Category Archives: Uncategorized

No Limits in My Life

By Elizabeth Rouse, Central College Class of 2020

Note:
October 12 is World Sight Day and October 15 is White Cane Safety Day / Blind Awareness Day

Elizabeth Rouse

Elizabeth Rouse

Elizabeth Rouse is a 19-year-old sophomore at Central College in Pella, Iowa. She is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in English with the intention of attending law school in the fall of 2020. In her free time, Elizabeth participates in Bridge Club, belongs to the sorority Zeta Upsilon, and volunteers as a YoungLife leader in her local high school community. 

When I was about five-months-old, my daycare provider noticed I was not tracking things with my eyes in a way that was similar to other babies my age. After a visit to my pediatrician that led to a visit to a genetic specialist at the University of Iowa, my parents discovered that I have Leber’s Congenital Amaurosis (LCA), a genetic disease that stopped the rods from forming in my eyes. This recessive genetic disease is not common. About 3,000 people in the country have it. My vision is 20/400 in both eyes, and it is something that cannot be corrected with glasses. The “cure” is genetic replacement therapy. Being legally blind has proven to be a challenge, but my parents never allowed me to use it as an excuse to sit on the sidelines. They pushed me to excel in everything I chose to do, and they helped me and others who supported me to succeed.

In elementary school, my accommodations were simple. Verbalizing by the teacher, brailled calendars, and other classroom items supported my participation in classroom activities, and, of course, I used a white cane in the hallways. I had a paraprofessional, a wonderful woman named Bonnie, who learned braille and went to trainings to best support my needs and those of my teacher. Over the years, my friends and classmates got used to my needs and pretty much got out of my way in the hallway, limiting the use of my cane indoors. This helped me feel much more like the other students. I am very grateful that my school was small enough to allow me to get to know everyone and create such a level of comfort and success.

In middle school, the challenges began to come more frequently as the curriculum got harder and travel became more a part of my daily experience. My paraprofessional continued to support my needs but in a different way. She went to my classes with me to help me learn how to develop specific skills, such as taking notes. Additionally, class materials, such as quizzes, written up by teachers ahead of time, were sent to be brailled by the Iowa Department of the Blind library services. Any materials needing to be brailled that could not be planned ahead of time were transcribed on sight by my paraprofessional.

My textbooks were also available in braille, but these presented a challenge in and of themselves. Because braille takes up a ridiculous amount of space, a normal sized textbook for history or science could be anywhere from 25 to 40 volumes in braille. This made carting my materials from class to class a bit more difficult. The administration in my school allowed me a rolling backpack to lessen the stress on my back. Additionally, I was given a bigger locker than most of the other students to compensate for my larger amount of materials. While I did not want to use my white cane, I found I had to use it to get used to traveling in the middle school as well as let others know of my presence. Eventually, I was able to use it infrequently, as I had done in elementary school.

When I started high school, I was terrified. As I have an older brother, I knew some of the classes I would have to take would be a bit difficult. I am forever grateful to the teachers I had my freshman year as they made my transition to and experience in high school much less stressful. I specifically remember having a biology teacher who went above and beyond to make sure I was included in the learning experience just as much as the other students in my class. The teachers and I learned how to learn together in many ways. Flash drives for exchanging content and assignments became an important tool for us.

Additionally, I was a bit nervous about extracurricular activities. Most of my friends were athletes, but I could not participate in volleyball, basketball, or other fast-paced sports. However, this caused me to seek participation in other activities. Throughout high school, I was an avid member of the choir and theatrical programs in my school. I led my team in a battle of the books club competition, and I was the president of Family, Career and Community Leaders of America. I was super stoked my sophomore year when I decided to become a member of the wrestling cheerleading squad and found much success.

I graduated in 2016 valedictorian of my class and received multiple high-value scholarships to different universities. I chose Central College in Pella, Iowa. As a sophomore, I could not ask for a better place for me to earn my undergraduate degree. I plan to major in English with minors in theatre and religion. My long-term plan is to go to law school.

What I have learned in my life is that the only limits I have are those I put on myself and there is nothing embarrassing about asking for help. My journey so far has helped me understand that achieving greatness is not tied to my gender, race, socioeconomic status, or any accommodation I may have gotten in order for me to have a level playing field. Greatness is achieved because of effort and discipline. Those come from my own desire to be the best at what I choose to do, vision excluded.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read my blog post. If I could teach everyone in the world one thing, I would like to project that just because a person has some limitation that is out of their control does not mean they are less of a person. Given the right tools and supportive people who want to see them succeed, the possibilities are limitless.

Blog articles provide insights on the activities of schools, programs, grantees, and other education stakeholders to promote continuing discussion of educational innovation and reform. Articles do not endorse any educational product, service, curriculum or pedagogy.

Posted by
Central College Class of 2020

Understanding Teachers Make “All the Difference” for a High School Student with Dyslexia

Note: October is Learning Disabilities/Dyslexia/Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) Awareness Month.

Carter Grace Duncan

Carter Grace Duncan

Carter Grace Duncan is a freshman in a Northern Virginia public high school. She is a youth advocate for Decoding Dyslexia Virginia who enjoys sharing her knowledge with students with disabilities about how accommodations in school can help create a pathway to academic success.

A teacher can make the difference between a good day and a bad one.

Actually, they can make or break a child’s entire school year by understanding what accommodations in a 504 plan or an individualized education program (IEP) can do to help a person like me who works everyday to overcome the impact of dyslexia, dysgraphia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

I think I am lucky to have been surrounded by teachers who worked hard to make sure I was able to be as successful as my peers.

I have had a 504 plan since the fourth grade. It’s supported me through elementary school, middle school and now into high school.

At the beginning of the year, I introduce myself and my accommodations through email. I think it’s important for my teachers to know why I benefit from something that most of the other kids in my class don’t use. The game changers for me include:

  1. Extra time
    Dyslexia makes me read slowly and work hard to decode words. This means that it takes me more time to take tests. Knowing that I can work hard and answer the questions correctly at my own pace is very helpful for me. I would like to be able to show my teacher what I know.
  2. Read on demand
    Reading and spelling are harder for me than my classmates. I can decode almost any word after my remediation; it just takes me some time to do it if it’s a harder word. If I am really stuck, I would like to ask for help to have the word or phrase read to me. It makes me way more comfortable in class to know that if I get stuck, my teacher will know that I really need the help.
  3. Small group testing
    It helps to be on my own or in a smaller group. If I am taking a test with the class I might get to the third question and someone next to me is finished with the test because they can read it faster. I’d like to be able to focus on the content and do my best.
  4. Technology
    I use my iPad to ear read (text to speech) everything I can. Eye reading is tiring for me. Sometimes, I use an app to change a handout to a readable PDF and then ear read it, if I need to. Normally, I just eye read the handouts. My iPad also has an app that will let me record the classroom lecture, if I need it. I don’t access the curriculum exactly like my peers, but the system in place right now works really well for me.
  5. Teacher notes
    I am dysgraphic, too. That means it is hard for me to put my thoughts onto paper quickly. I learn best by listening to the teacher first and then practicing what I have learned. It is very hard for me to listen and copy things from the board or write things down as the teacher is talking. I take notes, but I miss a lot. The teacher’s notes help me make sure that I don’t miss anything when I am studying.
  6. Advanced notice when called on to read in class
    This accommodation makes me feel comfortable in class. It feels terrible if I think I might be called on to read out loud without knowing what I am going to read. If my teacher wants me to read something, they’ll just tell me the night before and I will practice first. I am a good reader now, but I still get nervous when I have to read out loud. Messing up on a word like ‘began’ feels really bad in a classroom full of my classmates. That’s what dyslexia will do to me.

With the help of my parents, my teachers and my accommodations, I’ve created a successful learning environment for myself. Because I need to work very hard to achieve the academic success I’ve had, I don’t take anything for granted. I appreciate my teachers who have made an effort to understand me and my accommodations.

Teachers really do make all the difference!

Blog articles provide insights on the activities of schools, programs, grantees, and other education stakeholders to promote continuing discussion of educational innovation and reform. Articles do not endorse any educational product, service, curriculum or pedagogy.

Carter Grace Duncan
Posted by
A freshman in a Northern Virginia public high school and a youth advocate for Decoding Dyslexia Virginia

“Voices from the Field” Interview with Wendy Lewis Jackson,
Kresge Foundation’s Detroit Program

Wendy Lewis Jackson, Managing Director at the Kresge Foundation’s Detroit Program

Wendy Lewis Jackson,
Managing Director at the Kresge Foundation’s Detroit Program

Wendy Lewis Jackson is managing director for the Detroit Program at the Kresge Foundation. She co-leads the Foundation’s efforts to revitalize Detroit and to strengthen its social and economic fabric. Her work supports organizations providing economic opportunity for low-income people and addresses the needs of vulnerable children and families. Prior to joining Kresge in 2008, Wendy was a program director for Children and Family Initiatives and executive director for education initiatives at the Grand Rapids Community Foundation in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She taught at Grand Valley State University in Allendale, Michigan, and has co-authored and assisted in the publication of several reports and publications that address community needs and problem solving.

ED: How did you begin your career in Early Learning?

Wendy: My educational background is in political science and social policy. My career in philanthropy began at the Heart of West Michigan United Way in Grand Rapids, Michigan where I served as a senior associate responsible for grants in the areas of health, community development, and human services. From the United Way system I began working with the Grand Rapids Community Foundation. My professional focus has been to address issues that affect vulnerable children and families. In particular, how philanthropy can be used to change the trajectory of children’s lives by providing comprehensive supports to families and communities and ensure economic stability. My work over the years has included early childhood, child welfare, and K-12 education reform. My work in Detroit at the Kresge Foundation continues these themes with an emphasis on early childhood development and learning.

ED: What efforts have you and your organization been involved in to improve the quality of early learning?

Wendy: The Kresge Foundation is a national foundation that works to expand opportunities in America’s cities through grantmaking and social investing in arts and culture, education, environment, health, human services, and community development in Detroit. In my role at Kresge, I work to advance tangible and sustainable near- and long-term progress in Detroit. The Detroit program is the Foundation’s largest grantmaking area and we make approximately $30 million in grants each year to advance opportunity and quality of life. About four years ago, we began thinking more holistically about areas of emphasis in Detroit that could improve economic opportunity and reduce inequality. Early childhood became the major focus of our work. In 2016, Kresge launched the Kresge Early Years for Success Initiative (KEYS: Detroit), a five-year, $20 million grant, with the goal to build and improve early childhood systems in the city of Detroit. Within this initiative, the major agenda is to help the city of Detroit get traction to increase quality and to expand access for young children in early childhood programs.

KEYS: Detroit has five components.

  1. The first involves investments in new high-quality early childhood centers in the city. Through a gap analysis and needs assessment on Detroit’s early childhood system, conducted by the Midwest-based nonprofit IFF, we found there is a lack of 24,000 high-quality early childhood seats based on the number of children and their families in need of high-quality early childhood options. We are working to expand the number of seats by (1) investing in up to three new early childhood centers and (2) supporting IFF’s efforts to launch a new grant and loan program in Detroit to improve existing facilities. These grants and loans come with technical assistance to enhance quality.
  2. The second component is a partnership with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, called Hope Starts Here, to help the city of Detroit develop its first strategic framework for early childhood development and learning. Through the Hope Starts Here partnership we set out to engage 50,000 families to learn (1) what families with young children need and (2) how the city can improve its approach to early childhood development and education. We’re using the data collected from these community stakeholders to develop Hope Starts Here recommendations that will be released in fall 2017.
  3. The third component is establishing grant programs for Detroit neighborhoods. This program has not been launched yet, but it is planned to be a new opportunity for local leaders to work on early childhood initiatives within their communities.
  4. The fourth component is related to social investment. We are fortunate at Kresge to have tremendous social investment expertise. We are looking at innovative financial means beyond grant making to be able to provide other financial opportunities for those working in the early childhood space.
  5. Our last component is around field-building—meaning, making investments at the local, state, and national levels for improving data collection, advocacy, and research in early childhood.

We believe that the five components we are investing in will help Detroit’s youngest learners and ultimately have a positive impact on improving opportunities in the city.

ED: What are some of the challenges you have experienced in this work and what strategies have you tried to overcome them? 

Wendy: A major challenge that I have experienced is ensuring better coordination of existing programs. We completed a mapping exercise in Detroit to get a handle on the number of programs supporting young children and their families. We identified over 400 programs that support young children in some way, but they were not working in alignment with the same North Star. This fragmented approach is a huge challenge, but we are trying to capitalize on all of these efforts in early childhood.

Another challenge in Detroit is that many of the facilities that house early childhood programs are in substantial need of quality improvement. Families and their children should be able to receive services with dignity, starting with a building that fosters development and education. KEYS: Detroit is designed to put the necessary building blocks in place to have high-quality early childhood programs. In other communities, they start initiatives with bold goals, such as 90 percent of all young children will be able to access high-quality early childhood programs. In Detroit, there are so many fundamental things that need to be in place before we can begin to think of these goals. So setting up the fundamental structures is what KEYS is designed to do.

ED: What suggestions do you have for others interested in expanding access to high-quality early learning opportunities?  

Wendy: One suggestion is to not lead with the money. Really engage stakeholders and the community from the beginning, get a handle on what the needs are from various perspectives, and then develop a framework and solutions to address them. A community’s engagement is critical and fundamental to addressing its needs. Mobilizing families to become involved and help address the needs of their communities has been a critical element of the efforts in Detroit. A simple way of saying it—you need stakeholders and you need a plan!

Blog articles provide insights on the activities of schools, programs, grantees, and other education stakeholders to promote continuing discussion of educational innovation and reform. Articles do not endorse any educational product, service, curriculum or pedagogy.

Wendy Lewis Jackson, Managing Director at the Kresge Foundation
Posted by
Managing Director at the Kresge Foundation

Extension of Comment Period: ED Regulatory Reform

The Department is extending the public comment period for 30 days—
please comment on or before: September 20, 2017

On June 22, 2017, U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos released a statement on the Department’s Regulatory Reform Task Force’s first progress report as required by President Donald Trump’s Executive Order 13777. The Department also published a Federal Register notice to provide members of the public the opportunity to submit comments concerning regulations and policy guidance they recommend the Department repeal, replace or modify.

On August 11, 2017, the Department published a Federal Register notice extending the public comment period for 30 days, until September 20, 2017.

REGULATION AND POLICY DOCUMENTS:

  • The Department’s regulations are codified in subtitles A and B of title 34 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), which are available in electronic format at the Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (e-CFR) Website:

DATE:

Comments must be received on or before September 20, 2017.

SUBMISSIONS:

What To Submit

The Department requests that commenters be as specific as possible by:

  • providing a Federal Register (FR) or CFR citation when referencing a specific regulation or, where practicable, a link when referencing a particular guidance document;
  • including any supporting data or other applicable information;
  • providing specific suggestions regarding repeal, replacement, or modification; and
  • explaining with specificity why the referenced regulation or guidance should be repealed, replaced, or modified.

Wherever possible, please list the citations to the specific regulatory sections or titles of guidance documents to which your comments pertain in a subject line or otherwise at the beginning of your comments. We are particularly interested in regulatory provisions that you find unduly costly or unnecessarily burdensome. Although we will not respond to individual comments, the Department values public feedback and will give careful consideration to all input that we receive. Individual program offices of the Department will also be conducting outreach on this same topic.

How To Submit

Submit your comments through:

  • Via postal mail, commercial delivery, or hand delivery. If you mail or deliver your comments in response to this request, address them to:

Hilary Malawer
400 Maryland Avenue, SW., Room 6E231
Washington, DC 20202

We will not accept comments by fax or email. To ensure that we do not receive duplicate copies, please submit your comments only once. In addition, please include the Docket ID—ED-2017-OS-0074—at the top of your comments.

ED Regulatory Reform Task Force Progress Report and a Request for Comments

U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos released a statement on the Department’s Regulatory Reform Task Force’s first progress report as required by President Donald Trump’s Executive Order 13777. The Department has also published a Federal Register notice to provide members of the public the opportunity to submit comments concerning regulations and policy guidance they recommend the Department repeal, replace or modify.

REGULATION AND POLICY DOCUMENTS:

  • The Department’s regulations are codified in subtitles A and B of title 34 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), which are available in electronic format at the Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (e-CFR) Website:
  • Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS) Guidance Documents:

DATE:

We must receive your comments no later than August 21, 2017.

SUBMISSIONS:

What To Submit

The Department requests that commenters be as specific as possible by:

  • Providing a Federal Register (FR) or CFR citation when referencing a specific regulation or, where practicable, a link when referencing a particular guidance document;
  • including any supporting data or other applicable information;
  • providing specific suggestions regarding repeal, replacement, or modification; and
  • explaining with specificity why the referenced regulation or guidance should be repealed, replaced, or modified.

Wherever possible, please list the citations to the specific regulatory sections or titles of guidance documents to which your comments pertain in a subject line or otherwise at the beginning of your comments. We are particularly interested in regulatory provisions that you find unduly costly or unnecessarily burdensome. Although we will not respond to individual comments, the Department values public feedback and will give careful consideration to all input that we receive. Individual program offices of the Department will also be conducting outreach on this same topic.

How To Submit

Submit your comments through the Federal eRulemaking Portal or via postal mail, commercial delivery, or hand delivery. We will not accept comments by fax or email. To ensure that we do not receive duplicate copies, please submit your comments only once. In addition, please include the Docket ID [ED-2017-OS-0074] at the top of your comments.

Federal eRulemaking Portal:
Go to www.regulations.gov to submit your comments electronically. Information on using Regulations.gov, including instructions for accessing agency documents, submitting comments, and viewing the docket is available on the site under the “Help” tab.

Mail:
If you mail or deliver your comments in response to this request, address them to:

Hilary Malawer
400 Maryland Avenue, SW., Room 6E231
Washington, DC 20202

Voices from the Field Interview with Kelly Bentley, Michigan Department of Education

“Family engagement shouldn’t be a box to
check or a step in the process,
it is crucial to the work.”

Kelly Bentley

Kelly Bentley

Kelly Bentley joined the Michigan Department of Education in June, 2015 as the Project Manager for the Early Learning Challenge grant. She is responsible for leading cross-agency efforts to provide high quality early learning and development opportunities for children age birth to five. She works in close partnership with the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, the Early Childhood Investment Corporation, and the Michigan Association for the Education of Young Children implementing a range of activities within the grant, such as leading innovative efforts around family engagement. Prior to working for state government, Kelly spent over 15 years working with children and families, including as an administrator of a non-profit organization providing mentoring opportunities for disadvantaged children and youth.

Note to readers: Given the importance of high quality early learning opportunities for young children with disabilities, OSERS will periodically highlight voices from the broader field of early learning in our blog.

ED: How did you begin your career in early learning/early childhood?

Kelly: I am relatively new to the early childhood field. I graduated from college with a degree in counseling and knew that working with children and families was my primary interest. I had the opportunity to work with adjudicated youth and their families and with Big Brothers/Big Sisters as a case manager. After a few years under my belt I saw there were larger issues causing these families to struggle. Gradually I moved more into administration and became interested in systems change and the school to prison pipeline, and went back to school to earn my Master’s in Social Work (MSW). Through my MSW program, I interned at the Michigan Department of Education, focusing on issues related to suspension and expulsion, including the development of social emotional learning standards for the state. Through all of my experiences I grew to believe that it is so critical to intervene early with at-risk children and struggling families. Our systems and programs are set up to be so reactive; instead we need to shift our attention and invest more in prevention. That is why I believe focusing on high quality early learning opportunities is so important. There is a direct tie between early childhood experiences and whether kids are proficient in reading by the end of third grade.

ED: Why do you and your state believe that family engagement is so important in early learning/early childhood?

Kelly: The Michigan Department of Education has a goal of our public education system becoming one of the top 10 educational systems in the country within 10 years. Family engagement is a core component of the strategy for getting us there. Our Office of Great Start, which is our early learning office within Michigan’s Department of Education, has a long history of emphasizing the importance of family engagement. One of our core values is that families are primary to all children’s growth and development, so family engagement has always been central to our work. We’ve had a long history of engaging stakeholders, including providers and families, in every aspect of our work and the various programs we oversee. Family engagement is part of the culture of our office and we’ve had strong leadership that values promoting meaningful family engagement for early learning programs, and ensures we are being intentional with engaging families in the work at the state level.

ED: What are the strategies your state is using to promote family engagement in early learning? Have you experienced any challenges to implementing these strategies?

Kelly: We look for multiple opportunities to engage our stakeholders, including families. We have an advisory council that meets regularly and helps to guide our work, and this council includes families. An instrumental report, Great Start, Great Investment, Great Future: The Plan for Early Learning and Development in Michigan, was developed in 2013 with significant input from stakeholders, including parents with young children, and this has been foundational to our comprehensive state plan for early learning and development.

Michigan has helped develop an infrastructure to gather meaningful input from the field, and also to promote the importance of family engagement at the local level—we have 54 local Great Start Collaboratives that are connected to intermediate school districts and include one or more Great Start Parent Coalitions. These have been in place the last 10 years! The parent voices have been critical to the local Great Start Collaboratives and ensure strong Great Start Parent Coalitions. As part of the the launch of the Parent Coalitions, parent liaisons from the Great Start Collaboratives worked specifically with community parents of children birth to kindergarten entry to identify ways to improve their community.

More recently, through funding from the Early Learning Challenge grant, we are developing “Trusted Advisors.” The 60 statewide Parent Coalitions can apply for $5,000–$60,000 (depending on the strategies they propose) to work with their local community and to identify Trusted Advisors—individuals who are connected to local families and may have inroads to help reach the hard to reach families. In their applications, Parent Coalitions are looking at their local data to identify their high risk populations, asking who are the families that aren’t connected to our early learning efforts?, what are the community’s strengths?, and what’s already in place that we can build on and engage these families in meaningful ways both in the learning and development of their young children and in the local early learning programs? We believe that relying on the local communities to generate strategies for how to engage the hardest to reach families will be the key. We know that trust is so important, so if we can identify the right individuals or organizations in a community to help us reach families, we will be much more successful. We are also in the process of hiring eight “Family Engagement Consultants” that will be trained in the Strengthening Families™ approach. These consultants will be available to early learning programs and will provide training, tools and techniques for improving family engagement. These consultants are starting with parent and community cafés (invited gatherings) for some of our unlicensed providers (family, friends or neighbors enrolled to receive our child care subsidy) helping them to build partnerships with families.

Another effort we have underway is working collaboratively with Michigan’s Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) to ensure that their Pathways to Potential Success Coaches (eligibility specialists placed in schools) are trained to understand the importance of family engagement, and to view families from a strengths-based approach. The Success Coaches are on the front lines working with families to determine if they are eligible for various social programs, including the child care subsidy. They often don’t have backgrounds in family-centered services but because of their important role, they have the opportunity to help empower families. We are working with DHHS to develop an on-going training model to ensure these folks understand the importance of family-centered services; it is really about shifting the mindset, and understanding how empowering families ultimately helps the child.

ED: What recommendations do you have for other States or communities interested in promoting family engagement in early learning?

Kelly: Coming from an organization that has been upholding family engagement as a core value for the past 20 years, I think it is important to develop a culture that sees family engagement as crucial to the work, that it shouldn’t just be a box to check, or a step in the process. Seeing families from a strengths-based lens, and valuing their role and their input, will help programs build meaningful partnerships with families around individual children and the administration of local and state programs.

Another recommendation is to engage families early so the family-school partnership transcends their child’s educational experience. Be sure you build family engagement into your early childhood program standards, and then build them into your Quality Rating and Improvement System. The time and attention that we spend on planning for, and ensuring, family engagement should be equivalent to the time and attention programs spend on planning for other critical pieces of early learning, such as curriculum, facilities, assessment, etc. One of the challenges to this work is ensuring funding for the development and implementation of strong family engagement plans, and this is where cross-agency collaboration, public/private partnerships, and innovation can help.

Blog articles provide insights on the activities of schools, programs, grantees, and other education stakeholders to promote continuing discussion of educational innovation and reform. Articles do not endorse any educational product, service, curriculum or pedagogy.

Kelly Bentley
Posted by
Project Manager, Early Learning Challenge, Michigan Department of Education

Department of Education Seeks Comments on New IDEA Website

U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos has expressed her commitment to ensuring that infants, toddlers, children and youth with disabilities and their families receive support and services they are entitled to under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Recently, the Department of Education’s IDEA website, IDEA.ed.gov, which provides information and resources related to the IDEA 2004 reauthorization, was unavailable due to a technical malfunction from an external hosting service provider. Once the IDEA website became functional again, the Secretary directed the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS) to create a new and improved IDEA site and include stakeholder input as part of the development process. The current IDEA.ed.gov site will remain available to users during and after the development of the new IDEA website.

OSERS is seeking input from users of the IDEA.ed.gov website as part of our effort to provide updated, easy-to-navigate IDEA resources to children with disabilities and their families, teachers, administrators, advocates, and other stakeholders.

To help us facilitate this effort, we ask that you address the following items in the comment section below:

  1. What are the resources you use most often at IDEA.ed.gov?
  2. What additional information and/or functionality would you like to see included in the new IDEA site?
  3. Your title or role/designation (such as student, parent, educator, advocate, counselor, etc.), to help us gain a better understanding of who uses IDEA.ed.gov.

OSERS appreciates your support and suggestions as we continue efforts to improve our online resources as part of our commitment to ensure that infants, toddlers, children and youth with disabilities and their families have the supports and services guaranteed under the IDEA.

To protect your privacy and the privacy of others, please do not include personally identifiable information, such as a name of a child or school personnel, a Social Security number, an address, a phone number or an email address in the body of your comment. Comments containing the aforementioned information will not be allowed to remain on this site.

If you have a child-specific complaint or issue, please contact our customer service line at 202-245-7459.

Voices from the Field: Brenda Van Gorder

Interview with Brenda Van Gorder, Director, Granite School District Preschool Services, Salt Lake City

 

“Preschoolers don’t just learn in inclusive settings, they thrive!”

Brenda Van Gorder photo

Brenda Van Gorder

Brenda Van Gorder has been the director of Granite School District Preschool Services in Salt Lake City, Utah for 14 years. Nationally recognized, high-quality practices have been implemented under her direction. Ms. Van Gorder regularly presents on topics related to early childhood, pay for success, and special education at the local, state, and national level. Ms. Van Gorder is involved in leadership capacities with numerous state level committees and workgroups including: Early Childhood Utah Advisory Board, Salt Lake County Mayor’s Office, Utah School Readiness Board, United Way of Salt Lake, Utah State Special Education Finance Committee, Early Learning Network in South Salt Lake, and Intergenerational Poverty. Ms. Van Gorder has authored and co-authored numerous articles on coaching, early childhood, and special education topics that have appeared in professional publications.

ED: How did you begin your career in Early Learning / Early Childhood Special Education?

Brenda: I knew I wanted to work with young children with disabilities, but in the early 1980s there were very few University programs geared toward young children with disabilities. As part of my Master’s program in special education, my advisor and I pieced together an emphasis in early childhood by being creative and connecting with other Departments in the University. When I went to look for my first job, there really weren’t any available specifically working with preschoolers with disabilities so I worked in an elementary school with children with autism. Then our state started pilot programs for preschoolers with disabilities, and I never looked back. Eventually I ended up working as Utah’s State Preschool Special Education Coordinator where one of my priorities was helping districts think through how they could implement preschool inclusion. There were many challenges, especially in a state that didn’t have a state-funded general preschool program.

ED: Why do you and your district believe that inclusion for young children with disabilities is so important?

Brenda: When I interviewed for my current position, which included visiting with school board members and interviews with administrative leadership, and shared my vision for creating more inclusive options for young children with disabilities, the vision wasn’t a hard sell. Leaders in the district understood the evidence about why it is so clear that children with disabilities thrive when they are educated with their typically developing, same-aged peers. The district had been doing this in K-12 classrooms. They understood the importance of children with disabilities having access to the same curriculum as their same-aged peers, and having opportunities to not just advance academically but to gain social skills with peers in meaningful ways. They understood it wasn’t just the legal thing to do; it was the right thing to do. So when I proposed that we needed to develop a full continuum of services and programs (including inclusive opportunities) for preschoolers with disabilities, they liked the vision but hadn’t wrapped their heads around how it was going to work.

ED: What are some of the challenges to preschool inclusion that your district has experienced and what strategies have you tried to overcome these?

Brenda: When I started, the district had three distinct preschool programs: one funded by Title I dollars, another that was tuition based (parents paid tuition), and the preschool special education program. The first challenge was how to bring these three programs together to create a cohesive preschool program with inclusive options for children with disabilities. Initially we conducted listening sessions so that all involved could be heard. There was a lot of fear and concern about inclusion on the part of staff and parents. General education teachers were fearful that they’d spend too much of their time adapting curriculum and activities for children with disabilities and wouldn’t know what to do with challenging behavior. Special education teachers were concerned they were going to be obsolete. Their role was changing—in switching to more of a co-teaching or consultant model—would they be effective? Would professional development be available to them in their new role? Parents of children without disabilities were fearful that the curriculum would be “watered-downed” and too much energy would go toward meeting the needs of children with disabilities. Eventually through the listening sessions we were able to approach fear, dispel rumors and myths, and develop solutions and supports for parents and teachers.

Next, we had to tackle the financial aspect of braiding funds across these three programs so we could strike a balance and ensure funds for each program were used appropriately. A successful strategy we used was to develop cross-program formal agreements, so we don’t have to negotiate the finances every year. We built internal agreements with the philosophy that preschool belongs in our district and ALL preschoolers will have the opportunity to be at their neighborhood preschool first, and if there wasn’t one, then the next closest school. For example, I’m not housed in special education or in the Title I office, but we developed a formula for the amount of federal IDEA funds that would go to preschoolers and determined upfront that eight and a half percent of our district Title I dollars would go toward our preschool program. I don’t have to make the case every year. When I started, we had 30 preschool classrooms and now we have 90. All of our Title I schools have at least one preschool; and we have the full continuum of placement options for our preschoolers with disabilities. Where we needed to have a special education preschool class, we ensured that there was a general preschool class in that building—so that children with disabilities in that setting maximize their time with same age peers.

Another challenge has been finding space for our preschool classrooms. Our district has 64 elementary schools and there are a lot of different groups elbowing for space. Early on, I started to attend district meetings about space and began to educate those who made space decision about an appropriate preschool space. For example, you can’t have a preschool class in a portable without running water. Now whenever the district is renovating or building a school, it is a given that there will be two preschool classrooms in each building!!

ED: What recommendations do you have for other communities interested in expanding inclusive opportunities for young children with disabilities?

Brenda:

  • Enlist families to tell the story of inclusion. Stories from families whose children with and without disabilities have experienced a high-quality inclusive preschool can be powerful.
  • Keep the end goal in mind. What would it look like to have accomplished the full range of services and continuum for preschoolers with disabilities? What pieces do we already have? What is missing? What are the barriers to getting these?
  • Take enough time to be thoughtful but get started. Some districts do pilots but we went full on. It is better to try to work out the bugs while implementing rather than waiting for it to be perfect. Improvement comes with time and you can’t wait for one more cohort of preschoolers with disabilities to not benefit from inclusion and be with their peers.
  • Be sure to hire staff that are committed to inclusion and the full continuum of services, and then support your staff. Listen to their needs and determine if they need additional professional development as their roles change overtime.

Blog articles provide insights on the activities of schools, programs, grantees, and other education stakeholders to promote continuing discussion of educational innovation and reform. Articles do not endorse any educational product, service, curriculum or pedagogy.

Brenda Van Gorder photo
Posted by
Director, Granite School District Preschool Services, Salt Lake City

Texas Listening Sessions

Representatives from the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS) and the Texas Education Agency (TEA) will be conducting a series of Listening Sessions in Texas during the week of December 12. The schedule and location for the Listening Sessions are below.

For those unable to attend the listening sessions, the purpose of this blog is to provide members of the public an opportunity to provide comment regarding the timely identification, evaluation and the appropriate provision of special education and related services to all eligible children with disabilities under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). In an October 3, 2016 letter to Texas Commissioner Mike Morath, OSERS raised concerns regarding Texas’s compliance with a number of requirements of IDEA. The State responded to OSERS’ letter on November 2, 2016.

OSERS and the TEA are interested in hearing from the public, including parents, family members, students, advocates, school personnel and other stakeholders. OSERS has set up this blog for interested parties to submit written comments. This blog will be open for comments from December 5, 2016 through January 6, 2017.

To protect your own privacy and the privacy of others, please do not include personally identifiable information, such as children or school personnel names, Social Security numbers, addresses, phone numbers or email addresses in the body of your comment. Under no circumstances will comments be allowed to remain that contain Social Security numbers, addresses, email addresses, phone numbers, or similar personally identifiable information, such as children or school personnel names.

Schedule and Locations for Texas Listening Sessions

Dallas, Monday, Dec. 12
6:00 pm–8:00 pm
Region 10—Richardson
400 E. Spring Valley Road
Richardson, TX 75081-5101
972-348-1536

Houston, Monday, Dec. 12
6:00 pm–8:00 pm
McKinney Conference Center, Room 100 A-F
7200 Northwest 100 Drive
Houston, TX 77092
713-462-7708

El Paso, Tuesday, Dec. 13
6:00 pm–8:00 pm
Region 19—El Paso
6611 Boeing Drive
El Paso, TX 79925
915-780-6570

Edinburg, Tuesday, Dec. 13
6:00 pm–8:00 pm
Region 1—Edinburg
1900 West Schunior
Edinburg, TX 78541-2234
956-984-6180

Austin, Thursday, Dec. 15
6:00 pm–8:00 pm
Region 13—Austin
5701 Springdale Road
Austin, TX 78723-3675
512-919-5313

These meeting sites are accessible to individuals with disabilities, and sign language interpreters and Spanish language translation will be available. If anyone needs special accommodations, please contact the Education Service Center directly at the telephone number provided.

Challenges Not Barriers

An OSERS Guest Blog post by Jadene Sloan Ransdell, who has a son with Down syndrome.

Matt with his mother, Jadene

Matt with his mother, Jadene

I share my life with a son who has Down syndrome. His life has been filled with twists and turns that have helped to make me the person I am today. We’ve been through a lot—Matt and I—from the time we received his diagnosis and were encouraged to place him in a state institution, to residential placement in Germany while my husband served in the U. S. Army, to now—he is over 40.

Matt experienced delays in his development despite my dedication to keeping him stimulated and as active as possible. He took his first steps just before his third birthday and was finally toilet trained when he was nine years old. When Matt was a teen, he had a seizure in the shower. His use of words for communication was inconsistent, as he would gain a vocabulary and then lose it, several times throughout his life. He displayed many characteristics that resemble Autism, although he was not diagnosed until he was an adult. Over the years he has received several mental health diagnoses that now make sense with identification of early onset Alzheimer’s. There is much to share about that discovery, but I want to focus on Matt’s incredible accomplishments, despite the challenges that he has faced!

Matt left public school in 1996. We paid privately for him to attend a community program two days a week, although he wasn’t especially happy there. In late 1997, he received funding through a Medicaid Home and Community Based Waiver to pay for needed services. With that resource, he moved into his own home (with live-in support) and did something that he enjoyed. Of course, when he moved, I missed him terribly, but I knew that he deserved to grow up and lead his own life, just as his brother had.

Matt volunteering at the local VA hospital

Matt volunteering at the local VA hospital

About five years ago, he was given a chance to volunteer at the local VA hospital. It was a life-changing opportunity, as he takes incredible pride in his job. He loves working with his “soldier men” and the patients appreciate seeing him. The medical staff and other volunteers have told us that he is a wonderful asset. In fact, former Congressman C.W. “Bill” Young (deceased) formally thanked Matt for his service to the veterans and that tribute can be found in the May 20, 2013 Congressional Record!

I am proud of Matt and the path that he has walked. Some painted a bleak future for him. The recommendation of a day program and group home placement was not best for him, and I knew it. I worked tirelessly, encouraging people to discover the incredible person that I knew. And Matt worked hard, too. Even though he never spoke more than a few words at a time and had periods of unsettling behaviors, Matt has created a life that is beautiful and very meaningful to him, me, and the world. He has shown me there is always hope for the future!

Opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect the position of the U.S. Department of Education and such endorsements should not be inferred.

Posted by
Down syndrome and Alzheimer’s Family Advocate in Florida