“Your son is not ready to be in the general ed classroom.”

“Your daughter’s skills are so far behind the others, it wouldn’t be fair to her, the teacher, or the other students to be in a regular classroom.”

“Your child will learn so many more skills in a less distracting environment.”

How many times and ways have you heard “No.” to inclusion? It is frustrating and heartbreaking for parents, damaging to children, and a tragic loss to our communities as a whole, when students are segregated and told they don’t belong.

Explore the 9 ways listed below to influence change in school districts. Then share this newsletter with others so more students can benefit from inclusive education.

Influence Change

1. Find allies.

Look for other parents, adults with disabilities, teachers, therapists, community members, administrators, school board members, college professors, and anyone else interested in making sure all students receive the education they deserve.

Gather these allies and work as a group. Collaborating will help energize everyone, provide more resources to tap into, give additional hands to do the work, and supply a variety of ideas to try. One idea is to take turns going to every school board meeting – you need to show up even when you don’t have a pressing issue. The relationships you will develop with board members and administrators by being at school board meetings will be very helpful.

2. Develop a marketing plan.

Yes, think like a marketer with a goal of creating positive change in your school district. Begin with story telling – have people see, feel, understand and care about how things are currently. Then share a story of how things can be.

Sell the practical and intrinsic benefits of inclusive education. Examples of benefits of inclusive education:

• higher levels of engagement in learning
• increased social interactions with peers
• enhanced communication skills
• more reciprocal friendships
• significant development and academic goals

3. Serve on existing district-wide and school-level committees/organizations (District Accountability Committee, PTOs or PTAs, etc.).

Stop identifying yourself only as a “parent of child with a disability”. This sets you apart from other parents and discourages working together to create schools that benefit all students.

When parents contribute to existing committees instead of forming “special needs” parent groups, the emphasis is on “we are all in this together”. If we want others to care about our kids, we need to care about other kids. Any recommendations from these committees need to be looked through the lens of how every student will benefit.

4. Start a book/video club.

Focus on disability studies, inclusion, and how to eliminate ableism (belief that “able-bodied people” are superior to people with disabilities). Push each other’s thinking into new directions, share stories and resources. But you also have to remember to have fun – have food and adult beverages for everyone. Here are some suggested books and videos to get you started.

• Rethinking Disability: A Disability Studies Approach to Inclusive Practices by Jan W. Valle and David J. Conner
• Community: The Structure of Belonging by Peter Block
• Hope For The Flowers by Trina Paulus
• The Beyond Access Model: Promoting Membership, Participation, and Learning for Students with Disabilities in the General Education Classroom Cheryl M. Jorgensen, Michael McSheehan, and Rae M. Sonnenmeier
• Sproutflix, click here for link to free streams of videos
• We All Belong, click here for the link to the video.
• Short Bus, click here for the video link.
• A Credo For Support, click here for the link to the video.

5. Call for school reform.

Make sure the reform is based on:

• Changing cultures
• Staff training that includes peer modeling and coaching
• Universal Design for Learning
• Schools and districts learning from each other

Parents have tried a variety of strategies with different amounts of success to get their child included in general education classrooms. When a group of parents use the strategies above with a combination of approaches below, they will be 10x more effective at impacting change.

6. Legal: refer to laws, regulations, and court cases that define the Least Restrictive Environment (LRE)

7. Researched-based: cite studies done that show the benefits of inclusion for students with and without disabilities.

8. Social Justice : share how all students belong and deserve to be educated with their peers

9. Least Dangerous Assumption: explain how it will not harm students to presume their competence and have high expectations for their achievement.

Click here to read Cheryl M. Jorgensen’s article, The Least Dangerous Assumption. Here is Zach Rossetti and Carol Tashie’s article, click here to read it.

Change is possible. Let’s make it happen!