Child Study Teams for Emergent Bilingual Students: Professional Practices for Equitable Evaluation

Child Study Teams for Emergent Bilingual Students: Professional Practices for Equitable Evaluation 

Join us for an insightful session on Child Study Teams for Emergent Bilingual (CSTEB) Students and learn how to strengthen equitable evaluation practices. This webinar will explore how to effectively distinguish between language differences and learning disabilities, use language proficiency data to inform decisions, and implement culturally responsive pre-referral strategies.

Participants will gain practical tools to improve referral accuracy, reduce inappropriate special education identification, and support better outcomes for multilingual learners. Ideal for educators, diagnosticians, and school leaders committed to equitable practices and student success. 

Continuing Education Credit:
Participants who attend majority of the live session will be eligible to receive CEUs. Additional details regarding CE credit requirements and documentation will be provided during the webinar

Learning Objectives: 

1) Explain the role of CSTEB teams

2) Analyze language proficiency data

3) Distinguish language difference vs. disability

4) Support culturally responsive referral decisions 

 About the Speaker: 

Elvia Cisneros is a bilingual special education leader with two decades of experience serving emergent bilingual students across general education, special education, and district-level assessment systems. She currently serves as an Assessment Lead in Humble ISD, where she supports and oversees a department of approximately 110 assessment professionals. In this role, she focuses on strengthening district-wide evaluation systems, building evaluator capacity, and ensuring high quality, compliant assessment practices. Her leadership work has included expanding the district’s bilingual evaluation team, developing evaluation processes and quality review systems, and designing diagnostician training and onboarding structures.  

Elvia is passionate about helping districts strengthen their evaluation systems and build confident, well-trained assessment teams. Her work focuses on equipping educators and evaluation teams with practical tools that lead to more accurate identification practices and improved outcomes for students.