all right all right welcome everyone to our special education committee uh if we can get started my name is Carla grigo and I am a teacher I'm also a parent in L USD and I'm the newly elected School Board member for
Board District 5 and today is my first special education committee meeting as a chairperson so you um so just to share a little bit about myself um I just I've been teaching for 20 years uh 18 of those years are as a special education teacher
in special day program as well as the resource specialist program I have uh the last two years I was a community school coordinator at mallister high school which is an option school for pregnant and parenting minors and so as a special education teacher and somebody
who has been a longtime fighter and activist for racial and social justice it made sense for me to be a special ed teacher to work with some of our most vulnerable students but also some of our most resilient and courageous uh population that we serve
here in in LAUSD who have a history of fighting for their rights for inclusion and for equity and it is this movement of persons with disabilities that birthed the educational programs that sought a free and appropriate education
for students with disabilities it is because of them that we are here is because of this fighting movement that it was established that students with disabilities uh needed and uh deserved access to the least restrictive
environment that was appropriate to meet their needs this movement was made up of parents and uh they were victorious in passing a law that not only called for these um these educational Appropriations but more importantly
called for the funding um that our federal government would fund this uh educational programs for our students this is a movement that joined the women's movement the Civil Rights Movement the anti-war movement and it has made it possible for us to even be
here today in this moment and so as we sit here and we listen and we discuss I want us to keep in mind that this space is now more vulnerable than ever right um I want us to uh keep in mind that there's a lot of attacks against our
movement uh of students with disabilities and so let us recognize um that our work is not only to defend our students with disabilities and the programs that they fought for but also to keep fighting for more for more funding and for more programs um I want
to thank uh board president Scott Schmelson and his office and our LUSD um office of special education who helped uh get us ready for this meeting today and and um I want you to know that our
goal with this committee is to make this space a co-thinkers of space we not only want to learn about the programs that the district has to offer in special education but we also want to
co-thinkers and make them the types where our students with disabilities Thrive academically and social emotionally and that they benefit to the maximum from their educ experience how can we make our classrooms and school experiences such where our students are welcomed and
included in every single space how can we welcome our families and caregivers into their child's educational process such that they feel empowered and valued I invite our committee members to share their ideas and their experiences I
invite our public speakers to share their ideas and experiences this is a space where we discuss issues and think of solutions and proposals that we can bring to the board we in this committee are part of this broader movement that is fighting
for our most vulnerable students and in our district and we are engaging and growing our special ed programs so with that I would like to open up space for our committee members to introduce themselves and uh just share what
motivates you to be in this committee so I'd like to start over there hello I'm Samantha Taves I'm a a faculty member at Cal State Northridge in the special education department and I prepare a lot of teachers who um come
into the field and often work in LUSD and so I have a a a big interest in supporting the work that goes on in the district to support our students and um support our teachers and so I felt this was a good opportunity to to hear what's
going on but also to give back to that growth thank you my name is Amy BOS I work in the dep education program I'm an itinerate teacher I do facilitation between part C
the babies and Part B the school age group and a whole bunch of other things I am all about um Equity resources inclusion communication language
assess an inclusion I know I said that one but I'm big on inclusion thank you thank you good afternoon thank you for that question I'm Dr Ras um board member representing Board District 2 and um you know I've
never shared this but I'm going share it today um I have my cousin Adrian and he's older than me I'm 50 plus years and so he's older than me and growing up he's he um I always wonder what was going on with Adrian and he's on
artistic but back in the 870s that's something that um families struggled with it was something that uh parents felt ashamed because they felt it was their fault that their child was autistic and I remember my aunt really you know um struggling and I think for
me special education a students with special needs or Autism or down syndrome um always had a special place in my heart because of Adrian and so now board member I this is my second in this committee and I just want to be able to
learn more and um how to so I can better represent our families and our students of special needs and um so yeah that's why I'm here because I want to learn more and service more the the that this community that is the most vulnerable
and needs the most support so thank you thank you an excellent question so being a teacher was my first job and uh I had little jobs during the summer going to college but this was my first
real job and in 1973 I said I'm going to stay here as a teacher and work with all of our kids and little by little I got to know our special ed population and I felt that they really needed a voice at school and
that was me I was the special ed counselor at Virgil Middle School and uh very important to me so I just want you to know the special is close to my heart just so you know thank you
okay good afternoon Jose stto proud executive director of special education um a little bit about me I started working with students disabilities uh when I was very young because my mother used to teach catechism to students uh on the on the
modified core and I had to do Christian service hours as part of uh the school that I went to so I would go and do my hours with my mom and then an opportunity to serve as a special education assistant came up after high school and I I I took that job on and I
worked at willenberg special education center for about four years and then uh at the same time I was going to school to serve our students disabilities and I started teaching at celery special education center uh in Gardina and then from there I was able to transition to a comprehensive Elementary School in my
city where I was raised in Wilmington and then I took on various jobs with the division of special education ation including program Specialists Behavior specialist uh LR specialist and then ultimately served as special education administrator in region South and as you
can see special ed has always been uh part of my trajectory and part of my moral compass I did leave to serve as a school principal at two schools uh and then made my way back to serve as executive director but you know in leadership it's always great to see
through different lenses um and one lens that I offer in this position is I'm also the parent of a father with students two students that have disabilities so a lot of times when we're talking about students disabilities or we're making decisions that Impact Services or things of that
nature I always think of my children because I want to make sure that when we always make decisions I know that we always put our children's best interests at heart so I always have them in my mind when we're talking about students with disability so um yes um I'm I'm proud to serve in this position and uh
I'm proud to be part of this committee good afternoon my name is Mary Kellog and I'm here from the office of general counsel um during my entire legal career I have been working in the field of special education um during my entire
life I have been surrounded or um been near people uh who learn differently who have disabilities who have different needs and I can say that it is an honor um to to be included in this work and to provide service to the school district
and its wonderful students including those with special needs thank you hi uh my name is Ari forest and I'm proud to be here to be part of this special education meeting and uh that I get to hear like some presentations that like students that need to require that
like need a bunch of support for people with disabilities and for me as a disa person for having these hearing these past presentations this has been helping a lot to like not only to myself but like for other students who need out there for help and this actually motives me be a lot and
really proud to say that and I'm glad to be a part of this community thank you hi my name is Elizabeth Thomas Parker and I'm a proud LAUSD employee and I started off um with LA USD as a volunteer and recently recently I have
also been an SEIU vice vice president for about 9 years but I started off l l USD as educational Aid to and promoted as a special ed assistant and so I've been with district for 36 years and I'm an advocate for special education assistant and special needs students and
I had two two children of my own that were special needs students and so I have a passion and a love for special needs students and adults so I'm grateful to be on the committee and thank you for having me hi I'm Marsha Scott I worked I began my career in the district as a special
education office technician and that experience helped me to have a comprehensive understanding of how when we meet the needs of our students with exceptional needs they Thrive and their families are grateful a lot of times
those opportunities have been um fleeing to some of those families because as we don't understand what we don't know we aren't able to provide the best services so I am passionate about making sure that the parents' voices are heard that
the students voices are heard and that we as a community are representing those needs my mom was a special ed par professional for 32 years and so I grew up volunteering in special ed centers and special ed classrooms as a teenager
so I'm passionate about making sure that I give back and that I show gratitude and respect for the responsibilities we have to our individuals with exceptional needs hi I'm Gavin migani I'm the proud principal of willenberg career and transition Center um I had my start in
special ed when I was in third grade I was diagnosed with auditory processing disorder and visual processing disorder um I spent my years in special ed working through my challenges uh and overcame many of the roadblock blocks that were in front of me uh that helped
to shape me uh as a principal at a special education center helping to clear those roadblocks for my students um I spent uh first couple years teaching Jen Ed and then spent 10 years uh in assist of technology and then
spent the last 14 years uh developing the program at willenberg and proud to say that we are one of the top schools in the nation and finding uh employment opportun unities for young adults with disabilities and getting them uh into
jobs that they can uh maintain for the future I believe we have our staff members they should introduce themselves all right well the there are staff members and they make a lot of things possible Rosa is my chief of staff and we have Jasmine Garcia who
works with Dr Rivas and we have Sylvia Martinez who works with uh Mr smelson and we have somebody from whose office an ASL translator thank you um so
anyway thank you so much to everyone for sharing and as you can see we all are coming to this space with lots of heart and lots of desire to make things possible for our students and I appreciate you all sharing your personal
connection to the programs of special education so with that we're going to begin our meeting um we have lots of uh great presentations we one we're going to be um honoring and celebrating World
Down syndrome awareness day and World autism awareness month and then we are going to talk about how we empower students with disabilities through augmentative and alternative communication and assistive technology in communication and learning and as a
special at teacher I didn't know too much about this I learned about this through our um OTS our occupational therapists our speech therapists or our physical therapists so I'm very excited that we have these presentations so that
we all learn about this and we can take this and hopefully discuss at the end how can we make this more accessible to our families and to our students and how can we prepare our Educators and our educator assistants to support our students so I would like to uh bring
forth M uh Dr James CZ who will be speaking about world Down syndrome awareness day and World Autism Awareness Month hello everybody hi uh it's great to be in front of you again this school year so
excited to see this uh Gathering and to hear all of you share your experiences uh what a great way to open the meeting uh great to meet you Miss GGO um and other members of the of the board glad to be here with you today and other members of the committee glad to be here
with you today as well we are here to talk about world Down syndrome awareness day and Autism Awareness Month um but first I'd love to share if I could about myself as well um I am Dr Dr James Co and I'm the coordinator of moderate
severe instruction in the division of special education and so I get to work with students kindergarten through the time that they're no longer eligible for special education from the time they leave preschool and come into kindergarten until they end up at a
school like U Mr miglani and go to our career and transition centers I get to support my team and I get to support the programs throughout all of those years of instruction and it's exciting to see the changes that have happened um with our concerted our focused effort in
the area of instruction and now in the area of the diploma as you may have heard about and so I'm excited to be here with you all today and to share about these two celebrations we have uh coming up um world Down syndrome Awareness Day
is on March 21st each year and uh Down syndrome occurs when three copies of of chromosome 21 are present in a student or in an individual one in 700 babies are born annually in the United States
with Down Syndrome but the most important thing we want to say about people with any disability a big movement in the disability rights community and for those with Down Syndrome is that they should be included in the conversation
the theme is with us not for us the the message is with us not for us in the disability community that when someone does have a disability we want to include them in the conversation in the decision-making process and think about what they want to become what they want
to do what they need to learn best and so they need the freedom to make their choices they need to have full and effective participation in school and in their community and so when you when we come up to March 21st each year and as
we prepare for it I hope we're always thinking about how we can include people with disabilities in the conversation as we plan and and include and think about how we can support them throughout their lives some characteristics of people
with disabilities and these come from Down syndrome International um the learner characteristics that they list specifically are that people with Down Syndrome are often strong visual have strong visual learning skills actually I should preface this you know every indiv
individual is different and so while these are the common characteristics they may not be true of everyone with Down Syndrome but quite often we find people with Down Syndrome have strong visual learning skills that they have the ability to communicate and sometimes
that means using signs or gestures and visual supports but also to learn to use spoken language and to be encouraged in that area sometimes encouraging communication using their own voice also comes through the use of assisted
technology and uh augmentative and alternative communication methods um these students do always have the ability to learn more and to use the written word and so our Focus has been on increasing literacy skills for people
with disabilities across all of our programs but also specifically for students with Down Syndrome they have a tendency to Model Behavior and attitudes from peers and adults um that is one of the characteristics at Down syndrome International lists I think what we can
take from that positively is we should have positive attitudes we should have high expectations for behavior and that when we have those we will see results from our students with Down syndrome and like most of us people with Down
Syndrome do benefit from structure and routine and so any time we can plan for prepare our students for um any changes that might happen or to make sure the day is outlined well and that it's predictable we'll have more results in our classrooms when you're thinking
about supporting students with Down Syndrome you want to make sure to have an access to uh access to an inclusive and an equitable quality education most of you shared hints at that at the reason for your work in schools and with
people with disabilities is that you want them to get all that they deserve and I believe that that is what point number one there says and access to an equitable quality education we want we are teaching self- advocacy and self-determination skills
in our schools one of the key ways that we're doing that is encouraging students to be full participants or to participate in their IEP process whether that means participating in the actual IEP team meeting or preparing a
presentation a video Work samples or a message for the IEP team to review um teaching students to speak about themselves to know about their strengths and how they are best supported in their learning is a key to their success and
then I mentioned it earlier but high expectations we can't emphasize enough the need for high expectations in all of our programs moving on to the month that follows so March 21st Down syndrome Awareness Day the next month is all
about a autism it is autism acceptance or Autism Awareness Month and April each year is the time that we remember our students who are neurodivergent who are on the autism spectrum and April 2nd specifically is World autism awareness
day as designated by the United Nations the prevalence of autism does continue to increase uh currently one in 36 children is expected or suspected to have autism according to CTC estimates what that translates to in L
USD is that over 18,000 students are people with Autism in our school system at this time autism spectrum disorders are reported to occur of course in all racial ethnic and socioeconomic groups there is no predictor of that um and it
is four times more common among boys than among girls some of the ways ways that we um encourage our staff to be better prepared to support students with autism is that we we've provided a training for them we have evidence-based practice
training that is available in my pln for staff uh specifically in the areas of visual supports um prompting reinforcement and task analysis and those evidence-based practices are well researched and they're evidence-based
because they have a research base that the National professional development center on autism and the in the National professional development uh Center on autism sorry about that and en Cape the national Center for Autism evidence and practice have determined
has um enough of a base to be used in schools we encourage um staff participating listening today to check that out on my pln to search for evidence-based practices we also refer families to a set of modules that are available for UC
Davis um the UC Davis Adept modules are a beginning an intro to understanding your child with autism and they're available for free to the public um they're available at bit. leuc davis-
Adept another way that we are collaborating in California to ensure evidence-based practices are in use across the state is through captain the California autism professional training and Information Network and Captain is
as I said a Statewide collaboration between school districts higher education uh Community agencies such as task um and Family Resource Centers and Regional centers and through that uh collaboration we also provide um
information and training that's available and present at um at school sites at Regional centers um so that families understand how we're supporting students if they're in our school system my last slide is about an
upcoming uh Community Conference and there's a major uh need for our families of students with autism to know how to keep their children safe this conference this year is focused on that specifically it's presented by the autism intervention research and
Behavior group um they are presenting the safe and sound conference on March 21st I know that's a little confusing because that's also World Down syndrome awareness day but they're presenting that on March 21st and it is available for registration at the link on the
slide deck um well they will be reviewing uh topics related to the safety of individuals with autism and how to prepare for lifelong success and lifelong safety for them so I do encourage anybody that can to register and especially our families that may be
listening today to uh to participate in that and with that I believe that I am done thank you so much for your presentation I'd like to open space for anyone who has any comments or any questions uh regarding these two uh
presentations so it's a hybrid it's a hybrid conference in Seattle and online correct you know what I know that it is online well I think my guy re search that and I think it's also in Seattle but I'll double check before we finish there may be something similar I know
that they specifically present it to families in the LA area for this specific one I'm going to let others ask first but do you know that you are an Eminence when it comes to special at every time I say your name everyone knows who you are no matter what state
they come from I have to tell you that everybody knows your name just so you know that's a little embarrassing sir but I app app very proud of you I am very proud of you you can start with any questions and I'll come at the end all right anybody else have any questions or any
comments blush go ahead hi James good to see you and thank you so much for sharing these great resources um there's several that I'm I'm interested in in sharing with folks um I actually have a question about some of the activities that go on in schools
on on you know World autism day or or world um Down syndrome awareness day um and I'm curious if there are any if if we want to talk about um strategies to sustain those days but I think sometimes
when we have um special days where we celebrate diversity there's a lot of focus on that in the day but then we lose um focus of those accessibility goals throughout the year um so I wonder if there are activities planned that
involve like school goals setting or um students setting goals for accessibility in their schools or some something related to kind of sustaining the practices past that month or day no I I do love that question of course because we don't want students with Down
Syndrome to be celebrated one day um and and not celebrated every day and not taught every day we want them Highly Educated highly engaged every day of the school year and with their peers as you mentioned um we do have plans we are
planning um especially in advance for next school year for how we will keep that message going um for all of these kinds of days throughout the whole year um and so we are actively planning for that right now thank you so much
Gavin so Dr Co I appreciate uh presenting on on these topics because we've we've had many many conversations on how we can um promote uh these special days for our young adults um one of the things that I want to also look
at is it's important for us to um make our school families and Community aware of these special dates for our our kids but also to promote and Advocate out in the communities so the great work that
we do within our schools if they stay within the walls of our schools it's great for those students while they're here but if it stops at age 22 and not out into the community so are there plans or Communications that we could
look at to communicate to our larger communities outside of LAUSD to promote um how capable our our young adults are who might be diagnosed with uh an intellectual disability or Autism I'm going to say yes through
Captain especially that kind of conversation is happening that um because it is a collaboration a multi- agency multi- partner collaboration um the regional centers as an active participant are hearing about what we are doing in schools and encouraging agencies and encouraging future service
providers and and families to know about the work that's going on because like the work that you're doing at your school uh you don't want it to end you don't want it to be the last time a student has a work experience you want it to be the first time or or the second time they have a work experience and so
those kinds of conversations are happening in our consortiums in our relationships with other agencies wonderful anyone else oh I'll be last okay anybody else okay if um I have a question uh
regarding um training for teachers in special ed do you still offer the authorization programs for uh autism for educators I would have to defer to the district intern program on that uh Dr s are you
aware of which program we can look into that and I'll get back to you on that all right because that's a great program for all Educators in special education I got my authorization through L USD it was by a parent who also is trained to
do this and it was amazing I learned a lot as already a specialed teacher just to get a refresher and get that authorization program can I clarify are you asking about the autism added authorization specifically okay yes I I we'll we'll need to look into that I remember I did teach that many years ago
I was one of the instructors for it and it was a great experience we shared a lot of great resources learn so much I learned a lot through that appreciate we if we don't have it I would suggest that we bring it back and um for our teachers our Educators I I see Dr tae's hand up
could I add a clear or maybe you're going to answer about that well I just wanted to say that um for the most part the autism authorization is now built into the credentialing structure for teachers in California so a lot of teachers needed to get that added authorization when the credential
shifted um and so there were a lot of people who urgently needed that autism Al Al authorization but anybody who's being credentialed now comes out of their special education program with that um authorization in
California thank you so much um okay before we let me see I have had another somebody else has a question have one M Thomas Parker you have a question too no okay so Dr Rivas and then Scott
you know as I mentioned about my my cousin Adrian um things have changed since the 80s and 70s right thank goodness now we have awareness and you know the us as a society in a world are more inclusive of that um and now in our
as the is moving into inclusion including you know students with um NE or neurod virgin students just want to know how are we supporting our gen Ed teachers as they're um you know have students you know um with special needs
inside of the classroom I know you mentioned here uh visual supports prompting reinforcement and task analysis but if you can just kind of give us a a brief understanding of how we're supporting our our Jenna teachers with this new inclusion that we moving
absolutely I can tell you a few of the things we've done this school year um to make sure that gened teachers do hear more about our students with disabilities and their supports um last summer we started with Summer PD and the summer professional development um provided an opportunity for our gened
teachers to learn about students with disabilities and their needs from both the lens of students with mild moderate or less extens or or mild moderate support needs and with extensive support needs we provided um a especially the team that I work with supporting
students with extensive support needs we provided over a thousand teacher participants information about how students with extensive support needs could participate in their classrooms and could be supported in their classrooms we turned that into a full day presentation um that we've offered
five times during this school year and we'll work to plan how to get more of that message out there for students with extensive support needs specifically our teachers um are teachers are also participating in other professional development that the division of special
education offers such as our literacy trainings and other aspects of how to support the school day like our Behavior trainings and um that work will continue into the next summer PD planning as we move forward last question and with our
parent committees our Pac right how closely do you work with them in you know providing support for you know or at least you taking in their input and feedback and then supporting our parents I would have to defer to another team for that I have presented to them this
year and have supported them in that um in with a presentation related to the students that my team supports um but another team in the division of special education manages the yeah works with them directly and what's what was the presentation that you did with them ours was about of course the diploma which we
love to talk about all the time now and about the full range of supports for our students from Kinder through uh 22 along with um which assessments our students take when they have extensive support needs the because they they're not they
often are eligible for the California alternate assessment so that's that was our presentation this year oh so the presentation for autism or down syndrome was done by someone else U if there was I'm not aware of the other topics that were specifically presented it would be very important to provide a presentation on this as well okay
thanks all right thank you all right Scott I think all right you might be last yeah that's next time I'll go right away so you won't have to remember to get me uh West I have to thank you because I know that that training was given at
Johnny L Cochran junr Middle School where I was principal and I remember that when school was over a whole slew of people came in to be retrained I think they picked my school because it had a great parking lot not necessarily because of me but they had a great
parking lot and we made it very welcome for the kids and the teachers it was it there were hundreds of teachers there uh two nights a week participating in that program it was and they always forgot their cord to the computer they would call me in the morning and say you have my cord and I go to the room and it was
there so thank you West for doing all that for our teachers and our kids yes West thank you okay my question is for the benefits of any parents who are watching and listening can you go over the process uh Mr Coons about how
students ad vate for themselves and how their needs and and how the district appropriately responds to their own requests okay all right thank you all right so our students with disabilities are being taught um especially when
they're at transition age um the transition planning process includes our students and Key activities in that process include learning about themselves self- advocacy about especially at transition age the type of
learner that they are what they um are already good at and what they still need help at and so our transition teachers our transition team does work with students specifically in that uh in that age range to be able to help students
then transition those skills to Community College to four-year University and to the workplace our students get connected and are encouraged to connect with also the Department of Rehabilitation and to continue receiving supports from them when they leave our
schools along with any other services they may be eligible for through the regional center and so they're encouraged throughout to participate in their IEPs to share about themselves um to bring um what they know about themselves to the table and what their hopes and dreams are to that um IEP
table and um especially I got to emphasize when they turn 18 for the most part it is Theirs to manage it is Theirs to decide and they get to have those educational rights when they turn 18 with us as many students are turning 18
during their their senior year now in our schools right you're right Mr Coons it's all about them so I appreciate that thank you yes go ahead doctor I just wanted to follow up on that question about the self-determination um I I have a vague
memory of discussing new supports for teachers to use or to to plan self-determination goals with their students from a few years ago um could you talk a little bit about maybe what what those supports were they were supports around writing IEP goals for
students with ex uh for around self-determination I think you're referring to uh time when we had presentations uh specifically focused for our teachers of students with extensive support needs there was pandemic era we had a zoom meetings
about um planning for self determination we invited the state Council on developmental disabilities to present with us at those meetings as well and to share about um alternatives to conservatorship which we call supported
decision-making now which um was pretty I think pretty groundbreaking at that time that we were doing it in such a broad way sharing it with so many teachers at the same time um through that process we were talking about um including our students more in the IEP
team meetings and about thinking through how we can build those self-determined self- Advocate um goals into their IEPs um I will need to Circle back on where we ended up with all of that but I do remember that as well yeah yeah thank
you James um I did also uh want to share that we also have a micr credential program uh I think Dr Ras you asked about supporting our Genet teachers so I have Leela Rondo here who's our coordinator of instruction for the division who will share a little bit about that as well
hi please nice to see everybody yeah we um we have a team who's been working on our first micr credential for special education it's joining the the vast Suite of micro credentials um and we have our first participants this year our first cohort it's been really
phenomenal it's um it's a very extensive process as you all know and we have been hearing very loudly and clearly that gen teachers are hungry to know as much as possible about supporting our students with disabilities so um this is a program that's specific to general
education teachers to learn how to broaden their practices so they can better support students with disabilities in their classrooms um in addition to that I think James talked a little bit too about some of the the broad District wide PD offerings that we've had on how to better support
students with disabilities in gened classrooms one of those just to highlight it um there was a choice board a PD Choice board that was given to principles um earlier this year and we had two sessions there specific to supporting students with disabilities
and um one was on understanding disabilities and accommodations that they could do with their staff it had like a a full facilitators guide with it and the other one was on belonging and being an advocate for inclusive practices are these optional those are part of the principal's Choice board so
it's up to a yes they're optional in that a principal can decide is this something that my staff and I want to focus on this year but we know there's many focuses and different reasons but yeah we we want to make sure that we have high quality professional development available to our schools and
also the micro credential is that an option for a gened teacher to do yes it's exclusive for gened teachers okay and it's not required of teachers who are in an inclusive classroom no it's not required it's absolutely optional um and they receive salary points as a result of coming
through sounds good um I have a question to Dr T is it Tas is that how I pronounce it TZ Taves Tav okay um the credential program that you work out of do they have a section on inclusive
classrooms and how to teach uh the for the gened and the sped teacher to collaborate in teaching Jed um our our whole program is based in inclusive practices so all of our courses have some aspect of how to
support inclusion for for all students students we do have one course that is for all teachers in in any credential program at the University um general education Elementary secondary um where they're in class with special education
teacher candidates and that class is all about collaboration strategies um accommodation modification supports and um General inclusive teaching strategies and it has projects where they work together to plan um universally designed
instruction um so there is one course that everybody takes together um but that is the only course that our general education teacher candidates take during their um program it's not the only course where they learn about um inclusive practices there are other
courses in the general education Elementary and secondary programs that have content on accommodations and um meeting the needs of all students but um in our program that's that's where that's where it comes together all right wonderful thank you any other questions
comments back yes I just wanted to uh respond as well so the question was about self-determination and the curriculum um we are piloting uh last semester a program out of UCLA um that we're working with 40 weeks of lessons
to help students uh utilize self-determination to make choices um and so we we've expanded that from four uh classrooms to uh eight classrooms this semester and then we're expanding that uh Beyond but right now we're
developing that program and expanding it out all right this is the last chance for anybody who has not shared anything yet okay well thank you so much uh Dr Cs and um let's move on to our next
topic which is empowering students with disabilities we have a whole team wow that PowerPoint should I start it myself the it folks will come out and perfect there's a little button there
for you to advance the slides you see all right got it thank you while she's getting it up I can go ahead and start well all right there it is uh my name is Ray Daniel McCoy uh I like to consider myself like a lifelong La USD family
member you know as a student parent uh uh a staff member uh for the last at least 47 years or so so maybe not working but as a family member um I currently serve as the Director of related services for the division of
special education where I've been in this role for about uh well since July uh but I've been back with the division of special education for the last four and a half years or so um it is our pleasure today to bring to you a presentation on the role of uh AAC and
at in communication and learning our team is committed to ensuring that all students have access to the tools that they need uh maybe I should go right there because that's there you go that's the welcome uh uh we just want to make sure we ensure that all students have access to the tools and support that
they need uh in communication our team is committed to uh uh uh well I'm sorry sorry the AAC and and at uh play a vital role in in uh giving students the voice that they need at times when they don't always have it uh uh within them to to
to to say right so that we have the we have devices up here that we'll allow you guys to see and and get familiar with uh and just give you a little bit of background on on what it is we have several members of our team that will'll be presenting today uh we have our coordinator of the language and speech
program Miss Aon Hong who's here we have two of her Specialists uh nishana steel and Stacy Stacy Hotchkis always like stutter when I say her name St sty HK we also have our coordinator of ATI uh Mr
Steve Kim uh who will be presenting with uh two of his at accessors Malika farel and Anthony Morales so we'd like to thank you for your time your dedication uh and and supporting all of our Lear Learners so at this time I'll turn it over to miss Aaron h
I was supposed to show their names when I said that all right hello everyone okay it's so nice to be here today my name is Aaron Hong I'm the coordinator of the speech and language program sometimes we say language and speech so we use that a little bit
interchangeably um and I'm so excited to be here today to talk to you all about AAC augmentative and alternative communication so a couple of acronyms and definitions for you all who might not be as familiar Las stands for language and speech
sometimes we refer to ourselves as the Las program sometimes we refer to our service as Las services so just an example of how we use that acronym SLP stands for speech language
pathologist slpa stands for speech language pathology assistant AAC stands for augmentative and alternative communication and I'll include my colleagues acronyms as well
at stands for assistive technology it stands for instructional technology so I promise as we go into the presentation we will expand on all of these acronyms so that you don't have to be quizzed and
remember it all from this slide okay so a couple of our objectives for today's presentation so we are going to define the roles of Las as well as at in terms of the program and the supports and services that we provide we're also
going to establish foundational knowledge of AAC and at principles and applications we're going to examine AAC and at in terms of supporting communication and learning we're we
going to engage in some Hands-On exploration you can see some of the different uh devices and communication tools appear here you also have a little gift for you at your seats um that you probably have seen so we'll talk about that and uh have a chance to practice using it and then of course we're going
to share parent resources and strategies on how to utilize AAC and at at home all right so as we get into the first kind of chunk of of uh our presentation here we will be talking about language and speech and the role of
AAC so backing up a little bit and just talking about Las as a program so language and speech program it's a group of people and we have over 700 providers including speech language Pathologists speech language pathology assistants of
course there's me the coordinator and I have 11 wonderful administrators who are Las Specialists who support and directly super supervis those over 700 employees and this is districtwide so our mission is to support communication needs for
students who have difficulty accessing their curriculum so what that really looks like is in the areas of articulation meaning the way that you say your sounds it could be language which is expressive the way that you speak receptive the way that you're
understood and also pragmatic language which is social language how do you use language in social situations and then we also support students who stutter so we support fluency and voice so all of those areas you can imagine we have a
pretty broad scope and that's just within the school setting however our mission is to identify assess prevent and treat students who have these types of communication disabilities so that they can participate in their educational setting some of the students
who receive Las services and supports also require AAC or augmentative and alternative communication to Aid their communication and be able to participate in their educational setting so a little bit now we're kind
of focusing in on AAC so AAC supports individuals with speech impairments by supplementing or replacing spoken language through devices systems and strategies and that's idea's def definition of AAC so really the purpose
of AAC is to build those core language skills and to support communication we also can enhance speech and communication without hindering verbal development so that's a really important point that we like to highlight is that
by using a device by using a system that does not require verbal language that does not impede or that does not hinder a child or a person from learning able language it supports communication overall and alog together so in our presentation today we're going to be
talking about various types of AAC which include light te midte and high-tech and in the following slides we'll talk about what those different types of what those what that terminology means and what those different types of supports look
like and for now I will hand it off to my colleague Steve Kim thank you Miss Hong my name is Steve Kim I the coordinator of the assistive and instructional technology program and thank you for having us today the instructional um or assist of
instructional technology program or at um at is defined as any tool or device whether it's commercial modified or customized that enhances the functional capabilities of students with disabilities and this also comes from
the federal idea Act instructional technology or it those are tools or resources designed to enhance the teaching and learning for all students at we come in and we help bridge that gap between what the students abilities are and their
academic demands of the curriculum all of our at assessors are certified teachers and we provide specialized services to support academic access in the AIT program we focus on curriculum um Reading Writing
mathematics and physical access um my wonderful team consists of 20 highly qualified itinerant assist of Technology assessors um as I mentioned before we are all credential teachers and we all have a certification and assist of Technology um also every school is
assigned an at assessor if there's if they should require any type of supports and I will gladly pass it off to miss Hong so now we're going to kind of get into the meat and bones and the foundations of AAC and what does this look like I
want to take a quick moment to just acknowledge Dr C's presentation and how this is just it ties in so wonderfully because we're talking about students with disabilities and how to have them part of the conversation so where Las supports and AAC comes in is the
modality in which they can actually participate so we want them to communicate and be part of that conversation here are tools to help some of our most marginalized and vulnerable populations actually communicate with peers with staff members with their
families at home and this is such a a strong passion as you can see of ours to be able to give a voice to all of our students and particularly the ones who are more impacted so as stated before AAC stands for augmentative and
alternative communication the augmentative part of that term talks about enhancing existing speech alternative on the other hand is talking about replacing speech through uh different modalities when needed so some
people use AAC throughout their entire entire life from when they are first starting to learn how to communicate uh and onwards and some people only need it for a short period of time so for example there may be a student who has some sort of structural challenge where
they're not easily understood and so they need a device to help them be understood in a classroom setting however perhaps that there's a procedure or something changes with that structure and they are able to be understood verbally later on they may not require
AAC any longer at that time so it's really something um for everybody it's not limited to an age range or a particular group or population of people it's for anyone who may need supplementary support to communication so why do we use a so
there's so many different reasons uh that we could list however these are some of the uh things that come to mind when we're thinking about our students and promoting and advocating for our students so number one we want to enable communication and give access to
communication to all students in the district it's really important as we know to have students able to express their wants and needs and that is the basic form of communication that we need to establish foundation for then we want
to empower them to uh be independent to be able to be self-sufficient and not have to r on others to meet their basic wants and needs right and to be able to express those things we of course support learning so in the schools the
AAC is to bridge that Gap and be able to access your classroom curriculum in your educational setting and that includes building social connections so with other students with peers with adults and to be able to have them even engage
of course with family members at home all of that is so important we're all social creatures and social engagement is so important to us as people we also know that when children and when people are able to communicate effectively that reduces frustration I'm sure we all have
had an experience where there was some sort of challenging you know emotional situation even us adults when we're not understood we feel frustrated and so giving students that voice um it's really important for reducing frustration and also empowering students
and of course again we're just empowering communication and inclusion in all settings that a child and a student may be um in in the educational setting so we're also going to go this is all a little bit of a preview so
we'll go more in depth about the different types of AAC um no Tech we'll start there no Tech does not require a tool or any sort of um thing outside of your body so when we talk about no Tech
AAC that's using gestures facial expressions um manual signs sometimes a lot of our students learn early signs to supplement communication and that would be considered that does not require technology uh LTE is something that
requires I I'm pointing to this because this is a LTE and what you have in front of you is considered LTE your coreboard it's something that does not require a battery it's portable it's easy it's symbolic communication that you can use and it is considered LTE now midte does
require a battery and we have examples of that here too but it's usually a single or a multiple programmed response where you might hit a button and and then there's a speech output so it's a little bit more cause and effect there now we have high-tech which is our most
advanced or complex system for AAC that's what you kind of think about a phone or an iPad that has an app where when you press different buttons you can slide Pages or when you hit a button something opens up and that allows for more flexibility and a larger vocabulary
for students so when we talk about supporting students with AA these are two very common questions that we get and one of them is if everyone can use AAC does everyone need a high-tech
device and though absolutely everyone can use AAC and as people in the you know the committee the board us we all use AAC because texting can be AAC not everyone needs a high-tech device it's really individualized to the students
needs and often times we pair multiple types of AAC to support a student so even a student who's using an iPad with an app would benefit from using a coreboard and we're going to talk about more examples of that later another
common question is do all students who need Las service or language and speech services also need AAC and the answer again is no just because a student requires speech and language support to access their curriculum doesn't mean
that they need support with the communication system itself for example a student may be working on stuttering or articulation and may not require supplementally supplementary support to communicate however students who use AAC
systems to communicate all require some form of lasas support or service so that could be services in their IEP or it could be generalized services in the in the uh classroom setting in a more um less restrictive pushin type model so
all students who have AAC do require lasas support however all students who have Las don't necessarily require AAC okay so now I'm going to invite Stacy hotkis and nishana steel up to
talk about types of AAC hello we are honored to be here today to share a passion of ours my name is Stacy Hotchkiss I'm a licensed SLP and an ad administrator in the speech and language program and with my colleague nishana we both um lead our
AAC team for the district so we're going to talk about some types of alternative communication AAC whoop I pushed that too hard there we go our ltech AAC this was formerly
referred to as low Tech AAC they provide AAC supports without the speech output you have an example of those in front of you with our core coreboard and we call it a coreboard because it has you going to show it up we call it a coreboard because it contains the words that are
part of our core vocabulary they are the words that are most frequently used every day when we communicate those are often paired with what we call Fringe vocabulary and those are words that are specific to a lesson can I ask you to bring the mic down a
little bit sorry I'm short perfectly sized just the microphone that's wrong not you okay um so we use the core core boards and then we pair them in the classroom with what we call Fringe vocabulary Fringe vocabulary are those words that
are unique to a lesson or a setting um if you're talking about dinosaurs and that era those would be words that are important to that lesson are they important to the rest of your life maybe not I don't prefer dinosaurs so those are The Fringe vocabulary that we add in
to supplement those those can be in the form of pictures communication books we might use objects um photographs visuals um visual schedules for our students that need support communicating um in the home
setting that might be a menu how many times do we go out to a restaurant and we look at the menu because we want to see what the pictures look like so that we know what the food looks like those can all be supports that we all use also having LTE option is recommended even even for our students that are using a
midte or a high-tech option because as we said some of those devices require batteries we all know batteries die um our phones die at the end of the day so having these supplemental no Tech LTE supports are always beneficial also when
you go to Disneyland you're not going to take your iPad or your communication device on that ride but you absolutely can take a laminated coreboard or a Flipboard um another example of a LTE technology might be when you're traveling and you have a book that has
all of the tourist tips and words in that other language with pictures these are all supports that are no Tech and LTE that we um utilize in our daily activities that are also supported in the classroom and with the schools our midtech AAC as Ain stated
previously are operated using batteries or electricity to deliver a pre-recorded message um it could be a single message message or a text message my name is Nashana that is this is an example of a multi-step so it contains more than one
message I am 12 years old it can be programmed for a lesson for a student um when we look at our say our preschool classes and they have Circle time and they do their greeting or those those messages can be pre-programmed for our students that need those supports to allow them to interact and participate
in that activity with their peers and have a voice in that conversation um it is always recommended when we do these that we utilize a voice that is similar to the students so if I am a female teacher and I have male students it would be preferable to have that recorded in a male voice or in a
voice that is appropriate in matching the student that we're supporting these midtech AAC devices can support partner assisted scanning what that is is a communication method where the communicator is paired with a partner and they are moving through the
images and using either my eye gaze or a vocalization or a gesture the student would indicate which word or which icon they are selecting to make their choice and so the partner assist them in scanning these serve as valuable classroom AIDS in our early childhood
special education program we have coreboard and visuals that are available in all the classes and paired with all of their lessons which we'll touch on later and in our alternate curriculum classes they have the tech tubs that also have all of a wide variety of tools and supports to support curriculum
access and education and communication so that the students have a voice to participate in their classroom and be active members of their class our next one are high-tech AAC these AAC systems are Dynamic what I
mean by that is with some of our single message ones it's simple the message is on here you push one button button and it plays one message with a dynamic you think of your iPad technology and when you tap on an icon maybe you're playing a game and
you open your game and it opens up and that game is interactive and you move on to the next level this is what our Dynamic technology does in our Dynamic apps they move on to the next level with the student they also include a Voice output so they have a message that is paired and can grow and expand with the
student these include devices with touch screens a variety of AAC apps and ey tracking technology they allow for customized vocabulary for the student so in addition to that coreboard that you have which would be that core based vocabulary these apps allow us to build
a more robust vocabulary for the student that is specialized and unique to them it may include their family members it may include all of their classmates their friends their favorite foods colors different things that are vital and important to that student in their world and in their life to interact and participate
the high-tech AAC allows us to build that robust vocabulary and support that robust vocabulary for the student the supports a wide range of access methods including direct select touch using a switch um think of like
your gaming system where you have a switch or a joystick and they also include ey gaze and i gaze technology is where the student is positioned and they use their eyes to track and move on the screen or sometimes they have a the word
is escaping me sticker little head tring little head tracking sticker that is there that allows it to be tracked with their vision and they must be um balanced for the student and this they're very they're very difficult to utilize but they are very successful for those that are able to utilize them and
use them and do not have another access point so these high-tech AAC devices they require charging programming programming and maintenance for most optimal use and they are often used alongside LTE AAC for flexibility backup
and support so this is where we say that these no tech means like a coreboard would supplement those in settings or places where they might not necessarily be able to take it now I'm going to transition to my colleague nishana Wright hello good
afternoon my name is nishana steel and I'm very happy to be able to present to you one of my passions um augmentative and alternative of communication AAC um now that Stacy has spoken to you about the various levels and complexities of AAC um we would like for you to see it
in action so here is a video for you of a student who is using a combination of an iPad and a switch for a cooking lesson you make it go no make it go
Yay good job Phillip do you know what we're going to make make what are we going to make make do you know no you don't know no that's okay I'll tell you we're going to make
cookies cookies do you love cookies mm Russell do you love cookies yeah yeah so let's go over here because when we make our cookies the first things look we're
going to go to colors colors because we're going to put in some brown sugar who wants to put in the brown sugar me you do okay Russell's going to put in the brown brown brown
sugar very good philli do you yeah do you want to put in some sugar yes okay let's look over here there's one more sugar left let me show you here's the sugar that needs to go back this is white white
it's white sugar and let's go to core you can say I want to put it in I yes good job okay philli here you can put it
in yay very good all right I think that it's time to use the mixer this is going to be so cool are you ready to help help help you're going
to help with the mixer okay so I'm going to hold it and then you guys are going to make it go go okay I'm going to hold it here and you guys just hold down that button make it go what do you
think got to make it go go go so as you can see in that video the students are using a switch to make the mixer go which is also a part of assisted technology which you'll hear a little bit more about later but also these students are engaged and as you
can also see it's not impeding the verbal communication as Aaron spoke about earlier so I just want to make that very clear because a lot of people seem to think that if a student is using AA that will impede the ability of the verbal communication to come in and that's not the case and it's backed up
by research all right here you'll see another lesson with um what appears to be an iPad in a game my name is Laura stop you moved it's my turn
now my name is Charlie oh great that's very kind thank you my name is Olivia nice presentation see you tomorrow being nonverbal doesn't mean we
can't speak we can say anything any anytime and anywhere so that video was showing a person or several people using text to speech to communicate and in those uh
iPad applications was also predictive text which enables them to communicate a little bit faster than just typing each individual word and in addition some of those um Clips you saw um quick talks or quick phrases where there were phrases
that were already programmed and they're probably phrases that these people use repeatedly and with frequency so that they don't have to repeatedly type them word for word so as we talk about um students and individuals using um a AC there are ways
that students can access their communication systems there are times where we have students who have physical disabilities in addition to communicative disabilities when this occurs sometimes they cannot use their body to access their devices or their
systems or maybe they can't isolate a finger to to select a button on whatever system they have in these cases we use Alternative forms of access for communication and for their communication systems so alternative access could
include things such as switches which are buttons that students can press to either make their device scan through the images and then select or perhaps they have a partner who's helping them scan through the images and they select they can use eye gaze which is using
their eyes to to select point to and select um without using any other part of their body um additionally there's the head tracking s sticker that Stacy referred to it's just simply a DOT on the head and it serves as a tracking like a pointer almost and they point to
it and then they can either you know linger or dwell or they can um select it with a button or maybe a partner can press the switch for them and um there's also joystick control so again that's just like think about a video game we're using a
joystick and there's a button that you can press so depending on the students motoric abilities and their uh physical abilities to be able to activate certain devices we might need to put alternative accesses access methods in
place customizable settings also allow for adjustments and sensitivity so for example if a student H cannot press the button hard enough to activate it maybe we give them a switch where they can hover over it and activates their device
um speed is the device scanning too quickly through the images for them to be able to select them or press that button and select it before it moves on to the next image so all of these things are essential for ensuring that all students have a way to communicate effectively
just because our students might be very complex in their needs and have multiple disabilities it should not preclude them from being able to communicate nor should it be able nor should it preclude them from being able to access any communication system that we're able to
provide for them here we're going to see a student who is using his device with switch access stop go hello mine mine stop do with it stop stop stop more
okay W go stop stop stop stop your toy stopped stop go
go drink drink are you thirsty Tyler stop go hello mine M mine M yours okay so as you can see in that
video Tyler has pretty much kind of perfected how to use those switches and just when you think he's he's stuck at stop and go he moves on and he finds the word mine so um I'm going to pass it back over to Stacy for Hands-On aec
demonstration hello Okay so let's talk AAC using the vocabulary on the coreboard in front of you and we'll also put it up on the next slide and your lanyard coreboard I want you to tell the person next to you what you did this morning
either one they're slightly different because one is smaller you'll notice while you're doing that that they're divided by color those colors are a system that is used to categorize the parts of language so
yellow are our pronouns the green are our verbs we have prepositions in pink yes and blue are some of our adjectives these boards can vary in size from four icons up to about
128 128 icons depending on the complexity level and ability of the individual that is using them you'll notice it's not that hard it's not that easy to do cuz we've only provided you with the core words
so without knowing what your morning looked like and adding that Fringe vocabulary in there you were probably not able to give too much of a message to your partner so you see the value of having both the availability of core words and Fringe Words which our motto
is To always offer more words it is not our place to decide somebody's vocabulary and their encyclop their dictionary of words so we always want to offer them all the words and let them develop and utilize those words the interesting thing or fun thing about
these is we actually printed these this year for all of our speech therapists in our program and so every SLP has one of these to wear into their classrooms and so many of the teachers and other staff liked them that we've shared that file and we've noticed that a lot of the teachers in our preschool classes have
been printing them and wearing them themselves laminating them and so it starts with a small movement it starts with one person doing it and the passion grows and when we started with um our pal program our pal project which is what um my coordinator will speak a
little bit more about later um it started as an idea that we had in the elevator one day and um we partnered with our colleagues in early childhood and started putting these coreboard into the classrooms and there's different types of icons the icon that we use is
symbol sticks which is the icon system that is the district's alternate curriculum icon system so they are exposed to these icons from the moment they join our school district at 3 years old our youngest Learners and that symbol system is consistent all the way through their academic career so that
they are constantly seeing the same thing because this is essentially their vocabulary and we don't like to switch up somebody's vocabulary it would be like somebody changing our alphabet on us Midstream so something fun about these and that's why we provided each of you one as well we wanted wanted to show you a
little bit more of some of the other items we have so our LTE which you just saw and you utilized our midtech which were our single button switches with single messages that can be put on
there with any one message these are easy to access they can be put in the circle time at a student's desk um the most important thing we like to establish I used to work in a Brain Injury Clinic prior to joining the school district is to have establish a yes or no having the ability to say yes
or no as a base Point allows you control over your environment it allows you to advocate for your wants and needs it allows you to be able to say no because yes is not always the answer sometimes you don't feel like doing something so to give them that ability to have a button with a yes or no that they can access allows autonomy and Independence
and control over your environment so single button switches are a great start for that we also have multiple step switches in which you can record four messages in that midtech category we started with go ahead or we can even do that one finish the
messages I live at 333 South B Avenue in I am in the fifth grade nice to meet you so they can be programmed for Greetings because
greetings and communication with our peers is part of the Core Curriculum and being a able to work collaboratively in a group with your peers in the classroom so this allows them voices and messages that can be programmed to match the lesson that they're working on or to allow students to have that voice and be
heard with their peers to make friends build those social connections this is another example of midtech this is what we call a static device so there's a screen lay in there with pictures they don't change so the message that's programmed is the message
that's in the box you'll notice that there the volume kind of soft um we just printed out a generic one for the purpose of this demonstration but the top row always Remains the Same and then you can put different images in and load or program different levels of messages to switch
throughout the day to allow a student with more variety of ways of expressing themsel in different settings during the school day and then we move into our high-tech and we have examples for you up here to um look at later it's a little too small for us to show right
now but those would be our items ad apps and there are several that we work with um and the apps are as unique as the student so when we're looking at which app and which support to provide to a student we pride ourselves on what we
call feature matching so matching the features of that AAC support to the ability of the student to the ability of the student so that we decrease their Reliance on the adults around them to communicate and increase their independence the goal of
AAC supports is self- advocacy and Independence we want students to be able to communicate independently and not require an adult to give them their words do these devices stay in school yes and no ideally communication happens all over the place so it is an IEP team
decision we always highly encourage that it goes back and forth home to school um and that just depends on the family the IEP team and the support it as unique as the student I would love for them to program I need help oh that is a key
phrase that's in there okay good good and also a break help help and a break because those are important break is on too yeah it is now I pass it back to nishana for another example of lighttech I'll just
press the video and play it so this is an example you'll notice that there's bubbles on the screen clearly not a place for technology but we have a laminated coreboard because those go anywhere so watch this interesting fun activity I pushed it I'm afraid to push
it again hi guys welcome to today today's video um we are outside in the back backyard and we have a bubble machine and we are having so much fun with bubbles so out here while we're playing
with bubbles I just have a low tech board it is laminated that way we can just wipe it off after the bubbles um get all over it and everything um you can check out some of my previous videos for how I got the board and then also how I got The Fringe row up at the top
so that we could have access to Bubbles but today words that were while we were out here is that like we can ask who is going to get the bubble um we're talking a lot about get the bubble um that they
are going up that the bubbles are going to go down um if they're big or little bubbles I'm going to get the big bubble um how they're different sizes that bubbles make us happy um and that we are
playing so anytime that you're out you're having fun with an activity like this um just being providing making the language of communication fun um providing that input for them where we're not expecting them to repeat it back to us okay um AED language input is
all about just showing and telling them the words teaching them The Language by speaking very trigger happy with this button right here um the video goes on a little bit longer but I think you get the gist of it it's all about the exposure the opportunity and the ability
to explore their environment and communicate and utilize language to access and now I'm going to turn it over to our colleagues in assist of Technology thank you thank you so much I'm wondering if anybody has any more questions of this group this this was a
very rich uh conversation before we go into the assist of Technology yes hi there thank you so much for this information um I have a couple of questions if that's okay um first I I'm interested in knowing the
process a teacher or parents would follow if they want to um have a student they they think the student would benefit from an at or an assisted technology assessment um just the process for that okay so in La Unified School
District first of all I just kind of want to give you some clarification when we say at it's specifically for assisted technology to support instruction or academics and when you're speaking of assisted technology to support communication it's AAC and we do make
that distinguishment that we do distinguish between the two here in the district um but it's not so everywhere else so in some areas it's just all assist of technology in order to get um any type of assisted technology for communication or AAC you would need an
assessment but we highly recommend that the SLP at the school site reaches out to their AAC consultant because we do have a team of Consultants that are actually trained to help support our slps even though it's within the scope of practice of every
SLP we recommend that they ask their consultant to come out and help them screen and if they feel the student is appropriate which most usually are um they will go ahead and recommend an assessment and then they have to go through the assessment process IEP and
it would be an IEP um driven support so I hope that answers your questions as Sly as I could yes that's really helpful um I have a follow-up question um so if I'm a teacher in a classro where I have students who use
AAC devices um am I able to um get those apps from the district on my iPad or do I have to have a student who's has an open assessment or who is um con already receiving a
service I would have to defer that question to instruction because we don't um provide anything for the teachers we we specifically support the students who have the need for the support got it um I do have a followup on that sorry um so
I know we saw in the video a lot of modeling using the AC a AAC devices and we know that modeling and AED language input input is so important for students to acquire the use of these devices um so I'm wondering how frequently these
services for for a AAC support are delivered in the classrooms where the teachers are supporting the students so that um they can learn how to model and that the peers in the classroom understand how to use the devices um just how that how that gets shared that
is a wonderful question ideally this would occur all the time in the classroom because that is where learning occurs and that's where we're supporting the student um but the honest answer is it's an IEP team decision that is um a conversation between all stakeholders
and sometimes the students do need some of that specialized time to learn how to use the device because we're teaching them how to use it while we're also supporting them and using it and accessing it in the classroom so our ultimate goal is even if we start out with some support that's more individualized to the student that we
transition them in to generalize those skills into the classroom setting and um as everyone here is stated they've they're Educators and they've been in education everyone knows that the more people that support learning and surround the student the better the
outcome is and so us coming into the classroom as a speech pathologist and modeling and working with the student in that classroom the staff see the teachers see and it takes away the mystery and the fear of oh they have AAC and I'm not quite sure how to use it we're going to show you how to use it we're going to show you that it's as
seamless as conversation and we're going to show you the importance of having that students device out on the table and not in their backpack so that they can access that classroom and that curriculum you yes go ahead Amy thank you so much um I wonder I wonder just this is just a
personal Wonder but um I wonder if as slps in the district it would be like important to to do professional development around really pushing for that inclusive push in service um so that because I think teachers don't
necessarily know what they don't know um and I think a lot of special education teachers don't leave their programs understanding the important importance of of modeling the use of these language systems um or communication systems so I
just that's uh something I would like to I'm going to defer to my coordinator on that one because that is you're speaking to our heart um so absolutely we we recognize the importance of professional development to really be able to generalize these skills so it starts
with empowering our uh slps and then it goes into them ing through mtss sometimes even pre you know special education identification and then also PDS at the school sites and support we also do connect with region special
Educators and administrators to share out the information that we have so we're really trying to Target um student support from every angle I do want to just make a quick point that we have quite a few more slides to get through so and we do have a time at the end for Q&A so just in the interest of time
would that be okay to say some questions to the end yeah I actually I was going to do a little time check because I know we do have till a few more minutes and we want to have Q&A and discussion but I want to give Amy because she was waiting for uh a question go ahead Amy my question actually was tied in
with the assessments because I understand that there is a speech language person that does the assessment if a parent is asking for an AAC assessment and an ASI
assessment who is responsible in the district to do the ASL assessment is that also through the speeching language pathologist no so we don't do ASL assessments um however I would imagine that that would be in collaboration perhaps with um deaf education but I
would have to defer to deed okay or would there be any um ASL proficient speech language pathologist that could do the assessment we absolutely have ASL proficient slps um across the district who typically support in our um School
sites like Marlton and other school sites so uh those folks are called in as an additional support to the SLP at the school site to help navigate that assessment okay thank you thank you thank you okay so let's
continue so I'm gonna uh try to describe the differences of assistive technology and instructional technology obviously they both have technology and their names there are some uh differences though um here's an example of assistive technology
uh and I will go back as you see I rely upon my staff to do um to help me with everything um so what is assist of Technology um like I said before it's any tool device or system that helps individuals with
disabilities perform Tas more independently um uh very similar to AAC we have both low Tech and high-tech devices low tech devices would be stuff like pencil grips visual schedules um and high-tech all the way up to like
these speech generate generating devices some of these AAC high-tech devices that you see um to it tracking systems that was also talked about and we have uh a whole range um really dependent upon the students needs um assist of technology
like we heard we support Communications Mobility learning and daily living activities um at is essential for providing access inclusion and greater Independence for our students the focus of assisted technology is to like I said it's to aim
that bridge it's to bridge that gap between the curriculum demands and what the student is able to perform so that's where at comes into place which is a little different from instruct instuctional technology um sometimes it's referred to it as it um
instructional technology those are again tools and resources that designed to enhance the learning for all students some examples um interactive whiteboards um educational apps like educational Gams for instance uh digital textbooks
and learning management systems those are all considered instructional technology not assist of Technology um it they support engagement collaboration and differentiated instruction um it it does help streamline the lesson delivery
for students um assessments um and helps uh track student progress um it it's used to improve the overall classroom efficiency and learning outcomes the key takeaway is while it benefits all Learners at is individualized to meet the specific
needs of students with disabilities and here is Malika Ferell and Anon Morales to talk about the different types of assist of uh technology perfect hi everyone thanks for having us so this is a picture of a student who
uses assist assistive technology to access writing she's typing on an iPad using an external keyboard with a key guard um on dome that helps secure the keyboard and and um prevent it from moving around
um and the key guard is actually laid on top of the key keybard to help isolate her fingers so that she's able to efficiently select the letters um this is a student with some motor impairments um the icons surrounding the
photo are additional apps our students use to access digital text in their curriculum with audio supports word prediction and PD PDF annotation hello everyone my name is uh Anthony Morales I'm an assisted
technology assessor um with L USD um along with my colleague um so first we want to point out um we want to highlight some examples of the use of assisted technology for reading access um beginning with uh no Tech and low Tech supports um which could be an
example of the sentence isolator as it's shown on the slide um curriculum embedded supports digital accessibility features which we will be highlighting um shortly with the Hands-On demonstration uh and digital tools like auditory support for reading with text
being read aloud comprehension supports such as text leveling to simplify the text and uh the ability to annotate passages and display options which include color contrast and having text highlighted as it's read aloud
so in addition to reading supports we we provide writing supports as well and we'll start out with no Tech and low Tech options we do again have some displayed here but uh we would start with our lowte options which include tracing stamps letter stamps and S
sentence strips um that the students you would take a sentence on a sentence strip and cut it into pieces and the students could arrange the words and they build their sentence and that's their writing activity um slant boards to help uh support accessing paper for students
with um physical impairments um pencil grips pencil grips excuse me to assist in um holding a writing utensil adapted paper which we do have on that um slant board which may include raised lines or um color cues to let the student know
where to start and uh stop their letters to assist in the letter formation um word Banks could be utilized Clos notes which are um like fill-in the blank notes so that students don't have to write as much to indicate that they're following along with the lesson or even
providing a copy of teacher notes graphic organizers are very helpful uh low Tech writing supports those are visual aids that support um brainstorming and organizing and expanding writing and then we in some cases recommend that a scribe be
provided um for writing access as well okay next we want to highlight uh some mid to high-tech writing supports um so again these could this can include uh curriculum and device embedded supports uh by that we mean uh the thing the um
so we have devices right that um we incorporate into the the technology um and then we have digital graphic organizers uh we have the use of speech to text okay which is a student dictating their sentence or their writing into the device and the device
typing it out for them uh text to speech for editing and we have the use of word prediction U so this uh can be used to make the writing process more efficient for students uh for students that may fatigue when typing or for students that might have might be having some trouble
locating the keys on the keyboard um and then also providing students the ability to take photos of of notes okay all right so assisted techn technology for math um includes low Tech
options such as magnetic numbers using magnetic beads um providing tactile feedback so sandpaper numbers and could include um Mid and high-tech technology like big Keys calculators tablet applications that um assist with math
formatting so like an electronic grid paper um or electronic manipulatives um for students who have physical impairments and can't manipulate the teddy bear counters in the classroom um and accessibility features that are uh
embedded on the device and in the uh curriculum and we have some videos to to demonstrate that a little bit later so uh the assisted technology program also provides support for students with uh that might be having physical access challenges okay and uh that's supported with some of the
equipment that we have up here to show um so the first example is uh the Adaptive keyboard with the adap key guard uh the switches okay we also have some available up here uh the mount and the slant board
that we kind of we showed over here uh adaptive trackpads joysticks and a mice so as we can see here in the example um here we have a Chromebook okay obviously the the Chromebook has a trackpad and a built-in keyboard okay so for some students that might not be able to
access the trackpad or access the keyboard on the laptop uh we have a adaptive keyboard and then an Adaptive joystick okay and on this side we have another example of a a adaptive Mouse Okay so the students having uh trouble
accessing like we said the the keyboard or the trackpad we have these supports in place for that and then lastly the use of the igase device okay so this is our most complex technology for students that might require an igase device in order to access the curriculum um this
here is is a an iPad with an ey gaze track bar down at the bottom and it's uh attached to a a tabletop Mount so assisted technology is the core of what we uh do in our program we also um support instructional technology and
so these are some examples of instructional technology including our English language arts curriculum amplify and our learning management system system schooly and they all have embedded uh accessibility features in them in fact most of our district
adopted curriculum have digital uh text book components with the following features the ability for students to highlight text the ability for them to annotate and take notes the ability for the text to be read aloud and in many
cases the ability for that text to be isolated with line isolation so that they can just focus on what's being read aloud so now we would like to share a Hands-On demonstration of some of these tools so in the next few slides we'll be sharing some short videos that highlight
the use of accessibility tools for reading and writing using both the Chromebook and an iPad these are the tools that are commonly found in our classrooms and so these tools um that we're uh showing you today all students have access to whether they
require them for for uh curriculum access or whether it's just to make doing their work more efficient right so in this video we're looking at a Chromebook and using the text to speech feature which you enable by clicking a a
speaker icon in the bottom right corner of your Chrome book okay euan Clark famously known as the shark lady was a Japanese American fish biologist who was born in 1922 so you know technology has improved
the voice is not as robotic as it may have been many years ago when we had to layer in additional technology for uh for those voices um so that's our text to speech feature uh also embedded within the Chromebook is a
speech to text feature um that you can use anywhere uh on the Chromebook device and you would enable that by clicking the microphone icon in the bottom right corner of your Chromebook and here's a video of that Eugene Clark was a fish biologist
period so when we train um school teams and and students we do have to train them on you know dictating punctuation speaking clearly pausing and so there is training and support that goes into all of that
but the exciting thing is uh these features are embedded within the device and readily available for all of our students so that was the Chromebook so we know that in some of our classrooms um we have iPads as well okay so we're going to now we're going to show the same accessibility tools
being used on the iPad so in this next video we're going to see the use of speak selection on the iPad to have the text read aloud Venus and Serena Williams are sisters who play tennis they won many important tournaments from 1999 to the
early 2000s okay and with this feature as we can see as the text is read aloud each word is also highlighted so that's also beneficial for our students okay and in the next slide uh we're going to show how to use speech to text using the dictation tool on the
onscreen keyboard of the iPad so if you can see it's right to the left of the space bar um so here's a video of that Venus and Serena Williams are famous tennis players period we just wanted to demonstrate how a
student could use these tools to you know access reading and then respond if they had to regarding that same reading using tools that are embedded in in the devices okay so we will toss over to our
lless leaders thank you so much thank you okay just a few more so moving on to we will be talking about implementation success stories and impact of AAC and at within our school
district so for AAC and Stacy and sha alluded to this our um SLP so our speech and language program AAC team under the supervision of Stacy and nishana created a c a preschool companion pack AAC so it
consisted of the Core board similar to your lanyards along with fringe vocabulary that aligns with the creative curriculum for all of our early childhood special education Learners so this would include the pal program the
psse program the after school program so all of these programs that utilize the creative curriculum also have those communication accessibility modules to supplement for Learners who are who require that support to participate
ipate and to express themselves so it's something that we're very proud of and that way we get integrated and we collaborate with a lot of those different uh departments as well um I'd like to highlight uh one of our uh wonderful students Elizabeth she's a student that benefited from at
supports from preschool all the way through her senior year in high school um some of the at tools that she used throughout her years an alpha Smart Keyboard which is like a very dedicated type of keyboard with a key guard like we saw up here um she was issued an iPad
with an external keyboard and a keyguard as well and then as she progressed through uh the secondary she was issued um some uh laptop devices with both a joystick mouse and a trackpad and she was last year's yes I can award a nominee uh for the council for
exceptional children um we are very very proud of her so here's a a picture of her and like I said she is a senior and she does have a college Ambitions oops and so we're here to present some parent Strate resources and
strategies okay so moving on to how can parents support their students or their children who use AAC at home so here are some basic examples that we wanted to show in talking about building vocabulary you got a little bit of that example through the videos but you can
see for some for these three very common at home activities such as eating breakfast reading a story or listening to music there are various ways that we can encourage vocabulary building and communication by focusing on more simple
onew focusing on those one-word utterances or sorry not utterances but the onew vocabulary um all the way up to four words five words six words so you can see that we don't limit the communication and we use natural speech when we're talking however we might be
putting focus on one element or one vocabulary word and when that student is ready we start building that complexity to start modeling and also expecting to use more words within that communication back and forth here are some other examples of
how parents can support their children at home so using photographs and pictures objects gestures texting writing sign language Etc so this is a combination as you can see of no Tech LTE sometimes
midte if there is a device and also high-tech because I can say that I certainly use the speech to text pretty often myself and that's a strategy that's helpful to me this is also going to be on the slides that are available so here are
some resource and websites that as of February or as of last week really 2025 the resources were free um you may have to sign up and create a login to access some of these websites however it's a great list of tools that parents can
look into to supplement um their students communication at home and here's a list of some of the assisted technology resources um we decided to focus on device that are already in schools Apple devices Google
Chromebooks um Microsoft PCS um these all lead to their various accessibility websites a phrase that was used earlier was embedded accessibility which you may wonder what is that it's really cool because it allows every learner from
children to adults to utilize accessibility features whereas before it was a very specialized um very specialized product um for instance I could take my camera take a picture of that I see a little icon appear I can all of a sudden highlight everything as
a text and I can copy that into a text file instead of having to manually write it down um little Pro tiip for parents I told this to my kids and their mouths dropped I actually got respect as a parent but anyways um and also to sum this up um
the assist of Technology we have seven assist of techn ology lending libraries that are throughout the district um we provide short-term learns for school and for student access um we host parent workshops um we highly encourage um to have professional development on assist
of technology and along with our AAC Partners um we support access to Innovative technology and as stated before we have an atser assigned to each school and here are some District highlights of AAC and
at so this is just a quick moment for us to be able to brag about our amazing teams and our slps our administrators that support students across the district so lausd's AAC team under the supervision of Stacy and shaana is one
of the best in the nation I mean we are the second largest school district so we have to be up there with our um with our supports as well and this consists of 15 slps and nine slpas that support that team so we have actually over 3,000 stud
students who are using IEP driven AAC tools um to supplement or to enhance their communication and we have more students who are utilizing core boards and just utilizing some sort of low Tech or no Tech AAC across the district we
work closely with Early Childhood special education Charter and Dr C's team alternate curricul alternate curriculum Partners to ensure comprehensive support for students who are are transitioning into L USD for the
students who are at our ctc's as well um we also maintain relationships with other large school districts such as New York and Chicago and overall our team has played a key role in creating um you know like like nishana and Stacy said
sometimes it's an idea that's born in the elevator and we think of something that's going to support our students and we will not take no for an answer when it comes to finding ways to improve and um promote access for all of our Learners uh following that um for at
LUSD we're very unique in that we have a dedicated assistive technology uh Team unlike many other school districts um my team consists of 20 experienced credential teachers as I stated before they have additional certification and assist of technology and I'm very very proud of the work they do uh in addition
we have three um it support staff they manage the processing and setup of over 4,000 AAC and at devices uh like some of some uh that you see up here like um AAC uh we uh collaborate closely with the
special educations division of instruction Early Childhood special education a charter schooled and Alternate curriculum Partners um also like AAC we like to maintain strong um Partnerships with some of the other school districts and we like to stay current with the the most Innovative
technology for curriculum access including um iase technology we have robotic telepresence and we just recently triing triing something called neuron noes by control bionics Pro little thing it's a wireless sensor so
if a student's access is only a twitch that will be their access point um I meant again going back to embedded um accessibility that iase technology that you see up here if you have an iPhone or iPad it most likely has that built in
already they they had an update so it's really cool that those type of features are being spread to everybody so really closing out now with our summary and our future goals with just a few minutes to spare okay so summary AAC and at support students with
complex communication and learning needs the Las and the at and it programs provide tools and strategies for Effective expression and engagement and we help bridge communication barriers and promote Independence ensuring
Equitable access to education and enabling full participation for our students in their learning environments some of our future goals are to continue the work that we're doing now we want to increase access to AAC and at across the district we would
like to continue working on PDS and trainings for our staff partners other stakeholders parents Etc anyone who's part of that students life to help them succeed we want to strengthen that interdisciplinary collaboration as well
between stakeholders stay updated on emerging Technologies for AAC and at and then of course always use datadriven decision-making to support students in using evidence-based practices
so now with a few minutes uh first of all we would just like to say thank you so much for being such a wonderful audience and we are just so grateful for the opportunity to present thank you now I want to thank
you all all of you uh you presented with so much enthusiasm and I can tell that you really love what you do and that you're very much uh invested in this and so I want to thank you because I know that you are putting it your best to do this and as a special ed teacher I've
worked with our speech therapists and our occupational therapists and I've learned so much about these tools when they uh have uh implemented in my classroom with my students so I know this is this is incredible learning so thank you very much for all the time
that you took to to present so we are scheduled to end this meeting I hope by 5:30 so I am hoping that we have some Q&A and then some I have a couple of questions that we could pose for discussion for the
group and we also have public comment so let's try to do this in uh a bit of time so opening it up for dis uh questions or discussion yes well great why don't we have with start with Miss Scott and then Mr Gavin go
ahead good evening and thank you so much for such a comprehensive presentation I think um that information is very helpful in um being able to communicate ways that we can support our students I think it's also important to understand
how um are we supporting the families in sharing these strategies and utilizing these Technologies with the students it's important that the students have the reinforcement at home um so that they can better grasp the things that they're learning guided practice at
school and guided practice at home helps them to better acquire the skills so um how often are parents brought into the situation and how are we collaborating with parents and bringing
them those strategies along with the IEP teams and other stakeholders thank you so speaking to AAC when a device is issued following of course the assessment and the IEP team discussion and decision um there is a training that
occurs including the SLP the classroom teacher including parents and that way they are able to get accustomed and just learn the basics of the device at hand after that because of course we do have the Consultants but each SLP on staff
this is part of their scope of practice so as they continue to use the communication device or that modality they're talking to the teachers they're communicating with parents via email parents are welcome to come in and observe a speech therapy session we know that based off the parents schedule
that's not always the easiest thing for them to do but we find different ways whether it's via email communicating through the teachers and then we love to like Stacy and Nana said push into the classroom once the student has a foundational knowledge of how to utilize
the device or the the communication system so that whenever anyone is engaging with that student it's just just a cross collaborative conversation and very similar assist of technology has very similar processes um assist of technology is presented at
every IEP anytime um a service or support is placed we like to heavily involve the entire I AP team including parents um I think I was St it was stated before the more training and exposure um the team has the the better
the student um will do um specifically we have had uh parents reach out to us and they ask very specific questions and we are more than happy to support that um whether whether that's in the school um a lot of times it's so via email um but yes um I absolutely agree um anytime
you have parents supporting um just the outcomes just go up so just for quick feedback the core boards are in the classrooms but they're also uh in key locations as well our
speech pathologist puts them in the office so that students making deliveries can communicate they're in the cafeteria so students can ask and request food items and things like that so they are out and about and I just wanted to give you the feedback on that
my question is um in the early 2000s we were on the verge of new technology of iPads rolling out and the explosion of iPads in every classroom in almost every student's hands the question is we are
now on the same bubble uh with AI and have we done any exploration into Ai and how it supports at and AAC users that is the a thousand question um yes AI is all over from chat GPT to
Apple intelligence to even when I do a Google search I see then AI generated uh summaries um that I know that's something that this District has been working on and is still working on to figure out the role of AI um I know something that's very important for
the district is student privacy and we just want to maintain that student privacy we don't want to tell chat GPT I have the student and here's your name what can you do that information once it's sent we want to make sure that that data is secured um for the student sake
and for the family sake so I know that's something that the district is working on and a quick note about that in regards to Communication in AAC AI is the New Frontier and it's so exciting it's also a little bit scary um and so like Steve was saying we're trying to you know
that's an area of exploration we want to Ure that students have access to the best tech and at the same time be able to generate meaningful conversation and ideas that come from them and not just ideas that are being generated from AI so it's a balance of utilizing
technology to enhance their personal thoughts wants and needs but also not to supplant those thoughts wants and needs so we're absolutely exploring that um and we'll find out in the next couple years how it kind of rolls out to the
districts thank you and um I don't know if other folks have any questions I did have you know I did say at the beginning that I wanted this to also be a space where we can share ideas and uh you know not just ask the questions but hey maybe
we have some wonderful ideas and so I wanted to pose this if we can just take a five minutes at most um to discuss how can um as a teacher a parent in whatever capacity you come to this space what
supports could help um us integrate some of these tools um into the practice of parenting or training and I want to hear from you or the other one and everybody has a copy of it by the way um what can our district do to let people know more
about these resources so I know there's some ideas coming from the district but what about from our group here yes do you want to hi everybody um you know I wonder if um I I spend a lot of time in special day classes for kids with
extensive support needs through my work with teachers and I wonder if it would be helpful for um slps and at Specialists to periodically visit these classrooms um just to see what the needs
are um because I think a lot of almost all students in those classes are receiving some sort of um speech language service or at service but a lot of times when I go in those devices are off or or not in in place or the students don't have advice devices at
all or any form of of light tech or um Hightech AC and um that that's always concerned conc erning to me and so I wonder if part of um if part of the service in the IP for speech language
service or at includes some component of um periodic check-in with how General access is going in the class thank you so an idea is that can we include some check-ins on the use of any of the devices either LTE or
high-tech device in the SDC programs and maybe there are some kids in SDC who may have not been assessed but may present a need and have not been identified yet any other yes so for the first discuss
discussion question as a teacher parent or staff person what support could you help I'm going to speak to the lens of a parent um when my son was born he was uh he had many delays one being speech um for many
years and I remember that we started to use pictures to help label things around the house and to really support him like if he wanted the chair we're like oh chair or if you wanted water and that led to visual schedules right being able
to have him like tell us what he wanted to do next or earning a reinforcer what have you um it was such a great tool for me as a parent because I remember when he would trans transition from one class to another or one school to another prepping him for that transition was
something that we had to work towards because it's not like he was GNA normally just you know be able to matriculate into a new school or new program so we went to the school took pictures of the classroom of the teacher and all summer we'd be hey this is going to be your new teacher this is going to
be your new classroom so as a parent I highly highly encourage other parents who may be having same some of the similar issues that I did with my son to really use pictures and now it's so easy with cell phones being able to use a cell phone and he would walk around with
the ring binder a ring clip with pictures and I remember that it was really working when he came to me with a picture of a cookie and he put it on me and he wanted a cookie right and uh so I I I highly encourage parents uh those
parents who are tuning in or watching to really use uh pictures to help kind of prompt communication with your child especially if there's delays around communication because um it's so great when they're able to use those pictures as low Tech and be able to communicate
and tell you what they want so just wanted to share that thank you so much so maybe that could be part of the parent education right like you were sharing anybody else I'd like to open up
space for anybody who has not spoken or shared scanning I'll just have some yes um I'll answer to the second question what can our district do to let people know about these resources um I believe working with our CAC our committee I think
letting them know of this of all of these resources and the technology and this was great really I'm glad you all brought them here so we can actually see them rather than pictures in live um format and uh also working with our parent reps or Community reps I think
they are so essential in the and having that connection with parents and the more that they are aware then they can also provide this information to parents who go to them and say Hey you know I need you know some of them some parents are feel more comfortable going to a
parent rep rather the principal so I think as long the more that we inform all of our staff at the school particularly our parent reps I think that will be very essential in um sort of Distributing the information throughout our schools
if I can make a quick comment um we actually had the opportunity to present with CAC twice this school year and it was really wonderful the first opportunity was a generalized understanding of our programs and what we do and the second presentation was actually specifically about AAC and at
with um some other related Services included too so it was a great experience and we hope to do it again all right last call all right well I want to oh go
ahead thank you I think another thing we as a district can do is include uh these models as part of professional development for all of our teachers we have um time set aside to do professional development with our staff and this should be a part of that
because there are like you said you don't know what you don't know until you do and if we include these people can identify students that can benefit from these opportunities sooner and then we have more success stories like Elizabeth
because we have supported them earlier and supported the families earlier all right okay this is the last call for real um all right well thank you so much I want to thank the committee for bringing forth your ideas
and your comments I'm taking note of this this is going to turn into something at one point so I want to thank you all for your presentations again uh very grateful you are an amazing team and also for bringing all of the devices I as you were presenting
I could tell you are in special ed you just you demonstrated you modeled and you used all the different ways of of sharing the information so I'm grateful for that um so thank you all we're going to move on now to public comment right
thank you okay here we go uh we have 10 folks signed up for public comment tonight I'll call on the folks who are listed here as speaking in person and then uh we'll go to the folks who listed themselves as being remote so Norma Gonzalez are you here Norma
Gonzalez Miss Gonzalez is going to speak in Spanish so if you'd like to hear what she's saying in English as she's speaking in Spanish please put your hands up and we'll get you these translation headsets okay listo gz good afternoon my name is nor gonalez
I'm a mom of a student in special education who is in this District uh today I want to talk about inclusion in schools and the program that is is for uh children with disabilities
this program that is um available to Children is only seen to children with in grade school could work today this morning in the CAC
subcommittee um this came up and a video that was shown is what c um called for our attention but we wanted to talk about this middle school and high school students how would that impact students because a lot of
students have behaviors that are more severe and the reason is because I understand inclusion but inclusion is not that the whole time they may be included with their behaviors be why because sometimes
teachers don't have that preparation or the credentials or simply don't know how to handle the behaviors yes inclusion is important everyone wants to be included I that have a student want him to be included not just in school but in the
world and Society because my goal is for him to be independent as a mother with special needs I'm very saddened to see that there's other severe cases where they're ignored and sometimes there are they have been hit or they
have certain marks and there is no knowledge of what is happening because for everything they want to involve inclusion and yes but the presentation was great through CAC but it was a very
very very synthesized presentation we were given a video and it was it was very small I suggest next time that they provide one that's as ample as the one you guys received today because us parents are
the ones that deal with all these kinds of behavior so can it please be a real presentation that involves the community thank you I lost my list hold on one second please there we are thanks for your patience
Maria Duran are you here Maria Duran hello good afternoon uh board representative my name is Maria luran mother of a child with an IP the district thank you for the opportunity to express the thoughts of parents that have children with disabilities about
the minimal restriction topic the changes that are happening in the schools in middle school and high school and as far as full inclusion and so through conversations with General Educators and special education
teachers that inclusion in its entirety doesn't necessary work we all students since due to some having the minimal competencies when it comes
to hearing writing reading sometimes they uh are students that require a lot of information and this can affect their self-esteem in which way are we empowering the student to teach him in
the way that it most needs so can be difficult for teachers because students already are investing a lot of time in my school there's an Autism program and there will be total inclusion next year we all know that autism also
involves behavior that among a list can be complicated so this also requires for uh a marginalization that that happens with other typical students so we also need data of
this model of instruction another important topic is that they took away the bulletin that had reclassifications with students with an IP now students with an IP are obligated to demonstrate the
same competencies than in English to reclassify by law these students need to take class thank you very much for your attention thank you for your time uh let's see shires grber come on up and then after Miss
Gruber is Jacqueline kasas and then Maria Montoya so first shirle Gruber please good afternoon my name is Shirley guber and I am Latina and I am an extraordinary child with autism
non-verbal today I want to thank you and focus my public comments on the list in uh restrictive environment at the same time to inclusion that is really our students with special needs are not
living it it is critical that our young ones are offered the least restrictive uh environments I'm sorry I'm so nervous but with the adquate supports allowing them to develop their abilities
and to overcome their challenges within a educational in and and inclusive environments this not only helps us to get the abilities for academics but also prepare them for True inclusion in their
adult life promoting and uh Independence and quality of life I had a speech prepared for you and I'm not going to read it or I'm not going to finish it I want to talk to you as a mother Mr sto has just said that he has a student with
special needs my student is 5 years old he is just he's in a least restrictive environment with a lot of supports but they are not have not followed the IP he has not been given support with the sdp he has been hit and bullying on behalf
of the L disase so I call upon the board we need to supervise the schools and supervise Personnel our students when are nonverbal they rep they show behaviors and emotions and what is the district doing about this I want to see
supervision and consequences for those that are doing these types of abuses thank you thank you for your time Jacqueline kasas pretty before anything I want to thank all of you for being here today and I thank you
for everything that the remarks that you have made first of all to be able to be successful students require support and services and the empathy on behalf of those that work with them to
promote LUSD employees so that they are able to have empathy about special educ ation I want to let you know he is my son when he is my son he's 12 years old he has autism last year he was um was uh
fighting with him to take away the Chromebook do you think that's right is that how teachers manage when they uh are with our students who have special needs kind of fighting around shuffling around I want to know that he has also
been constantly hit that he has been a victim of bullying however the schools do not do not address our students needs so what
types of programs once they are requested they're not being provided when they are listed in the IEP I also wanted to make a comment about about about awareness teacher
awareness it is so fundamental in special education so that students are supported in all of their needs and to be able to help them about their uh behaviors because the services
truly are provided because the bi Services bid are always missing in the schools and that does not benefit the students in special education I don't understand how is it that they receive payment if our students are not
benefiting they are missing constantly in the school and that is not appropriate I also want you to know that the parents we have to be trained as well so that we are able to help our own students and another thing I want to let
you know that all children they require also their devices there's so many students without devices and to give good information but truly you are not providing them there's a lot of children with special needs that
require their Chromebooks or their tablets so that they are able to work thank you for your time Maria Montoya good afternoon thank you for the opportunity of letting us express a few of our concerns my my name is Maria
Montoya and I just wanted to let you know and ask you you gave very good information about the assist of technology I have a student in L USD who's 13 who is in in a non-public school and I would like just like to ask
you why is it that students in non-public schools are not given the support that you are here offering why is it that everything that you say that you offer about technology and all that is not offered to students that are in a
non-public school and how long does a district take to replace a device my son has been without a device without for a month that is his voice how would we feel if we could not communicate express
our basic needs because we do not have that voice because you don't have your communication device up to this point my son is not able to get his device back which is his voice to be able to communicate all for a month now now it's
frustrating as for parents to fight every single year to go through due process every single year so that your students can continue in the schools that offers the supports and services that are necessary it's so stressful and it's frustrating why is it that every
single year we have to go through this process so that this student can continue to access their education a service that is helping them is a that is benefiting them for their own progress and that the next year I really don't know if our student will where
they will be because we don't know if they will continue in that school there's very little information and support for La USD students that are in non-public schools and I would be thankful if you could uh Place more attention on that school thank you thank you for your time
uh Miriam Gonzalez Miriam Gonzalez is signed up to speak remotely but she's not online right now are you in the room Miriam no okay how about Natalie Bonia I see you're online with us Natalie Bonia please press star six to unmute yourself
and you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin Natalie Bonia yes hi um hope I hope you guys can hear me uh good afternoon board my name is Natalie and I'm a parent of a second grader at vintage Magnet Elementary from region north I'm here on behalf of
concerned parents because our children's safety is at risk and we demand immediate action on January 30th our school was place on lockdown due to a violent disturbance caused by a third grade student with an IEP and a history of known violent Behavior despite having
AIDS this students actions escalated resulting in a lockdown and law enforcement inter intervention parents received a vague message calling it a medical incident but we were left in the dark about our kids being secured in their classrooms since the start of the
Year this student has repeatedly dis displayed violent Behavior injuring both students and staff members this is not an isolated incident and reports from other schools show similar Violet alpers from this child parents were never informed and we still wouldn't have
known about this situation if it weren't for the lockdown and for parents being present during the situation this is no longer a one classroom issue but an ongoing problem that has no has now affected the entire school as a parent I should not have to hear from my own
child about how he is being told to stay safe nor should he need to be instructed on safety plans when his school is meant to be secure a secure environment the district and school administrations have failed to act and we can no longer trust that our children are safe we demand the
LA USD immed immediately to investigate how this situation has been handled Implement an effective solution prior prioritizing safety while offering appropriate support for students with IEPs and 504 plans establish clear
communication protocols with parents during incidents of school violence violence has no place in our schools violence is not an inherent part of a disability they are separate issues we urge you to act before a serious injury occurs into our school please do not
wait for the tragedy to take this matter seriously and I and I I did hear your presentations throughout the whole thing and I do support it I come with family with special needs so I do understand all the work that you guys are doing is essential but at the same time if you're
doing inclusivity you first need to find the proper guidelines the product proper protocols and no child is the same every child is different every situation is different you very much for your time thank you for your time okay um Dalia Gutierrez I see
you're signed up to speak remotely but you are not online right now are you in the room Dalia Gutierrez uh let's see Jenna noes I see you are online Jenna noes please press star six to unmute yourself and you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin
Jenna noes hello uh thank you for the great presentation um I I'd like to discuss some concerns parents are having with decision of the district being fully inclusive parents reach out to me knowing my background and they want
clarification as the district has not provided adequate information on how schools should address these concerns many parents are questioning why their students are being sent out of their classrooms due to one student's disruptive and violent behavior and why there is lack of appropriate behavior support how is this acceptable I'm fully
in supportive inclusion but it requires proper planning and more importantly it must be appropriate for the student as a former SEC teacher I saw how essential is support environment and small class sizes were for my students to succeed mainstreaming was beneficial for them
but they needed the right resources to thrive without AIDS in classrooms of 30 students sensory libraries different seating options how can we realistically accept uh all students except all students to learn but there are also concerns about future of special ed
teachers especially with cutting the positions gened teachers aren't even required to undergo specific trainings to work with the diverse student po ations is encouraged but not mandated for example I had to get that authorization to teach students with autism but General Leed teachers aren't
required to do the same as a parent I would want a special ed teacher in the classroom to ensure students receive the appropriate accommodations and support additionally I'm concerned about the student safety I speak from experience having navigated safety plans for my own
child who has an IEP The Bullying he he had space is unacceptable the only way we were able to secure the necessary support was threatening to involve the police with Rising incidents of violence on campuses I fear the solution will worsen without significant sufficient
support such as par professionals AIDS School climate Advocates and campus colleagues I hope the district PR prioritizes funding to properly train Jenna teachers come up with a member mentorship program for middle school and high school students have sensory
lending libraries and kindness campaigns at all School sites and incorporate Mary and IC success attributes for all students thank you thank you for your time di guen I see you're online di guen please press star six to unmute yourself and you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin miss guan's going to
speak in Spanish so if you'd like to hear what she's saying in English please put on your translation headsets Senor aen okay we will come back to uh Miss Ken um like we have one more person chomping
at the bit come on up here Mr tolkovsky you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin and then we'll return to uh Miss Ken thank you very much for the opportunity it's thought-provoking and it should be policy provoking um the assist of Technology Bennett Kaiser sat in one of your seats as a board member
with Parkinson's never received any assist of technology which tells you a little bit about the advocacy as necessary if a board member doesn't have assistance technology then it's a little bit diff difficult for families out there to get what is needed nine 900
kids have Assist of technology in the district there are over 60,000 kids in special ed in which is larger than Long Beach Unified so we need a federal lobbyist ask who lobbies for us in Washington DC we have government relations we need a stronger lobby with
respect uh right now there is talk that uh the president is going to move money from pel Grant and other things that we care about but he may move it into special ed weird but possible okay um there's a lawsuit on Tuesday you haven't closed session an interesting lawsuit in
which during the covid years there was a triple disadvantage to students with disabilities as they were sent home in online but you still have thousands of kids online what opportunities are there for those kids
online or in continuation schools or in mallister in other places for advocacy and let me say uh the there's a $9 billion Bond how much of that Capital went into cyber security and how much of it went into physical technology for children in the
classroom esy is the summer program for special ed you could be using the $500 million of of elot money to enrich that special ed so it's not just a minimal minimal since 1965 special ed program and lastly very important to uh uh utla
and others is the children youth Behavioral Health Initiative which is roughly $120 million has not been asked for to pay for social workers psychologists for all the support that's our special needs and our other kids and finally you will have the cops on your
agenda on Tuesday certificates of participation that why wasn't some of that Capital money put into the capital needs of special ad kids thank you very much thank you for your time um Mr Tok kovski and we're gonna try one more time
for Miss uh guen uh Miss guen please press star six to unmute yourself and you'll have two minutes to speak once you begin good afternoon members of the board welcome Miss Carla GGO what I want to say is according to
the board's rules the president can allow or can decide how many public comments they should have and how much time and previously Mr schmon had placed 15 public comments but it seems Miss GGO
that this morning I don't know if you changed this and you changed this modality I want to say that you should allow the community the community to speak and their voice to be heard this is very important parents that came to
speak today are bringing and certainly many thingss that you don't even know what's going on at the schools when I saw this presentation this afternoon I do have special needs students and you have never showed us this at the schools and we don't even know about this at
least the people that are at this committee they you speak and you say that the information is remote therefore out of the 880,000 children or less children that are in Special Needs
there are only certain parents therefore these type of things are you speak about inclusivity but you're excluding parents from the information that they need to be able to help their students special needs students need a
lot of support and many of the things that you spoke about today is that all the support that you want to give the children but how much money is this going to cost what is the budget that you will give in regards to to this and what is the trans transparency that
you're giving you have many lawsuits against you and we don't know how many more that that are being hidden that they're not public but this lawsuit that you have with art with art it's it this shows that you have no
transparency parents had advocated for Title One funds for lcap funds and there are there is no transparency and parents don't know what our students and what services our students have if you're not being transparent with General funds that have to do with the general at
students nevertheless the funds that are you have for special needs students and these are the most students that are in more need that are more vulnerable and you're talking about inclusion but you T you're excluding the parents from this information that they need to support their
children all right well thank you parents and uh audience for being here sharing your ideas I truly appreciate you coming forth and sharing your situation as well as sharing some ideas I did hear a lot about parent education you want more of this information the
process for getting these services and um and you want a a more comprehensive and detailed uh Workshop like what we had here so thank you thank you again to all the committee really appreciate everyone and we're having our next
meeting on May 7th um we will post the topic and uh we will make sure that there's plenty of space for disc discussion and uh comment and thank you again to our our uh speech and language uh division for this presentation thank
you have a good night and be safe