protection and funding is viable for the bilingual child with a learning disability? In other words, under what classification scheme does such a child fall; who attends to his/her needs; and how are these needs best met? This is the crux of the problem, and our common sense and some of the students whom this author has accounted in the classroom indicate that there are children who have both types of "handicaps" a learning disability and a language disability. Yet, there is a paucity of data on such children. Part of this is due to our inability to clearly differentiate doubly disabled students from the larger, single-disability groups. In fact, no guidelines have been established that would enable educators to arrive at a consensus identification of a bilingual, learning-disabled student. According to Langdon (1983), with the exception of two articles, "There is almost no reference in the literature as to what constitutes a language disorder in a bilingual youngster."Clearly, our legislative and governing bodies have taken note of the peculiar difficulties encountered by learning disabled, bilingual students. Similarly, the public schools, principals, teachers, parents, volunteers, translators and other decision-makers have involved themselves in what evidences as a particularly complex problem. At the same time, it is the view of this author that only a deeper scrutinization of the difficulties encountered by this specialized group as well as the related complexities and components of the issues will yield a satisfactory assessment. To this extent, a deeper understanding of the demographic makeup as well as the linguistic difficulties reflected by this exceptional group will prove to be most representative of the directions which should be pursued in assessing bilingual special-education issues. In the final analysis, assessment must be considered within the light or context of specific and fundamental components, including purpose;...
