safety” and zero-tolerance policies are detrimental to youth of color

DeVos considers whether to undo the Obama administration’s reforms to curb racial bias in school discipline

Necessary to recognize what’s happening in schools and step into your ethical role as an SLP

2013-2014 SCHOOL ARRESTS

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BLACK YOUTH & SPED

Students enrolled in public SPED systems continue to increase at an alarming rate

Diagnosis of SLI increasing over 17% within the last ten years – 3x the rate of the overall student population.

African American students represent 20.2% of the total student population receiving special education in the United States.

50k students arrested daily

Youth Confinement

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MASS INCARCERATION & RACIAL AND ETHINIC DISPARITIES WHAT IS THE SCHOOL-TO-CONFINEMENT PIPELINE?

In Texas, youth can be charged in a juvenile court for criminal offenses committed on or after their 10th birthday.

Can range anywhere from a class C misdemeanor up to and including capital murder.

A person who is at least 10 years old and under the age of 17 can be charged as a juvenile.

Can be tried as an adult at 14 years of age.

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WHAT IS THE SCHOOL-TO-CONFINEMENT PIPELINE?

Texas Determinate Sentencing Law:

Youth can be confined up to 40 years

Confinement starts in Texas Juvenile Justice Division facility, followed by an optional court transfer to prison

SPECIFIC LEARNING DISABILITY/SLD

SLD is a disorder that begins during SA in one or more of the basic processes needed to understanding or using spoken and/or written language. It may impair the youth’s ability to:

Listen

Think

Speak

Read & Reading Comprehension

Write

Spell

Problem Solving

Daily Activities

**CREATED BY SHAMEKA STANFORD, PH.D., CCC-SLP/L. THIS MATERIAL IS NOT TO BE DISTRIBUTED BEYOND THE PARTICIPANTS IN THIS WORKSHOP WITHOUT DR. STANFORD’S EXPLICIT PERMISSION.

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SOCIAL COMMUNICATION

**CREATED BY SHAMEKA STANFORD, PH.D., CCC-SLP/L. THIS MATERIAL IS NOT TO BE DISTRIBUTED BEYOND THE PARTICIPANTS IN THIS WORKSHOP WITHOUT DR. STANFORD’S EXPLICIT PERMISSION.

Deficits: Verbal and Nonverbal communication

skills – Difficulty with understanding social cues and gestures

Emotion perception and expression –May not pick up emotional cues from others or express emotions in a socially acceptable manner

Social problem solving – Difficulty problem solving in social situations (ex. with friends, in class, other social events)

WHAT IS WRONG WITH THESE DESCRIPTIONS?

1. low intelligence, poor school performance, limited involvement in positive extracurricular activities, hyperactivity, impulsiveness and risk taking, early antisocial behavior (including aggression and bullying), few bonds to conventional society (friends, girlfriends, parents, teachers, ministers, coaches).

2. Family factors - poor parental supervision, harsh and/or inconsistent discipline, physical abuse, child neglect, low parental involvement, parental conflict, broken/divorced families, single parent families, criminal parents, delinquent siblings.

3. Socio-economic factors - low family income, lack of roots/stability (high mobility coefficient), rent vs. own home, high aggregate socio-economic inequity coefficient in the community, limited opportunity structures

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THE POWER OF THE TONGUE

We often function in the practice oflabeling and categorizing children

based upon the results of theirassessments and standardized testsoverlooking abilities and potential to

be habilitated. (Stanford 2019)

THE TROUBLE WITH LABELS

Labels Impact how others view the child

Issue first terms – gang member, delinquent

Low-SES

Not cooperative

Non-compliant

Disruptive

Rude

Jerk

Problem

Behaviors

Violent

Labels Impact how YOU view the child Hard time

Refuses

Can’t

Struggle

Family Issues – mom doesn’t come, brother in jail, dad is abusive, drugs etc.

Overarching Disabilities – Behavioral, Learning, Communication

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LABELS IMPACT HOW THE

CHILD VIEWS THEMSELF: THE

LABELING THEORY

Labeling Theory Two different mechanisms by which a “label” can lead to increased deviancy

(Paternoster and Iovanni, 1980) in youth. The first primary mechanism is that a delinquent label redirects a youth’s self-conception or personal identity toward a deviant self-concept, (e.g., Matsueda,1992).

Edwin Lemert’s (1951) - depiction of the progression from “primary deviance” to “secondary deviance.” Individuals come to internalize the deviant status stemming from societal reaction to their behavior, and youth involved with the system start to organize their lives around this status and then associate with more deviant peers(Wiley Slocum, and Esbensen, 2013), and engage in criminal offending at a higher rate than similar peers who have not been labeled

SLPS ON THE FRONTLINE

Whenever a school reports a crime allegedly committed by a youth with CCD or any disability, school officials must provide copies of their SPED and disciplinary records to the appropriate authorities to whom the school reports the crime to the extent that the FERPA* permits the transmission

Some courts have found the juvenile court lacked jurisdiction in cases involving noncriminal school- related misconduct in which special education procedures had not been followed – No report advocated for the rights or needs of the child

A school’s responsibility to comply with IDEA procedural requirements does not end when a youth with a disability enters the juvenile justice system - OJJDP

* Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act

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HOW DOES YOUR REPORT HELP OR HURT THE STUDENT

Assessments and Progress Reports

Academic Impact

Subjective and Objective Information

Quality before Quantity

Alignment Statements

QUALITY (QUALITATIVE) BEFORE QUANTITY (QUANTITATIVE)

Formal testing no qualitative discussion of the testing outcomes – specific examples of the child’s performance

Numbers/scores mean little when attempting to demonstrate impairments and why the impairment exist and how it academically or socially impacts the child

No Academic Impact Statement

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ASSESSMENT AND INTERVENTION GUIDING QUESTIONS

1. What are the language and communication demands of thecurriculum?

2. What are the student’s current inner resources for meeting those demands?

3. What additional abilities and strategies might the studentacquire that would make processing more effective andefficient?

4. What changes can be made in the curriculum or in the way it istaught to this particular child that would make the informationmore accessible (collaboration and modifications)

Assessment and InterventionFocus on the areas of greatest significance for the student assessing

Areas of significance – contextually based areas that twoor more informants identify as being of primary concernto the child and significant others

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QUALITY (QUALITATIVE) BEFORE QUANTITY (QUANTITATIVE)

Receptive:

Answer ‘what’ questions

Answer ‘what doing’ questions

Answer ‘who’ questions

Answer ‘where’ questions

Answer ‘yes/no’ question

Answer ‘when’ questions

Answer ‘why’ questions

Identify pronouns

Pragmatics:

Respond to joint attention

Follow a point

Track eye gaze

Identify perspectives of others

Talk about the perspectives of others

Consider

Topic Maintenance

Attention to task

Recalling Information

Theory of Mind

Problem Solving

Consequential Thinking

Inference Prediction

HOW ARE YOU DISCUSSING A YOUTH’S SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS

Trouble answering who, what, when, where, why, and how questions – Hierarchy

Difficulty recalling information (remembering) – Processing/ APD

Trouble following directions

Difficulty remaining on topic/task

Difficulty learning and retaining new concepts/information

Difficulty communicating grammatically accurate sentences (verbally or written)

Difficulty explaining/summarizing one’s ideas and/or thoughts

Trouble with processing word problems verbal or written

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ACCESS TO CCD + PERCEIVED DELINQUENCY/INCREASED RISK CHART

You may access similar versions of the chart I referenced in todays lecture by:

1. Purchasing the Doing the “Work” Book (chart in back of book) via: https://the-juvenileforensic-slp.myshopify.com/

2. A version is provided in ASHA Perspectives August 2020 Publication: https://doi.org/10.1044/2020_PERSP-20-0002

CONTACT INFORMATION

Dr. Shameka Stanford, CCC-SLP/L

juvforensicslp@gmail.com

609-568-0358

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