K Banks Everybody knows that this session is being recorded. If you're uncomfortable with being recorded, please leave the session now and you can watch the session. Later on on the no PVC website, it will be posted there. Um, I'd like to introduce our speakers. Our first speaker of the day is Casey West Robertson. Casey is C Robinson a teacher of blind students. She's also a professor at Louisiana Tech and the teachers of blind students. Unknown Speaker Don't quite I don't quite have that the K Banks teachers are blind students department. If I got that semi, right, Casey, and she's the vice president of the NIOSH national blindness professional certification board. Also, we have Kate Carlton Walker here today. She's the president of the National Organization of parents of blind children. She is an attorney. She's also a teacher of blind students herself. So we've got an awesome panel, and Unknown Speaker I'd like to welcome them, K Banks thank you for being here. I'm gonna hand it over to you guys now. Unknown Speaker Thank you, Kimberly. Um, and you did great. Um, I am a professor at Louisiana Tech in the teacher's of blind students program. And the one that I have a little trouble saying is I'm the Vice President of the National blindness professional certification board. So that one gets a little tricky when you're saying that, um, I'm going to be doing the first part of this presentation. And then Miss Carlton and Walker will be doing the second part of the presentation. But we'll also get tagged back and forth as well. And we want to let everybody know that this is starting ip 101. So we're going to start from the very basic of the IEP, and then we're going to move up. So as I talk, I'm going to be talking about some very basic, basic parts that you may or may not already know, then we'll have time for question and answer. And then, um, Colton is going to talk about some IEP related just to blindness. And then tomorrow morning's IEP, we will move further into accommodations assessment service time, and then goshi ation, so this tomorrow morning's will build on top of this morning's so I'm Mark your calendars. If you've, if you're on this call, Mark your calendars for tomorrow morning as well so that you can get the full span of the IEP the IEP spectrum. Okay, so we're going to start with just a very basic overview of the IEP, okay. And most of the time, people call this the Individualized Education Plan. But it's actually the end of visualized education program, it's what you want for your student, you want an entire program that is going to work for you and your students, basically, for your students education. So in that program, you create a plan, and that's the actual hardcopy IEP, that you would have, and that you work on with the team. So throughout my presentation, we're going to talk about the team who makes that team up. We're going to talk about the plan. We're going to talk about smart IEP s, and we're going to talk about five mistakes to avoid. Okay, so let's start with the team. Who is the team? Okay, the team. I see. Yes, the parent. So that's you as the parent, the child, if appropriate, the child can be a part of the IEP team. Now I highly recommend that the child be in the IEP team, especially from grade three up, okay? I highly recommend that because they need to know the expectations that are being set for them. They need to know they need to be able to start learning self advocacy. That is a that's a huge deal for students to have self advocacy, okay. So they will start learning all of that in the IEP. Okay, so, third grade up. Now, the only time that I say a child should not be present, if it's a very controversial IEP, and parents are going to be speaking negatively about teachers or teachers speaking negatively about children. We hope That never ever happens. Um, Unknown Speaker and then, um, but if it does, then I recommend that you ask the child not to be a part of the IEP, okay, just for their self esteem, and for their self, um, for their self worth issues, okay? At least one of your child's regular education teachers has to be a part of that team. Now, you may think that it's not important for a regular education teacher to be a part of that team, if your child is has additional disabilities, and they're only serviced by the Special Ed, Department of your school. And that is not true, you need a person off of the regular education team in that meeting, because they know the curriculum, they know where your child should be at. And they help you set goals based on that curriculum. Okay, so you need a regular education teacher in there. If your school district tells you that they can't have a regular education teacher in the meeting, this is not correct, you always want to ask for a regular education teacher to be in that meeting. Okay, you also need a special ed teacher, you need someone that usually we call these the folder holder, they're the special ed person that takes care of your child's IEP, they oversee the IEP, and they help oversee the programming for your child. Okay, so, so far, we have the parent, the child, the regular education teacher, and the special education teacher, you need a school system representative, okay? Sometimes this will be the principal, sometimes it will be a counselor, sometimes it will be another teacher from the school, the actual school that your child is based at, they need to be in the IEP meeting. And then we need what's called the purse holder. Okay, we need somebody in that meeting, that is from the school district that can make monetary decisions, they know about the budget, and they know about things of how to make, um, how to make monetary things happen. For example, if you need equipment, they can be the one that approves that of that equipment request. So you need a purse holder, in your meeting, lots of times, this will be the director of special education, okay, that is who typically is the person that is the purse holder in the meeting. Um, anybody else that has knowledge about your, your child needs to be in that meeting, a TVI, an independent evaluator, um, maybe somebody that has done academic assessments on your child. Um, we don't recommend an IQ test for blind students because they're not normed or validated. So, please, you know, try to avoid those when possible, but anybody else in that has knowledge about your child needs to be in that meeting. Unknown Speaker Also, I Unknown Speaker think one of the most important people of the IEP team is an advocate, okay, you need an advocate at your meetings. This does not have to be a professional, paid, advocate, okay, this can be a neighbor, it can be a friend, it can be your spouse, but you need someone in that meeting that has your child's needs in mind, they can be a note taker for you, they can help pull you back to the topic, when the conversation gets off topic, they can pull you back, they can help you remember, things that happened during that IEP meeting. An advocate does not have to mean, um, does not have to mean that you are in any kind of IEP due process or mediation, or, um, it just simply means that you have somebody there that's on your side, that is an objective person that can see both sides and help you stay focused. Unknown Speaker Um, Unknown Speaker I as a parent, I, as a professional, I do IEP s all day, every day. Um, I do them all year long. I am an advocate for other parents. I go all over the country being an advocate to parents that help um, that need help getting services for their kids. Children, I review IEP s, I stand in that role as a professional. As a parent, when I attend my child's IEP, I have an advocate attend with me, because it is a different position, emotions are different. I am not the professional in that situation, I am the parent. And I need help staying focused on what my child's needs are. So I always recommend an advocate go with you. Okay. And then we mentioned the student if appropriate. So that's your team. Okay, your team that will work on the individualized plan. Now, let's look at the plan itself. Okay. Lots of times, schools are very intimidating. When a parent walks in, even if they have an advocate with them. There's two of us and there's a lot of the school personnel on the other side. Okay. So the IEP can be very intimidating. But part of this meeting is helping you know, the parts of the IEP and helping you feel comfortable with knowing what to ask and how to ask it. The IEP has two general purposes, okay, to establish measurable goals for the child, and to state the special education and related services, and supplemental aids and services that the public agency will provide to or on behalf of the child. Okay. when constructing an appropriate educational program for a child with a disability, the IEP team broadly considers the child's involvement and participation in three main areas of school life, okay, the general education curriculum, the extracurricular activities, and get this parents non academic activities. Okay, so often we go to IEP meetings, and we are told that we that the school is responsible for general education curriculum, but they're not. They're not responsible for extracurricular activities, or non academic activities, and that's incorrect, they are responsible for those. If a sighted child or a general education student is getting services, then that special ed or that IEP team is supposed to make a program and make a plan for your child to get those things assessable to them, they have more than access to the curriculum, they need access to extracurricular activities, and they need access to academic activities. And I'm sure Carlton would speak of this later, either today or tomorrow. But with the ECC, the Expanded Core Curriculum, this comes right, it parallels with extracurricular activities and non academic activities. Okay, it um, um, it parallels with those because you can get a lot of those extracurricular activities, and a lot of those ECC curriculum, components in those extracurricular activities and non academic activities. I can't keep up with the chat while I'm going. So I have some friends that are doing that Kimberly's doing that, but I did catch out of the glimpse of I, um, where is the documentation for that, um, Unknown Speaker I have a PowerPoint that I wasn't able to share it, but I will share the resources that I think every parent needs to have. And that is, um, I'm going to say it really slowly, and I'll say it a couple of times so that we make sure we get it. And I think Kimberly may can type it in the chat. Um, there's a great called rights law. w RIGHTSLA. w. Okay, rights law. They have a website, www. rights. law.if. Somebody can check it for me. I don't know if it's calm or org. I think it's codm copm. But they produce a couple of books. Okay, one that I think every parent should have is all about IEP s. And I can kind of show it in the screen here. It's all about IEP s K Banks okay. Sorry to interrupt, we can we can post your, your PowerPoint on the LPC website also after the session if you'd like, awesome, awesome. Unknown Speaker Okay, so, um, that will work there. But they have, um, they have another book that I think every parent should have. And that is from emotion to advocacy. And this book walks you through the entire IEP process, and what to expect and how to get started, it teaches you how to take your emotions out of the IEP, and focus on the game plan. Okay, so that's two books that I think every parent should have. There's also a Dear Colleague letter, and we, um, I can, when we post the PowerPoint, I can post the link to that on the PowerPoint. But there's a Dear Colleague letter that also says that the school has to meet the general education, extracurricular activities, and non academic activities. So if your child wants to play chess, then the team has to come up with a way of how to make chess assessable to, um, to your child, if there's a chess club already at the school, okay, so if your child it wants to attend any of the extracurricular activities, or non academic, lots of times I run into, when I'm advocating across the nation, I have this comes up multiple times, you have a gifted blind child, and they're told that they can't be in gifted education at that school, because they are under a special ed umbrella with getting services for their blindness. And that is, that is totally wrong, that is not true. They can be I'm in the gifted ed program and receive special ed services. That is, that's just a myth that schools try to play with parents to, to prevent them from having to adapt things to a non visual child. So let's move on. And we'll have time for questions and answers to. So there's lots of parts of the IEP, okay, and this is part of the intimidation process two, not that it's meant to be intimidating, but it just, it can be very intimidating when you look at all the parts of the IEP. Um, I have had special ed directors tell me that when we chose the program that was the most parent friendly, and I'm thinking on what part of this earth did you choose parent friendly, because it's not a very parent friendly document. Um, present level is the first part of the IEP, that the school should take the present level of your child. And it should be data driven. I see so many IEPs that says, oh, Sara is such a wonderful child. She's very pleasant, she gets along with all of her classmates. It's very nice to have her in my class, and it goes on and on and on. That is not data driven. We need the present level Unknown Speaker to be where where is your child? What academic skills are they on? We need documentation that says, We perform the Jerry John's reading assessment, and this child scored on the third grade reading level. Um, we did dibbles and the child scored on this level, you need, um, you need academic progress, and you need it to be data driven, okay, it's fine. If somewhere in that IEP, that they want to put that she's a nice child and gets along with all the classmates and everything, that's fine. But in the present level, you want current data driven information. And a lot of schools will say, well, we did an assessment last year that showed she was on this reading level. That's incorrect. You need current data driven, um, information. Another thing that I like about rights law with parents is on their website. You can ask questions Just about any thing that you have come across, they have already dealt with it. And they will have references there that tell you what you should do, what documentation you should ask for, and what information that you need to get. The next is annual goals. And we're going to talk about goals in a little bit more in depth in just a few minutes. You need measuring and reporting progress. How will this be measured? Lots of times I see IEP s that have goals, but there's no way to measure those goals. They just have statements on a paper that can never be measured, um, special education services, what services will be rendered for your child? And then related services, supplemental aids and services, extent of non participation, how much time Are they going to be out of the general ed classroom, I recommend keeping our blind students in the general ed classroom as much as possible. I teach my students at Louisiana Tech ways that they can use the general ed curriculum, and teach Braille through the natural order of contractions, so that the students are not pulled away from their peers and have a separate curriculum, Unknown Speaker accommodations in assessments, what kind of assessments are going to be given in the accommodations for that, and service delivery, and I want to put a big star on this for our parents that are on this, on this meeting needs must be determined before placement. So many times we walk into IEP s, and they already have decided that Sarah will be put in certain classroom in certain room getting certain services and we have not gone over the needs of the child, the needs must be determined before the placement is determined. Okay, so that's a big red flag for parents on that one. So I'm going to move a little bit quickly, cuz I know I'm getting close to cartons time. Um, so we want to talk about smart IEP s. Okay, the goals of your IEP should be under the form of an acronym smart, okay, they should be specific, they should be measurable, they should have action words, they should have realistic and relevance to the child and that disability, and they should be time limited. Okay, so we're going to look at these specific to the child goals and objectives, target areas of academic achievement and functional performance. They include clear descriptions of the knowledge and skill that will be taught and how the child's progress will be measured. So we want to target in it's like a bullseye, we want to get as close to the academic need of that child and tell how he's going to progress and how we're going to measure that. Okay, measurable means you can count it or you can observe it, it's not just a statement on a page that can't be observed, okay? Or can't be counted. As action words, it should say the child will be able to us it needs to be an action because goals are action based, okay? relevant, it must be realistic and relevant to the disability. Okay. For example, one big one that we have been pushing all across the United States for our blind students is touch typing. They Unknown Speaker a lot of schools do not think that blind students should be doing touch typing until they've completely finished the Braille code. And that is not accurate because we start typing even on iPads with pre K and kindergarten students. So that is a relevant need for our blind students is to learn touch typing. So that is a Braille Braille would be relevant to the disability of blindness. time limit, limited starting point and ending point. So I have a couple of examples here of goals. Okay. By the end of the first semester with that time there, sound will touch type a passage of text at a rate of 15 words per minute. We have, we have, um, the time, we have the gold targeted down to touch typing at 15 words per minute, with no more than 10 era's on a five minute test. So we've got our targeted skill, we've got measurable, measurable goal, we've got action words, sound, we'll, we've got what he will do, and how we will measure it. Okay, so that's a good goal right there. I have another one. After one year of specialized instruction, Megan will be able to decode words at a 25% Tower level, as measured by the decoding score of the gray oral reading test. So very, very targeted. We told what Megan was going to do. We told her how she was going to do it. We told how we were going to measure it. And we had action words in there. And it was relevant to her, her her disability. So very, I'm very, very targeted. Okay, so I have just three or four minutes before Carlton speaks. Unknown Speaker Um, Unknown Speaker do you guys have questions and answers? I mean, question. I hope I have the answers. I may not have the answers, but I hope you have questions. So this was just a very basic overview of the IEP and then Carlton's going to take you into deeper steps of it. Do I have anybody with a question? Unknown Speaker I do. Okay, George, as you were saying that they shouldn't tight. I mean, they should learn Braille and typing at the same time. I think that was a mistake I made on my daughter's i. Unknown Speaker p. Unknown Speaker can I fix that, at the beginning of the school year? Can I call another meeting to Unknown Speaker fix that? Because we absolutely, absolutely, the parent can call a meeting at any time, the parent surely can. And I would recommend that you go ahead and see and notice that you would like an IEP meeting when school starts back. And or even before school starts back whenever it's convenient for you. They have to comply with the IEP request. And you can just tell them, it doesn't have to be controversial. You can just tell them at the beginning, as as the summer went on, you attend several conferences, you gained more knowledge. And you would like to take another look at her IEP based on the knowledge that you have now. Unknown Speaker So she can learn jaws and Braille. And it will jaws and the computer in conjunction with Unknown Speaker the Braille, right? Unknown Speaker Yes, yes. Unknown Speaker Okay. Thank you. Unknown Speaker She's tricky. Unknown Speaker Okay. Do we have time for one more? K Banks I think so. Jasmine has a question. She has her hand raised Jasmine from all about glaucoma. Can Unknown Speaker I think it's K Banks star six, if you're on the phone to unmute yourself, either star six or star nine. We'll go ahead and move on. We have a question in the chat box. If the student uses Braille, should it always be included in the ad section of the IEP? Unknown Speaker Um, yes, yes, I would say yes, anywhere. If they're going to use Braille as their primary reading media. It can be listed in every part of the IEP. But I make sure that I list it multiple times so that there's no confusion that it needs to be Braille. K Banks And we have Colin Wong has hands raised. Unknown Speaker Hey, Collin. Unknown Speaker I'm sorry about that. I mean, myself. Thank you, Casey. My question is for students who are in honors classes at school, and what classes do they do you recommend them being pulled out of and is it possible for them to have services outside of oil specialists Unknown Speaker Yes, it is. And I recommend if they're in honors classes, then we know they're already advanced. And we know that they could learn the Braille code in a year, if it's taught in the correct way. I teach my students to teach Braille to their students within a year, and then work on proficiency. After that. You could even look at Braille outside of the school day, they could have it after school or before school. If they're in honors classes, I would just pick the one that they're the best at not always the one that they enjoy the most, okay, you don't want to take joy out of a child's life to insert Braille because then they become defiant. And they don't want to learn the Braille. But I like to look at options of before school or after their school options too, so that they're not being pulled out of their curriculum areas. And in this virtual world that we're doing, it's very easy to teach Braille, virtually, if they have the basics of hand movement, it's very easy to teach Braille virtually, and then you can do it just about at any time during the day. I'm so sorry. So we're going to turn it over to Carlton, I'm still going to be on the I'm going to be on the call the whole time, and I will be here tomorrow. And also I'm Kimberly can put my information in the chat box as well. Like I said, I review IPS and help parents all the time. So my, my email address is Casey West CASEYW e s t, the numbers nine four@hotmail.com. Unknown Speaker Casey, West 90 four@hotmail.com if you have questions, and we'll try to answer them the best we can. So I'm going to turn it over to Carlton. Unknown Speaker Hey, C Walker excuse me. Hi. I'm gonna try something. Let's see if this works. Unknown Speaker Let's see. C Walker Okay, it doesn't look like can you see my PowerPoint or no? Unknown Speaker Yes, we can see it. C Walker Okay, great. Good morning, everyone. Thank you so much for being here. I'm Carlton and cook Walker, I serve as president of the National Organization of parents of blind children. I my connection to the field as an attorney, and became a parent of a blind child, and I became a certified teacher of blind students. And now I merge the different Carlton's into one. talking today about blindness specific IEP issues. Can you see a whole screen or just the PowerPoint kalten. K Banks We can see the whole screen of the PowerPoint so we can see all your PowerPoint slides that are coming up. I yeah, I C Walker tried to do a slideshow and it won't let me do anything else because I have my notes and words that I need to. So I apologize for that. K Banks I can't see your notes and words were just point. C Walker Great, thank you. blindness, specific IP rights. These are the four major ones eligibility for IEP services, the Braille provision, assistive technology, and orientation and mobility as a related service. Full disclosure, this this technology is not just for blind students, but it's vitally important. I'm not going to say more so than any other disability. But I will say more than most. So that's where we're going. Now, eligibility for IP services. This just gets us in the door. I Well, there are too many children in this country who do not have a who are not identified as having visual impairment, cluding blindness on their IEP. Some of them are only identified as deaf blind, and I won't go into it, but that's a problem. If you're deaf blind, you need at least three eligibility quality categories, Deaf visual impairment and blindness and deaf blind. Minimum three. If a child is deaf, what some are lumped into, Oh, ah, I it's other health impairment. That's not appropriate either. There is a under federal law. If a child meets the definition for eligibility, the child must be identified and provided services for every area of disability. Not just a catch all. And there are children who only have five fours and I guarantee you there is I cannot I I'm a pretty imaginative gal and I cannot fathom any child who is blind, or who meets the definition of blindness and visual impairment, clean blindness, who doesn't need an IEP? I can't imagine blind childhood doesn't meet this definition. So anyway, three part eligibility test for the disability of visual impairment, including blindness. And I have the legal side because I'm a lawyer. First diagnosis. Visual Impairment including blindness means an impairment in vision that even with correction adversely affects a child's educational performance. This term includes both partial sight and blindness. That's the least that's what the regulations that I didn't say, partial sight blindness. We know it includes that. So what does this mean? OSEP the Office of Special Education Programs, a department of the US Department of Education with the agency in charge of policing and formula and regulations for the IDA, which is the law that allows us to have IEP s individualized education programs, clarifies that for visual impairment states may not use criteria or other definition of visual impairment, including blindness, that result in the exclusion of children who otherwise meet the definition. Okay, gobbledygook. Really, it isn't. It's really vitally important for years and years and years, and it's still true. A lot of states purported to have additional requirements, you have to be at least 2070 have 2070 acuity or worse, higher, higher, higher bottom number, you have to have a field restriction of 20% or less. These types of things that's completely illegal, completely, completely, completely legal. It has been illegal. Luckily, Department of Education issued documentation pointing out this is illegal. And in fact, they went further than I would have. But they also say that on conditions such as convergence insufficiency, color blindness, and other conditions qualify if, even if they do not require cause decreased visual acuity or field loss. I agree with color blindness completely. The convergence insufficiency and binocular dysfunction. I've had kids both ways. I've had a kid who was 2040. But the convergence insufficiency, both of them together made it a no brainer, had another kid who had intermittent binocular dysfunction, but a ton of testing and evaluation, we determined that there was just nothing that he needed from us. And for two reasons that those are other two parts of the test, he met the first one, he didn't meet the first prong second prong adverse effect on child's educational performance. This is one that they will try to trip you up on. It does not mean the child has to fail. What it means is walking into the school building, getting the exact same materials in the exact same manner as every other student is the child's education is that visual impairment causing the child some adverse educational performance that can include needing to squint not having enough stamina. A lot of times behavior issues when a child can't see something I know if I can't, if I were in a big classroom and I couldn't see anything, ah, my mind's wandering, I am not paying attention. So if I can't see or engage, I really should say engage with it. If I can't engage with an activity, my mind's wandering and children are different. Another thing to consider is impact on physical education must be included. So if a child is has some depth perception issues, that is an adverse impact on educational performance, you get to tick number two right there boom. colorblindness, most schools, when you walk in, they use color for organization go the red table, pick out your blue folder. Tick, it's a tick we got we have number two. Now number three, need in need of special education support due to the visual impairment including blind. Special Education support does not unfortunately mean a minimum of 10 hours of Braille instruction per week. Should but doesn't. It means anything it means adapted materials. It means teachers are changing the way they teach. Instead of having the blue table. They may have the blue triangle table That has a tactile triangle. So that's a special education support. So tick, tick, tick, all children should have this ultra meet these criteria should have the DI, B diagnosis or the label of visual impairment cleaned by us because our next point is real provision. It is the last federal law, children, any child any every child who has been identified as a thing, a child with visual impairment, including blindness must receive use of an instruction in Braille. Period. That's the default. Before we do anything else, that's the default. The only way we're allowed schools can not can get out of doing that is two things an assessment of current and future reading, and writing needs. And after that, because of that assessment, this IPT must determine that Braille is not appropriate for the child. Not that the child needs Braille, that Braille is not appropriate for the child. That's a pretty darn high standard. Under the law, schools may withhold Braille only after that IEP team decision not a TV eyes, teacher, visually impaired teacher blind students, not teachers decision, not an administrators decision. Only after the team decision. And, again, this should be done before the child. But before this assessment, the child should be receiving Braille. I've never seen it happen. I would love to see it happen. Sadly. Unknown Speaker Well, we'll talk about that a second. C Walker It anytime. If at any time the child is not receiving Braille, another determination must be made every time an IEP meeting is held. That's the way the laws written. It's not Oh, we only do that assessment every three years. Nope. Not even only one every one year. If a child is receiving Braille, we don't need to keep doing the assessment that sells receiving Braille. Only if but if a child is not receiving Braille, that assessment, and that IEP team decision must be undertaken every single it meeting everyone. Braille provision in practice, unfortunately, the laws rarely followed in practice schools withhold them until after Cobra until after the IEP do they withhold print instruction the same way? So they'll say, Oh, well, Braille, that this is a special service, we have to assess to see what to do. They don't do that print. Print and Braille are both essentially the same thing. They are written expressions of oral language. They are text printing uses lines and curves. Braille uses dots. They're still written expression of oral language. And we need to do for Braille what we do from schools often defer to the TVI teacher blind students, and they don't allow it to be a team decision. that's inappropriate. And all too often it's no Braille until you fail. The standard used is that the real standard is that Braille may only be withheld if it's not appropriate. Another little game they love to play is, well the child's not smart enough to learn Braille. Braille is really hard. As a teacher, I went to dozens of schools literally in six different school districts. And I saw children from a gifted to multiple, multiple and intellectually disabled, guess what there was print in every single classroom. Everyone. If the child, if we as a society believe that it is important to be surrounded by print, it's also important to be surrounded by Braille again, parody. There's a Dear Colleague letter of June 19 2013, that discusses this, I will keep moving. And it just it really does reiterate the plain language of the law. Sometimes, my child has a learning disability. And I do like to point out that in my experience, a lot of times it's the administrators and some of the professional educators who seem to have the worst difficulty in reading comprehension, plain language of the laws always a good place to go. Number three, assistive technology says technology defined it's a very broad definition. It includes any item piece of equipment or product system, whether acquired commercially off the shelf, modified or customized, that is used to increase maintain or improve functional capabilities of a child with disability, except it doesn't include medical surgically implanted medical devices. So it that's really broad, a SpongeBob pencil, or SpongeBob sticker tactile sticker that is motivating for a child, a chore chart, any of these are, can be assistive technology depending on the child's needs. So open up, we have a wonderfully wide definition. And even better, my favorite is assistive technology service. And this law at this provision, blot allows for training of the student for training of school staff, employers, and other individuals who provide services to employee or other or otherwise substantially involved in the major life functions of such child. I guess what that includes our daycare provider, that includes perhaps, Sunday school teacher, it absolutely includes family members. So this is pretty broad, and anybody whose child has assistive technology knows that it's really nice to have some training so that if, for us, technology might suck, and we use it all the time for a new child who's just learning technology, they're going to be hiccups, it's really helpful if we have that ability to help the child out of assistive technology and practice, it needs to be wide, wide open, no tech, low tech, medium tech, high tech. The key is the using it to increase maintain or improve functional capabilities of a child with a disability. And please, no cost cannot be a factor. It's illegal for it to be a factor. I always tell them, it's not the child's fault that this is expensive. And it's not the child's fault that the school chooses to use up materials and software that's inaccessible. So and there's a cost to that. And that's because the school decided to make things inaccessible or use something that's more widely available, but that's inaccessible. Children should never be punished for adults choices. And this includes accessible technology, assistive technology in many schools that it shouldn't be this way, but it is, it is considered kind of a dumbed down thing. Oh, well, if you need assistive technology, then there's something wrong with you. Well, that's not true. I'm assistant assistive technology absolutely makes this happen. So it's important for everyone. But what our kids need more than just assistive technology, which a lot of several educators are trained on is they need assessable assistive technology. So the accessibility is really important if we're talking about a laptop, for instance, certainly our children need the typing that other children need. But as Casey pointed out, they needed earlier, because they can't use the mouse effectively. They need the touch typing to utilize the accessible assistive technology of a screen reader like jaws. That's the difference on an iPad, they need the accessible assistive technology of voiceover commands. And for any of these things where we're having literacy numbers and letters, and words, we're learning the need to refreshable Braille display. Because as I tell administrators, the refreshable Braille display is like the monitor. Let's see the sighted kids play on the iPad but not be able to look at it. It's not terribly useful. These games are important, because you need to get sensible. Big one big one big one, especially now COVID assistive technology at home. On a case the loss is very clear on a case by case basis, the use of school purchased assistive technology devices in a child's home or in other settings is required. If that child's IEP team determines that the child needs access to those devices in order to receive faith. Faith is free appropriate public education. We'll talk about that in a second. But it's required because the child needs to get good at the technology and have access to books to information to the internet. Same things the adult non disabled kids do may need to have access to balls with bells in them so they so for physical education, there are a lot of reasons a child would need these because the local library, the local Why doesn't have the stuff and especially now with COVID in distance learning, our children need to have the accessible technology at home because they might not be able to access what's in school. And I think more and more, I've always thought that our kids need embossers. At home too, these are Braille printers embossers. Because most kids can print something out, or they can look on their computer screen or their iPad screen, at multiple lines of text, our kids can't do that we don't have a multi line Braille display. And given that other kids can do that, even if they don't have a printer, they can look at multiple lines at once our kids can't. That is a need a faith related need, I believe. So they really do need emboss and embosser at home. orientation mobility, I'll hit this quickly. But it's really awesome. That orientation mobility, cane route independent mobility, independently going where you want to and figuring out where you're going, it's kind of exciting to figure out where you're going, and not just be led around all the time. This is provided for in the definition section of the federal law, Individuals with Disabilities Education Act that made special education possible. And please know that the school does not have a right to make a choice, the school cannot legally force you to have your child when your child has an age, we don't need that. We'll have a friend lead your child around that on many levels, but also illegal, it's bad educationally, because we're working toward independence and age appropriate independence. But legally, it's terrible because the Americans with Disabilities Act requires that the person can decide a person with the disability, including a child may refuse any accommodation offered. So you may refuse that aid. And they in the school may not say well, if you're refusing a I don't care, because you're not gonna get a cane in this building. completely illegal. So this is a little This is Americans with disabilities, that still applies. And, and they can't say well, if your child if you're not gonna let an eight be with your child, the new playground time, no. Eight Ada specifically says that the child shall not a person with disabilities shall not be excluded in participation or in or denied the benefits of the services, programs and activities of a public entity. And that includes schools. Just a little bit more, is that all? No, we're just getting started, but not today. things to think about impact on education. We've talked about the blindness specific aspects. Now, we're going to be talking about IEP aspects, because this is what's really this is what drives IPS. What is the impact on education? It varies widely. It can go from loss of access to educational curriculum and environment, loss of incidental learning at opportunities. And even a relatively mild adverse impact still, merits at IEP. Children don't know, but they can't see. And many times I want to desire, are they excited to please by seeing something? Because a lot of times that's how it's been presented their whole lives, and that's a human thing. But it's not a good thing. Because they're good, whether they see it or not. It's really important to instill that in them think all you need to do is tell the truth. It's like trying on shoes. There's no correct shoe size for every human being on this earth. There are a lot of incorrect ones. The one that fits you is the one that is yours. And that's the truth. It's instead of saying can you see that? How about what do you see what can really open a whole lot more, and the child doesn't know what he or she might be missing or misunderstanding, especially with some partial vision. And look at these non visual in many, many manifestations of poor vision behavior, disruptive, lack of attention, lack of motivation, and unfortunately, lack of progress. Also really quickly impact on students with other disabilities. Most the typical and widely used. intervention for other disabilities are highly visual. Pretty much all of them very visual. The child the child's need for vision impairment related to accommodations or modifications is an adverse impact on educational performance. If that need is keeping the child from getting autism support services, speech services, etc. Look at the whole child not compartmentalised. And what about a student with significant multiple disabilities? Let me tell you, communication is the most important thing for any child with with or without any disabilities. And our children with multiple disabilities need effective forms of communication. And that's what our blind specific educational tools can give us. Whatever, and whatever it must do prepare students with disabilities for post secondary education, post secondary employment, independent living, and they must provide faith free appropriate public education. Look at to what look at what the non disabled students are receiving, and add services needed for post secondary life. Casey was talking about the Expanded Core Curriculum that's in here too, but and extracurricular activities, independent living absolutely all of these, but also even things like curricular things like field trips, need to be able to move into in an unfamiliar area. What are the special the real special needs of the blind children? parody of access with, with non disabled peers access to the curriculum, access to instruction, access to environmental information, and everything must be as effective, efficient, and sustainable. And that's me. Unknown Speaker We'll stop my C Walker sharing. And I live we have some questions. In Casey, come back on. Unknown Speaker video, please. K Banks I'm Carlton we have a question in the chat. See if I can find it. I'm sorry. No worries. Unknown Speaker Um, K Banks it's about om instruction. Andrea Carlson says we have been told he doesn't require it. Now, that further assessment he does not. But he has issues with depth perception and changes in depth. The assessor claim none of those existed, unsure of where to go from here. Oh, and an instruction is not on his current IEP as they fill he can see too. Well. What are your thoughts? Well, C Walker that just the statement, he can see too well makes my stomach turn. But beyond that, the assessment isn't obviously not accurate. And a lot of these assessments aren't done very well. They're not scientifically based. They're not research based. Sadly, one, you have a right to an independent educational evaluation, ie. And I would recommend that you look into that, discuss that with the school. You also have a right to a new assessment if you if anything changes or as new, you have a right to. So if he's tripping a lot worn, or if he's becoming really scared to do things, that's another, they don't have to be tripping around. They might just be quite hesitant. And that's a big, big sign. I highly encourage you to come to our session tomorrow, where Casey will be talking about a an actually good assessment, the Noma K Banks Angel Pierce has a question Angel, can you unmute yourself? Go ahead and Unknown Speaker join. Unknown Speaker I have a question. I have a six year old going to be is going to preclude p k. And arching. Yeah, next year. He's a little regard. I'm honored to have him and with the IP meeting, group and everything else. Did you have a question? Uh, yeah. I just wanted to do a comment or say that that one, the other lady said that. Oh, first grader. First grade only thing you got to get him and and that around that age and stuff like that. But I already got my kids in kindergartner. C Walker Excellent. And excellent. And again, we're going to look at what are the non disabled kids doing? What are they doing on iPads? What are they doing with computers? What are they doing with posters of the classroom? My goodness, bulletin boards, especially the halls, this is so much information. every other kid gets it. Our kids deserve it. K Banks Carlton, it is 1030. Can we take some more questions or do you want to go ahead and C Walker I'm good. Okay, we K Banks have a question in the chat. Is there a law that mandates the child can get sufficient Braille instruction for example, a certified Braille teacher instead of a teacher that is able to complete Items enter Braille via technology but does not know the raw code themselves. C Walker Yeah, it's the idea. It's free appropriate public education. We don't have those tools left behind anymore, which required highly qualified instructors. But again, our back even back to the ADA, the Americans with disabilities that a child cannot be denied a service because of the disability. And being denied the service of learning to read and write at age appropriate levels. That's being denied a service. And unless the school really has a whole lot of people teaching French who've never taken French and just do like, use Google Translate you maybe if it's a bad bad of school, but I'm guessing that they require certification in regular ed classes. We need to have certification for our students. That's a parody issue. That's, that's still a rights issue. So do we have FAPE? With Ida, we have the Americans with Disabilities Act not being not a service. And we just have basic if you have you require certification for your math teachers, you need to require for your Braille teachers to K Banks thank you. We have a question from a nominee to get this name wrong. Vasia vasca? Alaska. Unknown Speaker They have they Hoss. Okay, thank you. I say hi. Unknown Speaker Oh, sorry about that. I just got a Okay, so, um, Hi, it's Vegas. And I just wanted to make a comment, because I'm, I'm a blind student now who's in college, but I just want to make a comment about like the, the gifted and talented thing because, um, I was tested for that. And I didn't, I almost qualified but it wasn't they, they said I couldn't get in because of the images, but are because I couldn't see certain images in it. But something to just keep in mind with, like the gifted and talented program is just to know how it works. Because at my school, in my elementary school, then the students who were in the gifted and talented program were actually pulled out of the other academic stuff and had to go somewhere else to do the gifted and talented stuff, plus they had extra homework. So it's just a matter of trying to figure out how to weigh in whether or not the student should go into that program with the knowledge that they might be pulled out of it. So just are pulled out of there other academics. So that's just something to keep in mind. C Walker It's that's a great point, they asked, we're going to talk about assessments tomorrow. And what they did with your assessment was absolutely inappropriate. It's illegal. Sorry, I'm such a lawyer, to have to, to use assessments that are not appropriate for the child. Because that's, again, we're denying participation, because of a disability can't do that legally. We have to pull out, they're no good IQ tests that are whole for buying people. So we have to pull out sub tests. And we have to look into information with that also for learning disabilities, like my child gifted and learning disabled, it was becoming a mush, because they weren't, they didn't want to do the IQ test. And they want to just average things that's not cool. With regard to pull out, gifted education, remember, this child has a right to an Individualized Education Program. And that may mean not necessarily being pulled out. It may mean the gifted program either being individualized to that child, which is not awesome, because part of the gifted program is the peer learning. But it may mean rethinking the gifted program a bit. And earlier, somebody talked about services after school. Absolutely. There's nothing in the law that says services must be given between the hours of 730 and 330. Um, Unknown Speaker we have Casey I'm sorry, no, Casey. Unknown Speaker Sorry, can't let me jump in real quick before we go to our next question, because we've had several things in the comment box about, um, about extended school. So I wanted to touch base on extended school I typed Excuse me, I typed a little bit in the box, but I wanted to let everyone know. A lot of families are being denied extended school year because their students did not regress over certain periods of time. Well, extended school year is determined based on two different things. But number one is regression and recoupment. For example, if over Thanksgiving break or over Christmas break or anytime that they've been at a school, they've regressed and they haven't been able to regain that within the same amount of time that they were out of school. School. The other one is critical point of need, all of our blind students meet the critical point of need. Because no matter how much Braille we give them during the school year, they still it is still not the amount of print that our print students receive. And in the summertime or over breaks, our print students are able to go and have print everywhere our Braille students aren't. And Braille is a skill that will diminish if you do not use it and consistently use it. So all of our students always meet the critical point of need for extended school year. So push back on your school until them you don't want recurrent regression and recoupment, you want the critical point of need, because no matter how much girl they give the student, they can't give them enough throughout the summertime or the extended school year to meet the amount of print and reading that print students get. C Walker And this also agreed and it also goes for assessable technology. Because, again, they can't get it at the local library or grand mom's house or whomever. And consider Oh, Nm two, because we want our kids to be age appropriate climbing trees and walking trails, and in summer, and if they're not able to do that, that's a critical lead point, too. Unknown Speaker And critical point of need is part of the law. It um, that is how all summer, all extended school years, they can be based on those two items. Okay, now, Kimberly, I'm sorry, I had to interrupting C Walker now. Okay, and just one more thing Some states have additional options to. So it's not just those two, but some. Pennsylvania has seven factors. So but yeah, Casey's absolutely right. K Banks We have a question from Ashley's iPhone. Ashley, can you unmute yourself? Oh, hello, can Unknown Speaker you guys hear me? Unknown Speaker Yes, yes. Unknown Speaker Okay. Unknown Speaker Um, I think you guys kind of just answered it. Because I raise my hand before you guys were talking about critical point of me. Um, I am an IEP advocate for parents in my affiliate, and something that we hear often is, oh, there's not enough hours in the school day to add all these things, there's not enough time. And then when we ask them to work outside of school hours or on weekends, they respond that the district doesn't allow them to do that, or they're restricted by the time limits. So they have like, declined to put a lot of things on the IEP or not wanted to due to time restrictions. So I'm just kind of trying to figure out a better way to respond to that. C Walker Katie, made a great point earlier that placement and service time is those are the last things we determined on IP, we have to terminate first. So really try to push forward with the need documenting that need, then if they say, well, we can't make our teachers work on the weekends. Yeah, that's fascinating. I really appreciate that they share their employment concerns with me. But that has nothing to do with the child. Nothing at all. That's called administrative convenience. There's a legal term. And courts have been really clear. Administrative convenience is no reason to withhold services. We don't have a TVI on staff. So we can't give services. You know, what if that were an excuse, there would be no TVI positions in this nation? Of course, that's known as us. That's goofy. And Casey, we have other Jackie triva of stephanies. We have some really great teachers in our Federation who do distance learning. So that's just not a good excuse. Casey. So that's how I would document the need. If they refuse to put an IP put it in the parental concerns portion. They cannot refuse that. If they refuse that write a letter here at the parental concerns. I asked him put in the IP you refuse to do that. We may have to go to mediation, they are not allowed to refuse parental concerns. Oh, you're muted, Casey, we're gonna fix that. Maybe I'm gonna fix it. I can. Oh, I think I can do it here. Unknown Speaker I'm trying to ask Unknown Speaker you to unmute you pace. Okay. C Walker You're good now. Hands off. Unknown Speaker Okay. I agree with what you said. Yes, that that is the school's go into IEP thinking that we have x amount of teachers, we have X amount of classrooms, your child has to fit within our box. But that is not what the federal law says the federal law says, we have to determine need before placement. So we go in and we make a list of all these kids this child's needs. And then we figure out a way to make those things happen. But schools automatically and I've been on the school, I was a general education teacher with inclusion students before I came into the field of blindness. And even at the university level, they teach their students to go in with the the IEP basically in a skeleton form saying, well, we have this amount of time with this teacher and this amount of placement. But that is not the way the federal law works. It works with we find out the needs of the student, and then we figure out how to do that. And I've worked with a many of cases in the last several years, where we've actually let um, we've done it through distance learning, because their TBI or their school cannot provide that distance learning. So we picked it up and we provided distance learning for that student. It either breaks during the breaks that they had during the day, or either after school or before school. It's not that much to add 45 minutes or 60 minutes to a child's day at the end or in the beginning to get them the services they need. And these are good quality services. C Walker Braille assistive technology orientation mobility, distance, yes. K Banks I'm Carlton, we have a question in the chat box that's getting a lot of attention from some parents. It's from Sarah herb. Many blind children in our area are classified as functional skill students rather than academic students. The functional skills students are being taught pre Braille activities but not Braille. Can you give an example of how a parent might might advocate for Braille instruction for their child who is nonverbal? has other health impairment impairments or has a behavioral plan? C Walker Sure, pre Braille is a terrible term. And I I advise you advise everyone do correct people every time they say it. Not I'm not correcting you, Sarah, was it get me wrong, I know the schools use it. We don't say pre print. Yeah, if we're not saying pre print, we can't say pre Braille, again, parody print Braille, we might say pre reading fabulous. However, the way I would really push against that. One is I want to know what assessment they have that says that indicates that child is not capable of learning to read. Because they probably don't have a good one, they probably have one that was put together in a back room and pieces parts. And it almost certainly does not meet idpa standards for assessment, we'll talk about them tomorrow. And if we have if you have a crummy assessment, you know, junk in junk out is a crummy assessment, don't accept their premise, don't accept this functional thing. In the basic baseline is least restrictive environment. Least Restrictive Environment is full time in the regular classroom. We can pull that back only when we have data assessments proving that we need to those might be a Braille need. Although Braille can be pushed into the classroom a lot, some of it might not be assistive technology orientation, we're building against some in some out. But if we're pulling a kid out of a regular ed classroom, we had darmowe better has some great assessments, indicating why and indicating and we have had to have a great plan indicating how we're going to get that kid back into the regular classroom as soon as possible, least restrictive environment, regular ed and pull out only to the minimum extent needed to provide a free appropriate education for that child. non verbal does not mean learning disabled or intellectually disabled. Nothing wrong with thinking or learning or disabled or intellectually disabled. But if you're deaf, you don't want to be labeled blind because you're not going to get the right the services you know, is that there's nothing wrong with either one. But we've got to have the right category so we can provide the right service child needs. Unknown Speaker I don't know of any assessment for pre Braille. It's a term that the field uses tons and tons but there is no assessment for pre Braille. It is a miss conception that we see a child that is non verbal, and we automatically think they can't learn. I have taught non verbal kids functional Braille, where they had enough Braille that they could read functional Braille girls bathroom boys bathroom cafeteria. Um, they could write out what they wanted coke candy soda pop, there's, um, that's a misconception in our field we need to as parents, and as educators, every time we hear the word pre Braille, we need to know that it doesn't exist. That helps them not it doesn't exist. Yes, it's pre literacy, it's emergent literacy. The correct term in the educational field is emergent literacy. And that's all the beginning literacy that pre K and kindergarteners, us. So I would push for them to show me their documentation that shows that this child cannot learn even some functional Braille. And if they can't, if the child can't, then that's fine. Then we go from there, and we start teaching other skills that the child needs, but eliminate Braille just because they're non verbal, is, um, is very, very wrong. C Walker And I too, have had some kids that significant and significant intellectual disability can read. I have also a child with orthopedic I'm just going to hit this because orthopedic disabilities, oh, well, you can't read with two hands. You can't attract so you can't learn. Child I have child she could only move her right index finger, one inch horizontally, terrible, terrible on juvenile arthritis as a result of Lyme disease. Hey, we were playing after not terribly long. We were playing Sudoku and Uno. She learned to read Braille playing Sudoku and Uno. So it's possible. Unknown Speaker Alton, how are we on time? C Walker We have let's we'll have to cut at 1055 57 at that we must be done by 11. There's no going over. Because we have affiliate caucuses. I'd like to be finished by 1055. But I'll except a couple minutes. Unknown Speaker How about you Casey? Unknown Speaker I'm good. I need to be um, yeah, the time difference throws me off. But yes, I need to be done by like 1050 1055. So but we do have I want to remind everybody, we do have another IEP session tomorrow. And we will go into assessments and we'll go into negotiation processes of what to do when the school disagrees. And I think a lot of the questions we're getting would fit really well in that section of what to do when the school disagrees. Unknown Speaker Great point. K Banks Um, one Ortez has a Unknown Speaker question. Sure. Unknown Speaker Yeah, yes. Good morning. Yeah. My question is this, I just want to be clear. So now that we have the pandemic, and there might be a student that may not be getting the mobility or the services that they need. Is it true that, let's suppose they go back to school the next semester? The last term? Is it true that if they don't get the service and dies on the IEP, they can request those service of plug the service that they are to get on the next term, meaning that support they're supposed to get 20 hours of mobility this semester? So and then that's the method 20? Can they say, Well, I didn't get the 20 before, so you got to give me 40 hours. Is that true? And the other question is, I have to question Another question is, what is the best place to send children for independent evaluations? Unknown Speaker Okay, C Walker I'll tackle the first I'm gonna like, hey, Casey, it also the first and second, the first if you're what you're asking about this a term it's just helpful to know these terms because the school people know it, it's compensatory education. And that's when there's there's a lot going on politically about it in the school and legal community. Schools sometimes bristle at it because it's long been punitive, the school messed up so now they have to give compensatory education. It really isn't that what it is, is, for whatever reason, purposeful or negligent or unavoidable, the child did not receive the special education services he or she needed for fake. So the child needs more services, compensatory education services, but it's not a one for one legally, it's not a one for one. So if you miss 20 hours, you don't necessarily entitled to 20 hours. What you are entitled to is what is needed to make up for that loss for that that time. For that three or four month loss, so not the hours lost, but the time loss to pull the child back to where he or she would have been, if we'd gotten those 20 hours, that might be five hours, the kid might have just kind of grown and done a lot on his or her own, which is you still want to document Unknown Speaker that. Unknown Speaker But that's a possibility. Unknown Speaker But C Walker the kid might need 50 hours, Unknown Speaker 60 hours, C Walker because there are windows of opportunity that are lost, or the kid might have just kind of lost a whole bunch of skills during that time, the critical point. So it really depends. It's an IP team decision. Realistically, it's usually done one for one, but you need to know Unknown Speaker why. C Walker You have a right to either five hours or 50 hours, depending on where what the child lost skills wise. So that you don't have to take except five or 10 hours. When you say, hey, it might be 50 gig. It's it's part of negotiation, but it's not a one for one, right, but it is a right to the skill level that should have been achieved, has the services been provided? I see. Unknown Speaker Um, I agree with that, and your question about where to send for an independent evaluation. If it's orientation and mobility, I would have to say if you could email me, I can connect you with someone in your state that we trust to do independent evaluations. Because you don't want to get more of the same you don't want your own instructors friend to do an O and e m in independent evaluation, and then the same results come out of it. So if it's, um, if it's for Braille, same thing, email me and I can connect you with somebody in your state tomorrow during the assessments. I'm going to talk about an assessment that's been on the market for about 10 years, but a lot of professionals don't use it. But it is the only valid and reliable assessment out there for reading media. Unknown Speaker And Unknown Speaker you can do a lot of it yourself. And then you would have your TBI do the rest of it. But we're going to talk about that tomorrow. But one if you would just email me at that Casey West 90 four@hotmail.com. I can try to connect you with somebody in your state that would do an independent odium evaluation. Unknown Speaker Okay, thank you. And I also want to say that presentation is excellent. Oh, thank Unknown Speaker you so much. And well, I K Banks think that's a good note to stop on. I just wanted to let everybody know that the recording will be made available. The recording of this meeting will be made available on our website and opc.org. Again, that's www.nopbc.org. We should also have accessible versions of the PowerPoints available on the website as well. I I put Casey and Carlton's email in the chat, but if you didn't get it, Casey's email is Casey West. ca se y w e s t nine four@hotmail.com. And Carlton's is Carleton walker@gmail.com. I'd like to thank Carlton and Casey for being here today and sharing so much wonderful information with us. And I'd like to thank you all for coming. C Walker And thank you to Kimberly for and Chris. We're doing awesome posting jobs. Yes, Unknown Speaker thank you, Kimberly and Chris. Unknown Speaker Welcome. C Walker Joe, find your affiliate caucus, join your affiliate caucus Unknown Speaker net. Please do and it was our pleasure to help this morning guys. Transcribed by https://otter.ai