Learning Together · The BRIDGE Community

Learning Together

In my study conducted in Trinidad and Tobago in partnership with UWI-ROYTEC, I asked 40 Caribbean caregivers and educators to complete a knowledge survey about neurodivergence before we started working together. The results stopped me in my tracks.

Not because the knowledge was low. Because the misdiagnosis was so consistent. Across the board, the most deeply held misconception was this one: that neurodivergent behavior is a discipline problem. Not a brain difference, not a developmental difference, or a discipline problem, meaning the child was choosing it. Meaning the parent was enabling it, meaning the answer was more consequences, not more understanding.

By the end of the program, stigma-related beliefs had decreased by 35 percent. The greatest shifts happened specifically around that framing. Parents and educators who had spent years believing their child simply needed more structure or more firmness walked away understanding something fundamentally different: that the behavior they had been trying to manage was a communication they had not yet learned to read.

That shift does not happen through willpower. It happens through knowledge, and knowledge is exactly what you are here to build. This week, we are going deeper into the misdiagnosis pipeline and what it specifically looks like for Black and Caribbean children. Because understanding why the system gets it wrong is the first step to knowing how to advocate when it does.

This content is educational and is not a substitute for individualized clinical assessment, diagnosis, or treatment.

Dr. KC

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Learning Together