(upbeat music)
-: Welcome to "The Accessible Learning Experience,"
where we help you turn learning barriers
into learning opportunities.
On this episode, we welcome
the CITES Framework Development District partners,
Janna Greathouse and Samantha Reid
with Jenks Public Schools,
and Bijul Dalal
with Grossmont Union High School District in California.
Janna and Bijul serve
as their districts' Assistive Technology Lead,
while Samantha Reid serves her district as the Edtech Lead.
These professionals and their teams
work with the Center on Inclusive Technology
and Education Systems, better known as CITES,
to try out evidence-based practices to discover
what works when building inclusive technology systems.
In their conversation, Maggie Pickett,
Senior Technical Assistance Specialist
and Project Director with CITES,
talks with Janna, Samantha, and Bijul
to pull back the curtain
and share their stories about what worked
to build and sustain inclusive technology ecosystems
in their district.
Here is their conversation.
-: What an honor it is to elevate these stories today
with such amazing professionals.
This episode is actually four years in the making,
as the work of Bijul, Janna, and Samantha
have journeyed through
to build inclusive technology ecosystems in their districts.
This work started back in the winter of 2019.
These professionals and their teams,
along with five other districts,
were courageous enough to buy into this concept
that district technology systems
should serve all students,
including students with disabilities
who require assistive technology
or accessible educational materials.
Little did we know that one month into this journey,
that there would be a global pandemic.
But nevertheless, these folks persisted,
and here we are today sharing their journeys.
So, let's get to it.
So, I think we've all learned over the past few years
that leadership is key.
So let's start there.
Bijul, your team has worked to curate a shared vision
around inclusive technology.
How has this changed the way you work?
-: Creating a shared vision,
it really brought our institution together.
So, I do work for a school district. It's Grossmont,
and typically, we operate in silos.
The Assistive Technology Department
is housed within the Special Ed Department,
and then separately,
we have an Instructional Technology Department.
And together, our three departments came together,
and we literally picked apart
and analyzed our district's vision.
And that, what we came up with,
that was presented to the board,
and it was ultimately approved.
And so, what was really great was
it was very process oriented, and it also was inclusive.
So it included all of us through that process.
I would also say that creating a shared vision
has also helped our entire district
level up technology skills to provide information,
engagement, and assessments in multimodalities.
Specifically, many gen ed teachers
didn't know the connection between assistive technology
and ubiquitous tools, such as voice typing.
You know, sort of what starts off as assistive technology,
like, I don't know, after like maybe five years
or 10 years, sort of becomes like ubiquitous.
Voice typing used to be DragonDictate,
we'd buy it individually for kids,
and now, everybody has access to it.
So in many ways, assistive technology
is sort of on the cutting edge of technology,
even though it's individual.
So what it allowed us to do
was kind of spread that technology
and make it available to all students.
And more than anything, creating a shared vision
really helped me work collaboratively with my colleagues.
And what we really recognized
was that we really like working with one another.
As we are in an institution,
we do operate in very distinct lanes or silos,
but the process has helped us build relationships,
which has led to effective collaboration.
Creating a shared vision,
we were able to shift the culture
and empathetic to include all student needs
and not just some student needs.
So when we analyzed our vision that we had for our district,
we did tweak it, we made some changes,
made it relevant for today,
we made it inclusive to include all students,
not just some students.
-: Oh, great.
So let's take that a step further.
Janna, when you're thinking about the need
to build a shared mindset
around inclusive technology practices,
did everyone on your team already have
that mindset established,
or were there opportunities for growth?
-: Establishing a shared mindset of inclusion
was very important.
With any systems change,
it's important that the arrows
are all pointing in the same direction
so that our efforts don't contradict one another.
And with this shared mindset,
each stakeholder, in overlapping conversations
with their different groups,
they can then share what's happening with our work
as well as communicate back to the leadership team
what is happening throughout the district
and the community, so that we might better align our efforts
with what's already happening.
The awareness component is very important.
-: So it feels like developing that shared mindset occurred
during that self-evaluation process,
this discussion opportunity.
The self-assessments are key in another way, too.
Samantha, your team was very open about your district
not having a working technology plan.
So how did the work with CITES,
the Center on Inclusive Technology and Education Systems,
help your team to envision and build this technology plan?
And what's different about the way the district operates now
with the plan than before?
-: When we first started with the CITES process,
we didn't really understand the whole scope
of the project, the grants,
the full scale of everything we were tasked to do.
So we really just had to trust the process.
CITES was telling us each step what we needed to do.
And so we just started with the self-assessment.
We started on the leadership.
And so when we, as a team,
started to go through that leadership self-assessment,
a lot of the first questions
were all about your technology plan.
And we were like,
"Well, we just don't have a technology plan."
As a team, as the edtech team anyways,
we kind of knew what we were doing.
We were doing a lot of the things listed,
but we just didn't have it written down anywhere.
So a couple of us on the team kind of sat together,
we did some research, we read our state tech plan,
the national tech plan.
We looked at different edtech plans throughout the country.
And we were just looking at,
"Well, what do we really want our edtech plan to do for us?"
We didn't want it to be some 80-page document
that nobody ever looked at, just there to say we had it.
We didn't want it just to be a box that we checked off.
We really wanted it to be something that we used
to guide everything that we did,
something that was actually a living document
that we checked, that we updated.
It wasn't like, "Okay, this is our three-year plan."
No, it's like, it's something
that gets updated every single month.
Nothing to be printed out.
It all lives in Google Drive.
We started with that.
After we finished the self-assessment,
we picked the areas that we felt we needed to improve on,
or the ones that we wanted to improve on first.
And we wrote our goals,
and that became the basis of our tech plan.
So, after each self-assessment, we would write a goal,
and then that would become our tech plan.
So, each of the areas of the tech plan
then coincided with the CITES' headers for each.
We had our leadership, then we had teaching
and learning and assessment and infrastructure
and family involvement.
So those were our sections,
and as we continue to go through them,
we link all of our documents as we meet.
So it's a living, breathing document
that everybody has access to,
and they can look up at any time.
And then as far as how we operate differently,
anytime we're looking at things,
we look at our tech plan and where does this fit in?
Does this align with our goals for our district?
Does it meet the accessibility standards
that we've set for use in our district?
So everything that we do has to line up
with our technology plan and our goals,
and if it doesn't, then we don't go that direction.
So everything has to be aligned.
-: Setting a foundation for leadership is key,
but eventually, we've gotta get this stuff
into the hands of educators.
So Samantha, as the Edtech Coordinator for your district,
how are you helping educators
build their inclusive technology toolkit?
-: Some of the same things that we've kind of mentioned,
you know, with our tech tips, we have those available.
We have a knowledge base in our district,
so every time I do a tech tip,
that gets added to the knowledge base.
And then those tech tips get added to problems.
So like, if a teacher's submitting a ticket for something,
some of those knowledge base articles will be tagged as,
"Hey, this is something that you can do."
So we have that.
Again, those one-pagers that we send out.
We have a Canvas course,
so all of the resources available in the curriculum
are linked in that Canvas course,
which every teacher in our district is in.
So they have access to them there.
We have some of those accessibility features
built into our curriculum pieces
that are right there on the Canvas course for teachers
to look up, download.
We're a Google district,
so everything is in a Google Doc,
so it's constantly updated.
ClassLink, we have all of our announcements
that we send out through there.
Again, it's all linked into a Google Doc.
We're just slowly trying to give them those tools,
and through all of our PD that we offer,
every class that we do on any topic,
we incorporate accessibility just as a norm.
It's just becoming part of our speech and technology now.
So, if we're teaching teachers how to create a homepage
on their Canvas course,
we show them where to click
on that little accessibility checker.
It's just part of our vocabulary now in our department.
And so we're continuing to work on that.
And then, again, our CITES team
is spread throughout the district.
So there's several CITES members at each campus,
and then they continue to have those conversations as well.
So, it's a slow process in a large district,
but I really feel like we've made huge headways.
Also, we've met with the Board of Education,
we've met with our leadership team,
and everybody's on board with the work
that we're doing here. Principals' meetings,
they're all aware of the work that we're doing,
and they're looking for those things.
And we're starting to get to the point of,
they're asking their teachers about accessibility.
So, it's a process.
I'm really excited on how far we've come
in the three years that we've worked with the CITES team,
but we still have work to do.
-: Such a robust approach.
So, with so many products and resources available,
how are you ensuring that families
and educators have clarity
on what tools are available for use within the district?
-: We use the WCAG standards, the accessibility guidelines.
We look at that and they have a rating scale,
which is A, AA, and AAA.
So, the first thing we look up
is what are the accessibility standards?
What's their rating for any tool that we're going to adopt?
And they have to be at least a AA standard
before we'll adopt them.
After that, we dig a little deeper and we say,
"Okay, well these are the screen readers that our kids use.
"So does it work with this screen reader?
"These are some of the other tools.
"The communication device that a student uses,
"does it work with this communication device?"
So, we kind of look at some of those tools
as far as, does it have closed caption in all the videos?
So we're looking for specific things
to make sure that it's accessible.
And if it's not, then we don't even consider
as an adoption for that particular tool.
We've done several things to ensure that families
and educators have clarity on what's available.
I will tell you, this is still a work in progress.
I don't feel like we're there yet
with everybody knowing everything,
but we're a lot closer than where we were.
So some of the things that we're doing
is we do a Tech Tip of the Week every Tuesday.
It's not always on accessibility,
but it's on different tools that we have available,
how to do different things,
how to encourage our students to use different tools.
One week was just on closed captioning.
How do you turn on closed captioning,
if you're watching YouTube, if you're using Edpuzzle,
if you're using any kind of video?
How can you turn on live captioning in your slideshows
if you're doing a presentation?
So, we do stuff like that for our Tech Tips of the Week.
How do you run the accessibility checker in Canvas,
which is our learning management system?
So, just doing tips on how to use those things
and just highlighting the importance of the fact
that accessibility is not just for special needs students,
it's really for all students.
And we talk about how these tools
can really help every student.
You might have a headache one day
and not want to read your screen
and you want to use a screen reader.
You may struggle with trying to type your thoughts.
Your brain might work faster than your fingers,
so why not use your voice to type
and then you go back and edit?
These tools that we have available
really can benefit any student,
and it's not just a special ed thing.
So, really trying to spread that message across.
For all of our adopted curriculum,
we've created one-page guidelines
of all the accessibility tools that are available
in our district-adopted software.
So like, this coming up year, we're adopting ELA,
so we'll take all the textbooks as we start getting them
and we'll build.
These are built-in accessibility features
that you should just be using on a regular basis,
so really educating our teachers that way.
We also do student spotlights, we do social media posts,
we do district tech tips through our district newsletter
that goes out monthly.
We have Lunch and Learn times once a month
where teachers can come in and ask any questions.
So really, as many ways as we can think of
to spread the word.
Our next venture is really
working on the family involvement piece.
So we actually have an appointment set up next week
with our PTA, our parent groups.
So, we're going to now start working with our parent groups
to make sure that our parents understand the tools
that are available for their students to use.
And so we're going to start there.
We're going to look for recommendations,
have those conversations about
how can we as a district be more accessible
and how can we communicate the things that we have available
for students better to families?
So, we're really looking to partner with our families
to continue the work and the process.
So, that's our next goal,
and our tech plan, which brings us full circle
back to the first question.
-: Bijul, you all took a different approach
at Grossmont Union High School District.
Describe your SPED Tech Team
and how it provides development for staff.
How did you decide what important knowledge
and skills for educators in your district,
what skills they need to have?
-: So, in terms of professional development,
our Assistive Technology Department,
we meet directly with students, and we push into classes.
So, we really have a sort of boots-on-the-ground perspective.
We also provide training to support staff
and teachers throughout the year at In-services.
But this year, because of the enormous teacher shortage,
we do a road show.
So, instead of the teachers coming to us
to learn about professional development
and assistive technology,
what we do is we meet with teachers on their site
during their prep periods.
So essentially, what we'll do is we'll go to a school site,
and we have teachers sign up on their prep period
and we teach them either what we think they need to know
or what they would like to know
to support students in their classroom.
We have professional development that is live,
it's in person.
We also do professional development over Zoom,
and we do hybrid for varying times and lengths and content.
So, we really try to keep professional development
as flexible and just in time
for teachers' schedules as needed.
-: So, within this context, how are you supporting students
with more complex learning support needs?
-: The way that our district supports students
with complex learning needs is really, really dynamic.
I mean, this is something I'm really, really excited about.
I would honestly say our district is on the cutting edge
of supporting students with complex needs.
We have one of the highest refugee populations
in the entire state of California.
We also are a preferred district for students
with disabilities who come from military families.
And we have a number of Title I schools.
What I'm trying to say with all of this
is that we have a very high-needs population.
That said, we use eye gaze technology for students.
For example, there's one student that comes to mind,
his name is Yohan. He's an Iraqi refugee.
He had systematically been excluded from school
his entire life.
He never went to school in his home country,
never went to school in a refugee camp.
He landed in our district,
and the teachers could see
he had so much more to say and express.
And through a really long process,
I would say approximately 18 months,
we were able to get an eye gaze system for him.
And I kid you not,
he appears at the high school's talent show
and what he does is he tells jokes.
He's in gen ed classes;
he absorbs information.
I think one of the most phenomenal things is
he uses his eye gaze equipment to teach his parents English
because his parents only speak Arabic.
And that's just one example.
We also have students like-- Joseph comes to mind,
who uses a switch to activate a camera,
so that way he can participate in the photography class.
So he uses his switch to take pictures.
We also have students, like Layla comes to mind.
She uses her switch to turn on a hose
so she can water the garden.
These are just some small ways
that students with complex needs
are supported in a classroom.
But we also have students who,
they will use an AAC device,
or some sort of communication device,
in order to communicate more than just their needs at wants,
because it can't start and stop there.
But they're able to communicate
and have conversations with others,
or make preferences, or take turns,
or tell each other jokes and be conversational.
Our district is a high school district,
so that social element, no matter who the student is,
is entirely important.
It amazes me.
We had one student, I remember, AJ.
He had a very specific laptop with his needs on it.
And three times in one year,
he ran over his own laptop cord
and severed it.
And one of my colleagues made the comment
and said, "You know, that's AJ.
"He's hanging out with his friends between classes
"and then he's trying to motorize as fast as he can
"to his class, and of course, he's going to run over his cord."
And it was like something you would imagine
any typical student doing.
You know, they're hanging out with their friends
and then, of course, they're running to class
when they hear the bell ring.
AJ was no different, his cord just got in the way.
So those are just a few ways
that we support students with complex learning needs.
I would also say that we really strive
to support students in the least restrictive environment.
So even if a student has a complex learning need,
they are in dance, or photography,
or PE, in some way
that shows integrity to the class,
not in a way that is token.
And what we do is we try to find the technology
and adapt it to meet the needs of the student.
-: All right, let's talk assessment for a minute.
Janna, your team knew
that you had some connections to make
in order to get a full understanding
of how assessment operated within your district.
So, how did you go about gaining a person on your team
that brings that perspective around high stakes assessments,
but also formative assessments?
-: So to get a full understanding
of the work in the district that related to assessment,
we definitely have to make some connections.
And when we were first introduced to the self-assessment
related to inclusive practices in assessment,
we were embarking on testing season.
And so our assessment coordinator was,
as you might imagine, very busy.
We did invite her director to meet with us at that time,
and she was able to help us feel better informed
when it came to scoring our self-assessment.
But most recently, our assessment coordinator
accepted an invitation to participate on our team
beginning in the fall.
I will say
that my path and the path of the assessment coordinator,
our paths have crossed much more frequently this school year
than any other school year,
particularly because we are collaborating more
on test accommodations and universal supports.
And I attribute that collaborative growth almost entirely
to our work with CITES.
We have, I think, recognized the roles that we play
and the importance of our roles
and the importance of working together to make sure
that our students are accommodated appropriately
when it comes to testing.
-: The concept behind continuous improvement
is that we're always using data
to consider how we can improve our efforts, right?
So Janna, how are you attempting to further a culture
of inclusion and acceptance for students with disabilities
in your district?
-: In attempting to build a culture of inclusion
and acceptance for students with disabilities,
we have partnered with our communications team
to plan regularly scheduled social media posts.
And these posts are highlighting some of our students
who rely on technology resources
to participate in school,
either academically, socially, or both.
We have currently
only had one student story go out,
but we have many students on deck
who are ready to share their stories as well.
One of the other things that we're doing
to build this culture of inclusion
and acceptance is to provide training
to our general education teachers
on tools that we have available in the district
that historically maybe have only been offered
to our students with disabilities
or to our language learners.
And so far, the response has been tremendous.
Our general educators, I think, have been looking for things
like this that they can provide to all of their learners
to just help better support them in their classroom
and in their academics.
-: We are thrilled you all could share time
and space to help us elevate these stories today.
So, if you're listening and thinking,
"Wow, I want to know more about these teams
"and what they've done, their journeys,"
we've got you covered.
So both Jenks Public Schools
and Grossmont Union High School District
have their own stories highlighted on our website,
cites.cast.org.
On these pages, you'll find images of the beautiful people,
audio clips from our interview,
resources, including Jenks' technology plan, and more.
Links to these stories can be found in the show notes.
And while you're there,
be sure to check out the rest of the website,
which is the CITES Framework.
The self-assessments these folks have talked about
that helped guide their work, as well as guides,
are there to help you get started on your journey.
And they're all available to you for free.
So we hope to see you over there.
And remember, the future is inclusive.
(upbeat music)
-: Thanks for tuning in to this episode
of "The Accessible Learning Experience,"
brought to you by the National Center
on Accessible Educational Materials at CAST.
You can find us on the web at aem.cast.org.
There you'll find show notes
with link to all of the resources mentioned on each episode.
Thanks again for listening,
and remember, accessibility is everyone's responsibility.
(upbeat music)
The contents of this podcast were developed
under a cooperative agreement
with the US Department of Education.
However, those contents do not necessarily represent
the policy of the US Department of Education,
and you should not assume endorsement
by the federal government.