Matt Fugate, PhD : Understanding Twice Exceptional Students | Season 7, Episode 1

In this episode, guest Dr. Matt Fugate discusses twice exceptional, or 2E, students. 2E students have been identified as Gifted and Talented along with another diagnosis such as a learning or neurological difference or communication disorder. We were surprised by Matt’s definition of what it means to be twice exceptional, which gave us a new perspective in viewing these students. He also discusses signs a student may qualify as 2E, the benefits of the distinction, and how to support twice exceptional students in the classroom. 

Dr. Matt Fugate is Provost of Bridges Graduate School of Cognitive Diversity in Education. He received his doctorate in Gifted, Creative, and Talented Studies from Purdue University. Previously, Matt worked as an elementary teacher, Gifted Coordinator and Magnet School Coordinator in HISD. His research interests include twice exceptional students and students from underserved populations. He has presented on a variety of topics including the social-emotional needs of twice exceptional students, culturally responsive pedagogy and creativity. Matt is currently President for the Texas Association for Gifted and Talented and was named one of the 22 People to Watch in the neurodiversity movement by 2e Media.

Transcript

Stephanie Landis (00:06):

Hello and welcome to Babbled, a podcast that navigates the world of special education, communication, delays and learning differences. We are your host, Stephanie Landis and Meredith Krummel, and we're certified speech language pathologist who spend our days at The Parish School in Houston helping children find their voices and connect with the world around them.

(00:25):

Gateway Academy is a unique school in Houston, Texas, serving sixth through 12th grade students with academic and social challenges. Gateway's committed to teaching traditional academics while also meeting the social and emotional needs of their students with learning and social differences. Over the last 15 years, their work has been to provide students with opportunities for identity exploration, learning, self-awareness, and practicing self-advocacy, opening a path to personal significance in college, career and community. For more information, visit their website at www.thegatewayacademy.org.

(01:03):

In this episode, guest Matt Fugate discusses twice exceptional or two-e students, meeting children that have been identified as gifted and talented along with another diagnosis such as a learning or neurological difference or a communication disorder. Matt is Provost of Bridges Graduate School of Cognitive Diversity in Education. He received his doctorate in gifted, creative and talented studies from Purdue University. Previously, he worked as an elementary teacher and gifted coordinator in Houston Independent School District. Throughout the episode, Matt gives us a quick definition of what it means to be twice exceptional, which may come as a surprise to many. He also discusses signs a student may qualify as two-e, the benefits of the distinction and ways to support twice exceptional students in the classroom.

(01:53):

Welcome to another episode of Babbled in our new season, we're so excited to kick off this season with Matt Fugate, who is a professor and expert in twice-exceptional students, and we're really excited to learn about that and chat with you today. So welcome.

Matt Fugate (02:09):

Thank you. I'm excited to be here with you and thank you for having me.

Stephanie Landis (02:12):

So twice exceptional is an area that when you say that people either are like yes or they're like, I have no idea what that is. So do you want to give us a little elevator pitch of what is twice exceptional?

Matt Fugate (02:25):

Sure. Twice exceptional is a term used to define students who are gifted and gifted and have some other form of neurodivergence, whether it be ADHD, autism, dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia runs the gambit, but it's that gifted and piece that qualifies as the twice exceptional.

Stephanie Landis (02:51):

What got you into studying and working with twice exceptional students?

Matt Fugate (02:55):

Well, I often joke that I am one-e. I got the ADHD part down solid, missed the gifted part in school, but it was really what really set me down this path was when I was teaching. So before I went into academia, I taught reading language arts here in Houston at the Rice School, and I had an amazing student. I was also the gifted coordinator, and I had an amazing student who was identified in kindergarten when he came to us in kindergarten as gifted, quickly realized he was two-e, and when he got to second grade, he was in my class and I knew I had to find out everything I could to understand who he was as a learner. And so this really started me down my path. And so even in my dissertation, I credited Michael as being my muse who really set me on this path, and I still talk about him to this day. So it's an amazing adventure.

Stephanie Landis (04:00):

Oftentimes I say that the students help me learn just as much as I help the students, and that is a great example of it.

Matt Fugate (04:08):

I used to tell my undergraduate students when I was teaching pre-service teachers that on the first day of class, I would always say, keep this in mind. If you walk out of the classroom at the end of the day and you haven't learned something new from your students, you've probably had a bad day.

Stephanie Landis (04:27):

So on our podcast, we've talked frequently about language disorders, dyslexia, ADHD, but this is the first time we've ever talked about gifted and talented. What qualifies somebody as being gifted and talented?

Matt Fugate (04:40):

Oh, that's the million dollar question.

Stephanie Landis (04:44):

I think a common misconception is that you have to be a straight A or straight A student, and the only way to be gifted is in straight academics. You started reading when you were three, or you can do math in your head. Do you find that that's a common misconception?

Matt Fugate (05:05):

Yes, and I will use myself as an analogy. People will call me doctor, but I'm pretty sure you don't want me to hold a scalpel when you need an operation, right? It's this myth that if you have this broad label of gifted, that must mean you're gifted in everything and that you are sailing along and making straight A's. Those are teacher pleasers, right? Folks out there that are listening to this, I don't have hair now. I always joke that I used to have hair before I started teaching gifted kids. Correlation doesn't imply causation, but I'm, I'm not sure in this case, the straight A teacher pleasers are such a small group of who these gifted kids are. They're complex, they struggle in areas. And sometimes as educators, we may have this mistaken belief that, well, if they're not excelling absolutely in everything every day, then how could they possibly be gifted? And this is the challenge we face when we talk about twice exceptional students because there's a disconnect in people's mind between having a learning or behavioral difference and being gifted. It seems like an oxymoron. How can the two go together? But really it's more common than people realize.

Meredith Krimmel (06:37):

We talk a lot on here, like Stephanie said, about learning differences and communication delays, and we communicate to families how to get those types of diagnoses and where to go if they feel like their child may have a learning difference. If we have a parent listening who thinks, man, creativity, task focus intelligence, that sounds like my kid. Where do you suggest parents go if they have this idea that maybe their child could be gifted or twice exceptional?

Matt Fugate (07:04):

Just like there are tests for neurological differences, there are tests for giftedness. And so in a public school setting, those are readily available provided through districts in private school settings, seeking out the same way. You got diagnoses for neurological differences, seeking out psychologists who specialize in assessments around giftedness can help and clarify this because parents have a hard time seeing the gifted piece too, because they're often so understandably so caught up in the challenges that sometimes it's hard to see the strengths. I remember I was on a flight, this was years actually, I do, it was in 2014 because it was right after, it was literally after I had defended my dissertation and I was flying from Indiana to a conference in Minnesota and I was on a plane. And as much as I'm a talker, I'm not one to talk to people on a plane.

(08:11):

There's something about hurdling through the sky at 35,000 feet that we don't need to have a life story here. I was on the plane and I was sitting next to this woman and she was reading a book, and she looked at me and nodded and smiled and then went back to her book. And I'm like, it's the perfect seatmate. And so I opened up my laptop, I start working on my presentation, and I can see out of my peripheral that she's kind of looking over. And then she said to me, she goes, pardon me, I don't normally talk to people on planes. And in my head I'm like, and I'm the lucky guy today. And so she said, but I have to ask you what is that you're working on? And so I explained to her I was going to be doing a on twice exceptionality, and she said, can you explain that to me?

(08:59):

And I do. I give her a similar definition that we discussed. And she goes, you just described my son, but no one at his school has been able to figure it out. We haven't been able to figure out. I said, tell me about your son. And she tells me, she starts out first thing she said, he's very bright, he's funny, he's witty, but he has these X, Y, Z and goes down this list of challenges. And so after she describes him, I asked her, I said, tell me what the first thing you said about your son was. And she went directly to the challenges. And I said, no, no, no, no. The first thing you told me about was how incredibly bright he was and creative. And so parents get caught up in, and I think same as educators in this fix it mindset and it's not.

(09:51):

And we have to help them understand this is not something to be fixed. It's who these kids are and they have so many incredible gifts and strengths that we have to it. It's incumbent upon us to seek those out and find those and address those in our settings. But when I am talking to schools and districts around the country, and I'm talking about advocacy and professional learning, I always stress you've got to include the parents. Also, the parents have to be involved in this process because they're just as confounded by this as many of our educators are.

Stephanie Landis (10:35):

Yeah, I think that we often feel the same way because we will describe many of our students here as they're bright and they have these challenges, but they also have all of these strengths. And I love that you were talking about approaching, helping support twice exceptional kids from a strength-based approach. How do you do that?

Matt Fugate (10:57):

First, you've got to know who they are. It means talking to your students, finding out who they are, using tools like interests, interest inventories that start to delve into what are their likes, their dislikes, understanding their personality types. So one of the things that we talk a lot about bridges and we through our strength-based assessment lab, we have what the assessment tool we use is called the Suite of Tools. It was developed by Susan Bauman, Robin Sha. And one of the pieces of that assessment is the quick personality indicator. And we talk about, we talk to educators and parents and families about the four personality prototypes and understanding that we all have all four of these personalities, whether it be practical manager, creative problem solver, people, person, and I've just forgotten the fourth personality type, so forgive me. Anyway, we all have these four personality types, but it's to varying degrees.

(12:08):

And so in that understanding the differences that exist and how we work best when I'm very much not a practical manager, it's my lowest degree of personality prototype. But in my job, I know that there are times when I have to be that practical manager, and so I need certain conditions. I need to be in that workspace that blocks off outside distractions and noise so that I can focus and really think I have to dig deep. I'm very much a people person and a creative problem solver. That's a very different environment that I need to be in it. It's all about getting to know your child and understanding who they are. And when I say your child, I'm talking about whether it be your biological child, your adopted child, or the child that you have sitting in your classroom as an educator, you've got to know who they are, know their story, and know who they are beyond the four walls of the classroom.

Meredith Krimmel (13:11):

That sounds like something that would be really beneficial in teaching all children, not just twice exceptional children, just knowing the child there being strengths-based, I mean, can't hurt anybody. Yeah.

Matt Fugate (13:22):

So my good friend Richard Cash years ago said, asked the question, what does GT mean? And the answer is, it just means good teaching. Oftentimes as educators, we tend to work in silos. I am the special education teacher. These are my strategies. You can't have them. You can't see them. I'm the gifted teacher. These are my strategies. You can't have them. You can't see them. I'm the multilingual teacher. These are my strategies. You can't have them. You can't see them. What do we do? And then you've got the general education teacher who's like, well, what am I supposed to do? Right? We need to break down the silos and understand that all of these practices are just good teaching strategies for all kids.

Stephanie Landis (14:09):

So you mentioned special education. Do children who are gifted and talented fall under special education already, or would they only fall under special education once they hit the twice exceptional and have the gifted? And

Matt Fugate (14:23):

In Texas, gifted education does not fall under special education. It is separate in some states. Yes, it does. And this is part of the challenge we face in gifted education is that there is, unlike special education, which through legislation is standardized across the states gifted education, it's a patchwork. You have some states that have a formal definition. I think in the last NAGC state of the states, it was 46 states, I believe, if I'm remembering it might've been 48, who reported having a definition of gifted and talented. But some states require IEPs for students who are identified as gifted. Some states have funding. In Texas, we're very lucky that we have the trifecta in gifted educations world because we have a state definition that requires identification, requires services, and there's funding attached to it. In some states, you may have a mandate for identification and services, but no funding to support that or any level in there.

(15:43):

And so in Texas, we do have the Texas State Plan for gifted and talented education, which outlines best practices. But how that is carried out is left to the various schools and districts at the local level, which again, creates its own unique challenges because for many years in Texas, and Houston's a great example because we have so many districts in the Houston metropolitan area, and for many years you could be gifted in one district in Houston, move a block away, but suddenly you're in a new district and you have to requalify for gifted, right? It's not like special education where it could travel with you. That has been corrected in the new state plan, the recommendation. But again, these are recommendations. It's just, and so it's hard when it is this patchwork, and certainly if a student is to move out of the state into another state, whether or not their gifted label follows them, it depends on the laws and regulations of that state.

Meredith Krimmel (17:02):

So if GT really means good teaching, and if all of our educators, in a perfect world, we're doing all of these things, what are the benefits of being identified as twice exceptional or gifted and talented? What kind of benefits would that provide your child, or what would be your ideal situation of once you get that qualification?

Matt Fugate (17:20):

Yeah, that's a great question, Meredith. We often talk about, so we have an estimate of about 385,000 twice exceptional students in classrooms. We all agree that is a gross underestimate, but it's the best we've got because we don't have a systematic way of identifying students as gifted the way we do for special education. And because that varies from state to state and not everybody's reporting on it. The other challenge to identification is what we call the masking effect. You may have a student who's identified as gifted, but that, and so that giftedness may mask their special education need. So the giftedness is recognized, but special education need goes unrecognized because oh, well, you're gifted. And again, it's that misunderstanding, that disconnect or the students have learned to self compensate for their areas of challenge. You could also have a student who's identified for special education.

(18:30):

The special education masks the giftedness. And so then special education needs are identified, served, but the giftedness isn't. And then the third, and often what I call worst case scenario is when the gifts and the special education needs mask each other, and the student just presents on the surface as average, maybe slightly below average. And so neither is ever recognized and served. And so we have to do a better job of identifying these students because if we're not, we're always leaving part or whole needs out of their services and what we do with them in the classroom. And so I often advocate for schools and teachers. I said, start with your special education students, dig into those files. I'm not one to say, look at the final score because the final score doesn't tell you anything. But what we do know is that on average are twice exceptional students for an average of 10 points lower on tests of cognitive ability than their gifted neurotypical peers.

(19:54):

And so if you're going in there and you see have a student who's scoring in the one 10 to one 20 range, I say, pull that file and start looking at those sub tests because that's where you start to really see where are the extreme discrepancies, where there's very, very high here, but processing is very, very low. That tells you, okay, here's a student I need to look at further. And the same goes for our gifted students. When looking at those assessments, again, we get caught up on this final number, but we don't do enough investigative work to look at how we got there, what are the subtest scores, because that's where the story truly lies.

Meredith Krimmel (20:45):

But do school districts, true school districts have the ability to really dig in and change? Or is it really just a numbers game at that point?

Matt Fugate (20:54):

They have the ability, if they have the will.

(20:57):

I mean, this was one of the things when I was a gifted coordinator that we did, we were looking at, okay, these kids exist. We've got to make sure that we're serving their needs. And so it just takes constant, it takes dedication. I mean, I would work with our dean of students regularly and we would go through data of our students and identify every time we had test a gifted screening time coming around, okay, here are the students that we're going to send invitations out to the families to say, this testing, we're inviting you to take part in this testing for our gifted and talented programs. It's not easy. It takes a lot of work, but it's important.

Stephanie Landis (21:52):

It's

Matt Fugate (21:52):

Important to do

Stephanie Landis (21:54):

For parents. You mentioned the three areas that you look at for qualifying a student for giftedness. Can you give an example of what a student might look like in this area that would tip a parent off for like, oh, they are actually a really creative kid, or, oh, they're task management. They're doing well on this. What does that look like?

Matt Fugate (22:16):

So when we talk about the three ring conception of giftedness, it's not something that you can necessarily pin down with a psychometric assessment because it is about the convergence of this. And so it's about what you see a lot of times when we're talking about gifted behaviors. And so this is where that talent development focus really comes into play. And creativity is one of those things that we have to help parents understand what we mean when we say creativity. Because as humans, when you ask somebody to define creativity, nine times out of 10, they're going to talk about performing arts, visual arts, painting, drawing, acting, singing, creativity is so much more than that. It's about finding those areas where kids are expressing those divergent thinking skills, the fluency, the flexibility, elaboration, originality of ideas within a specific context. And so there's creativity in math. There's creativity in language arts in teaching.

(23:34):

And so we've got to break out of the stereotypical, what do we mean by creativity and see that a kid who may struggle, a kid who struggles in reading language arts may excel in mathematics. And so where do you see the task commitment, the above average ability and the creativity? It may not be in language arts, but it's over here in math. And so it's again, flipping the paradigm from a deficit perspective to a strength-based perspective. It's where are you seeing the strengths so that you can know where to leverage that and pull it into the work you do on a daily basis?

Stephanie Landis (24:18):

I really appreciate the definition of the creativity because oftentimes, myself included, when I think of creativity, my brain first goes to art and I'm like, well, I am not creative. But I do find that sometimes I am very good at problem solving, thinking out of the box, having divergent ideas, and that is totally different from asking me to develop a dance. You don't want to see that,

Matt Fugate (24:42):

Right? I'll say, don't ask me to draw my stick. People look funny. But there is creativity in the work that I do because it is passionate. It's a passion for me. And that's what it drills down to when we're talking about creativity in this context, is not just strength and interest, but passion. And that is the task commitment piece that we're talking about. It's that passion and focus of, I want to dig in. It's interesting because we talk a lot about perfectionism and procrastination for a lot of times for our two-e kids, yes, those things can exist, but when it's in an area of strength and talent, what can sometimes appear as procrastination is really a need for incubation first and foremost. And the same goes for instances of perfectionism. If a student's in an area of intense interest, of intense passion that perfectionism can sometimes really dissipate because they're so focused on it, it becomes, that's where you see the risk taking come into their pursuits, right? They're willing to take those risks. And if something doesn't work, well, that was a lesson learned. I'm going to try something different. So in that case, these things become learning opportunities. And so again, it's about finding those strengths, passions and interests, and really being able to bring that into focus.

Meredith Krimmel (26:27):

See, so much crossover between giftedness and ADHD, the task focus, the hyper focus, the passion. I mean, you see a lot of some of the same things,

Matt Fugate (26:40):

And in truth though, it's not. Yes, there a lot of overlap in this discussion between giftedness and ADHD, but we see it in our gifted kids who are autistic. We see it in our gifted kids who have dyscalculia. We see it across the spectrum of learning differences. And so it's really important to recognize that when I was doing my dissertation work, I was really bothered by the whole, and again, I was specifically looking at, and most of my work looks at giftedness in ADHD, but I was bothered by the whole gifted and ADHD piece because the deficit disorder was still in the conversation. And so I started playing with it, and I came up with A DHG attention, divergent, hyperactive giftedness to really highlight that there are strengths and unique interests. And what I've come to learn over the years is ADHD isn't reserved just for our gifted ADHD students. It really does speak to the broader population of our twice exceptional students. It's about finding those areas where they are focused and interested and amazed. And when they find that, and when we preach to that and teach to that, then that hyperactive giftedness really kicks in. And that all goes back to finding above average ability, task commitment, and creativity in that convergence for creative behaviors. It all falls into that same category for our two-e students.

Stephanie Landis (28:26):

So if you have a two-e student in your classroom and you don't want to lose your hair to try and find ways to support them, do you have any suggestions that parents can bring into teachers or teachers could start using to help differentiate to support those students?

Matt Fugate (28:43):

So when I was in the classroom, and again, this goes to all students, but the first I would give, give homework on the first day of class, and the homework was always for the parents, send me a letter, tell me about your child, something I'm not going to know. Tell me what they love to do outside of school. Tell me what their favorite food is, what their favorite activities are. And so tell me the good things about your kid that I may not know because I only know them in the context of the school building. So that was always the first place for me to start. And what was amazing was I would get probably about an 80% or higher return on those letters. And oftentimes somewhere in that letter would be, no one's ever asked me this before. And so that's the first step to getting to know who they are, because from there then you can bring in the ways to understand how do I begin to differentiate to meet their needs.

(29:53):

And then it's about bringing in, again, understanding their personalities, looking at the environment we've created in our classrooms. Are we creating an environment that supports their intellectual needs, their social needs, their emotional needs, and their physical needs and their creative needs, those five pillars of what should be involved in the learning environment, and are we doing this for all of our kids? My classroom was one that I lovingly called controlled chaos furniture, the tables, the chairs, those were convenient places for us to keep stuff while we were under the tables or in the computer lab or in the library or whatever we were doing, learning and understanding how our kids learn best. I had a mom who came up to me for the meet the teacher night one year, and that's when the class list would be revealed. And she came up, she's like, oh, Matt, I was so glad to see my son was in your classroom.

(31:00):

If you teach him one thing this year, please teach him how to sit down in his seat. And I said, well, you better go talk to the principal and see if you can get a room change. I don't care if he sit his seat. I knew this kid again, I had been working with him since kindergarten because he was identified in kindergarten as gifted. He was a bouncer. He was standing at his table on the balls of his feet bouncing, but you know what else he was doing, working and being productive. That was how he needed that movement to be able to think. And so it's just as simple as that is. Those are the places to begin to understand then bringing in the art and craft and creativity of teaching of then I can use this information to differentiate in the right way for my kids. But just like I said at the beginning, you got to talk to the kids. You got to talk to the families too.

Stephanie Landis (31:54):

Yeah, compliance really doesn't always equal learning.

Matt Fugate (31:57):

No, no.

Stephanie Landis (32:03):

Because worked in the classroom with some lovely children that would sit and smile and nod and stay quiet, but they were off in their own. They were thinking about something else and other kids who have been moving and going, and they were just engaged and on it. And so I had to differentiate and know that I could not just guarantee that because that child was sitting there that they were learning and just because that child was moving around, they weren't learning. And it's a fun game.

Matt Fugate (32:33):

Yeah. And I'll tell you where the challenge comes in A is for our twice exceptional girls. And just to your point, Stephanie, because what we often see is our girls have been socialized from a very young age, starting early in kindergarten and preschool. Well, that's not how young ladies behave. And the boys kind of get a pass because boys will be boys. And so it really prevents a challenge in identifying our twice exceptional girls because they sitting there and it's like, Meredith is, I am on fire today. Meredith is hanging on my every word. Look at her. She's got her eyes straight to me. And Meredith hasn't heard a single word I've said, but physically she's learned that I have to do this, look straight ahead and look at my teacher at all times. But I'm thinking about what am I going to do at lunch? Who am I going to talk to? Where am I going after school or the fight I had with my friend before I got into class? And so again, this goes to that whole stereotype that we have of what a gifted student looks like. The same goes for our two-e students. We have this stereotype of what behaviors we should be seeing, and that's just not reality.

Stephanie Landis (34:04):

Instead of being like, oh, they're so well behaved, they couldn't have ADHD or twice acceptable, they're only gifted and then they're missing out on those other supports. It does work in the opposite way as well. Yeah, I could see that.

Meredith Krimmel (34:17):

I can totally see how one can mask the other, especially in girls. I mean, just identifying girls as ADHD or learning differences harder alone than to diagnose boys. So

Matt Fugate (34:29):

It's a challenge. And so it just takes things like this, things like your podcast and working with parents and teachers and the students so that they have a better understanding of who they are. And I'll tell you, one of the things that constantly comes up in the research and the work we've done at Bridges is that as students start to become more aware, self-aware of who they are as a whole learner as being gifted, we talk about it twice exceptional. One of the things that we always emphasize is that these kids are gifted first. And so giving them that power and that permission to see themselves as gifted has a tremendous effect on their self-esteem and their resiliency and their self-determination. It has these positive effects, but there's no magic pill for that. It takes time, especially because a lot of these kids and a lot of their families have spent so much time fighting the system that to build that trust up takes a lot of time. There's a lot to repair. And so the more we can make teachers and families aware that these kids exist, that they're out there, the sooner we can start to and hopefully prevent that damage from happening from the very beginning.

Stephanie Landis (36:13):

So for parents who are trying to advocate for their students that they feel like this might be their child, other than getting the identification, what would you say their first step is?

Matt Fugate (36:23):

The first step is to learn to seek out information to Joe Zuli. I talked about Joe Zuli and Sally Reese. They have a tremendous book. It's been out for a few years now, but I still always recommended it to parents. It was written specifically for parents, light Up your child's Mind, a tremendous resource to begin looking at Susan Baum and Robin Shader and Steven Owen's book to be Gifted and Learning Disabled a tremendous resource, looking at the book misdiagnosis, learning about what does two-e look like and seeing that, and don't be afraid to reach out to people like me. I just last week got an email from someone I've never met before who happened to read an article that I was quoted in who was like, tell me more. We are here. We want to help. And so don't be shy. You are your child's first and best line of defense and your child better than any test or any educational system. And so empower yourself with the knowledge so that you can go out there and be that advocate. Because look, reality is you're going to face some roadblocks, but it's just about not giving up because at the end of the day, we've got to do what's best for the kids.

Stephanie Landis (37:59):

I feel like that fits so many families that we work with. They advocate so much on every different level. And I think I really like about your perspective too, is that we're not just advocating to get any deficits fixed. We're also advocating to build on the strengths and the things that they already have. As such positives within that so that we're looking at them holistically, and we can work with those strengths. And sometimes it's hard to then advocate for the strengths because we're so over here focusing and helping, supporting the areas that are difficult. So I'm hoping that that makes parents feel both empowered and encouraged.

Matt Fugate (38:40):

Definitely. Definitely. It's important. It's important work. Yeah. I've loved in the last few weeks learning about the work that you all are doing at the parish school because you really are the embodiment of what we're talking about here, doing this and taking this approach. Yes, today we're talking in the context of our gifted twice exceptional kids. But again, going back to that idea of this is just good for all of our kids, and so understanding that, and you all are living that work every day, so thank you for that. That's important and powerful. And you're giving parents that knowledge that they need to understand and again, look at their kids differently.

Stephanie Landis (39:32):

Yeah, that's one of our founder's goals was to just to see each child and let each child be known and for their strengths and areas and to support them. And as a parent myself, the best thing that a person can do that's working with my child is to see them,

Meredith Krimmel (39:52):

Get them to

Stephanie Landis (39:53):

Understand, to get them. So I appreciate so much of your time and all of your knowledge. We do have one final question that we ask everyone. If you had one piece of advice to give to the listeners, and it can be on this topic or just any topic in general, but if you had any piece of advice, what would you give?

Matt Fugate (40:10):

Oh, right now, in this day and age, go out and celebrate your educators and your teachers. They need it. Right now, education is getting a bad rap, and it's not just limited to public education. There is a lack of understanding. So just go out and just walk up to your teacher and say, thank you. Thank you for all you do. That's my piece of advice to parents right now.

Meredith Krimmel (40:41):

That's great advice. I mean, our teachers spend so much time with our children. So many of their waking hours are spent at school with their teachers, and they make huge impacts on our kids' lives. So definitely, I think sometimes we forget just how impactful and important they are. So I love that advice. That's good.

Stephanie Landis (41:02):

Thank you. Thank you so much. I appreciate all of this and have learned a lot myself, and I'm ready to start looking at the students that I work with differently and speak with the families differently. And so I think this will impact a lot of people. So I appreciate it.

Matt Fugate (41:18):

Thank you so much for having me today.

Meredith Krimmel (41:21):

Thank you for listening to the Unbabbled Podcast. For more information on today's episode, please see our episode description. For more information on the parish school, visit parish school.org. If you're not already, don't forget to subscribe to the Unbabbled Podcast on your app of choice. And if you like what you're hearing, be sure to leave a rating and review. A special thank you to Joanna Rissmiller and Mackey Torres for all their hard work behind the scenes. Thanks again for listening.