Episode 295 - Ableism in Schools

Summary

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ABA Inside Track – Episode 295: Ableism in Schools

Date: December 11, 2024
Hosts: Robert (Rob) Perry Crews, Jackie McDonald, Diana Perry Cruz

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Overview

This episode focuses on ableism in schools—the systemic discrimination against disabled individuals embedded in educational practices, language, and policies. The hosts use recent research articles to unpack the ways ableist beliefs and structures pervade schools, reflect candidly on their own biases, and discuss practical steps practitioners and educators can take to combat ableism and shift toward more inclusive, strength-based approaches.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Personal Reflections and the Challenge of Ableism

• Hosts’ Journeys: The team shares how they became interested in ableism, commenting on the discomfort and growth that comes from recognizing personal complicity and the pervasiveness of ableist language in education and behavior analysis.
  • “Some of the areas where these are ableist practices...I found myself with a lot of the ‘here’s some ideas or ways we could move away from that’ really struggling with...Yeah, but like, I really, yeah, butted so much of these articles...it was a little scary to think about. Oh man, ...I could be one of the people that I’ve been increasingly frustrated with in the world.”
    — Rob Perry Crews (07:38)
  • “I found myself reflected in many of the articles and what I have been writing and what I have been saying and without even thinking, right, because our language is embedded in our society.”
    — Jackie McDonald (08:32)

2. Definition and Nature of Ableism [12:20–16:51]

• Definition: Described as “a pervasive system of discrimination and exclusion that oppresses people who have mental, emotional and physical disabilities.”
  • Quoting Rauscher & McClintock: “Ableism is a pervasive system of discrimination and exclusion that oppresses people who have mental, emotional and physical disabilities... deeply rooted beliefs and... an environment that is often hostile to those whose abilities fall out of the scope of what is currently defined as socially acceptable.” (13:34–13:48)
• Embeddedness: Unlike overt discrimination, ableism is insidious, often unintentional, and normalized in both language and school structures.
• Comparison with other ‘isms’: Just as pernicious as racism, ageism, or sexism, but less discussed.

3. Historical Framing and Language [21:45–26:55]

• Medical Model Origins: Disabilities historically defined as deficiencies, with language contributing to social perceptions of inferiority.
  • “Right from the get go, when they said, okay, you have this disability, they were automatically characterized as less than because of the language that was surrounded by it.”
    — Jackie (22:25)
  • Hosts imagine: What if autism was described initially as a strength or just “another way to be”?
• Language Shift: Recognizing limits of “eliminating stereotypes.” The goal should be cultural responsiveness—listening to individuals’ experiences and needs, not assuming one can fully “know” another’s culture or identity.

4. Ableist Structures in Education [31:03–34:18]

• Special Education: Examined critically—does it liberate by personalizing learning or reinforce exclusion by aiming to ‘catch up’ or ‘normalize’?
  • "You're never going to be doing the same things as our normal students, therefore give them their own scope and sequence...The other type of special education is: you're behind and my job is to catch you up...Which again also points to why do they need to be caught up? Why doesn’t the regular ed teacher just teach better?"
    — Rob (31:03)
• Curricular Priorities: Questions the rationale of what is taught and why functional skills are reserved only for those in special ed.

5. Case Study: Ableism in School Reform Initiatives (Timberlake, 2020) [37:53–55:38]

• Educational Initiatives Reviewed:
  • Alternate Assessments: Intended for fairness, often reinforce otherness and separation; teachers express uncertainty, often removing disabled students from regular settings.
    • “A lot of real concepts about how the students in order to access these ideally equitable practices really just ended up with a lot of the students with disabilities being othered from the other groups.” (46:55)
    • "We can't just dump them in regular classes where everything's over their head..." (48:41)
  • Scripted Curricular Modules: “One-size-fits-all” approaches erase individualization and exclude disability representation.
  • Project-Based Learning: May promote inclusion but often rests on “capitalist” values, judging students by workforce readiness.
• Language as a Red Flag: Discussion reveals how terms like “dumping them in regular classes” devalue students and reflect ableist frames.

6. Inspiration Porn and Tokenism in Schools [55:38–56:54]

• Feel-good “Inspiration” Stories: E.g., allowing a student with disabilities to score a touchdown.
  • Labeled as “inspiration porn”, these stories serve the feelings of non-disabled people and reinforce otherness instead of true inclusion.
    • "That is, like you said, giving everybody else a pat on the back because they make. It makes them feel good…That's what that's called. So you're right to feel weird about it. And we don't want to do that."
      — Diana (56:18)

7. Guidance for Anti-Ableist Language (Bottema-Beutel et al., 2020) [57:15–65:45]

• Checklist for Communication (see [59:00]):
  • Would I use this language with an autistic person?
  • Does it imply autistic people are inferior or need fixing/cure?
  • Is it overly medicalized?
  • Is it based on tradition despite being stigmatizing?
  • Does it unnecessarily “other” autistic people?
• Practical Suggestions ([Table 1, 61:26]):
  • Instead of “special interests,” use “areas of expertise” or “focused interests."
  • Swap “special needs” for “specific supports.”
  • Use “targeted education” instead of “special education.”
  • Avoid “challenging/problem behavior”—describe specific behaviors.
  • Replace “treatment” with “support services” or “educational strategies.”
  • Shift from “autism as an epidemic” to “autism as increasingly recognized or diagnosed.”

8. Combating Ableism: Recommendations (Story, 2007) [66:33–78:03]

• Ability Awareness: Discuss disabilities openly, not as taboos; everyone is different, needing different supports.
• Address Classroom Norms: E.g., expecting everyone to sit still and listen may disadvantage neurodivergent students.
  • “The expectation that everyone's got to sit on the floor, crisscross applesauce...could be an ableist expectation for someone whose neurotype is different and could learn in a different way.”
    — Diana (67:03)
• Meaningful Inclusion: Avoid “buddy” systems where disabled students are treated as sidekicks; inclusion means genuine participation.
• Representation and Presumed Competence: Employ staff with disabilities, avoid talking about individuals as if they’re not present, and presume competence in all students.
• Teacher Training: Professional development should center disabled voices and lived expertise.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Reflection:
  “If you find yourself referring to a group people as ‘them,’ you probably want to pause that sentence and reflect.”
  — Diana Perry Cruz (49:50)
• On Language Shifts:
  “I think I need to change my language in order to support my actual feelings and thoughts based on what I have in the past written.”
  — Jackie McDonald (59:04)
• On Tokenism:
  “It just feels icky and it has a name...‘inspiration porn’...told at the expense of the person with the disability and makes everyone else look so great for allowing them this opportunity.”
  — Diana Perry Cruz (56:18)
• On Individualization:
  “It has to be approached individually.”
  — Diana (34:18)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Definition & Nature of Ableism: [12:20–16:51]
• Impact of Language & Medical Model: [21:45–26:55]
• Dilemmas in Special Education: [31:03–34:18]
• Educational Initiative Case Studies: [37:53–55:38]
• Inspiration Porn and School Tokenism: [55:38–56:54]
• Checklist & Language Suggestions: [57:15–65:45]
• Combating Ableism—Recommendations: [66:33–78:03]

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Final Takeaways & Recommendations

• Self-Reflection: Combatting ableism begins with continual, honest self-reflection—including discomfort—among educators and practitioners.
• Change Language, Change Culture: Adjusting the way we speak about disability can help shift broader societal attitudes and behaviors.
• Push Beyond Stereotypes: Tokenistic gestures of inclusion or one-size-fits-all reforms often reinforce ableism rather than disrupt it.
• Prioritize Flexible, Individualized Supports: Move toward “targeted education” and strengths-based support for all students, not just those with IEPs or 504 plans.
• Listen to Disabled Voices: In policy, training, and curriculum—center and defer to the lived expertise of disabled individuals.

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Related ABA Inside Track Episodes

• Episode 165: Quality of Life
• Episode 160: Incorporating Unique Interests (w/ Tamika Meadows)
• Episode 251: Self Determination in IEP Planning
• Episode 236: Assent and Self Determination (w/ Alex Kishbaugh & Dr. Haley Steinhauser)
• Episodes 268, 280, 281: Neurodiversity Series
• Book Club: “NeuroTribes” (1001-level episodes)

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Pairings & Ending

• Snack Pairing: “Square pizza, corn and chocolate milk”—the emblem of an average school lunch, symbolizing the “one-size-fits-all” experience that the episode critiques.
• Final Thought (Diana):
  “Giving people skills and education isn’t enough... We need to really make concerted effort towards identifying [ableism], allowing people to sit with it and move, move through it, so that they can then become... anti ableism advocates and allies.” (77:33)

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Transcript

[Unknown Speaker]

Foreign.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Hey, everybody. Welcome to ABA Inside Track, the podcast that's like reading in your car but safer. I'm your host, Robert Perry Crews, and with me, as always, are my fabulous co hosts.

[Jackie McDonald]

What up, Rob? This is your friend, your lovable friend, Jackie. That's if you couldn't guess. That was my sitcom intro.

[Robert Perry Crews]

That's pretty good.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I like that a lot. And it's me, Diana Perry Cruz.

[Jackie McDonald]

Hello. Don't. Should I say my name? Jackie McDonald.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

You can if you want to.

[Jackie McDonald]

I say Jackie, but not Jackie McDonald. So I'm going to say Jackie McDonald.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I decided to start adding that because.

[Jackie McDonald]

Nobody knows who's married to Rob.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah. And also, I want people to know our last names, too.

[Jackie McDonald]

Truth.

[Robert Perry Crews]

It's a good idea. Okay, well, welcome. This is a podcast.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Thank you.

[Robert Perry Crews]

About behavior analysis and behavior analytic research. Not a podcast about full names. But that's okay, because in behavior analysis, we do have full names. Every week on the show, we pick a topic.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Oh, wow. And we do have full names.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Discuss it at length, as in through the lens of research article. Sorry, folks. We. We all just came back. This is, like, the second recording in a row where we all went and did some, like, busy thing right before. Related to the Cub Scouts. And we are all very tired from. We had a fun overnight activity that we all did, which. Yeah. Which is fun, but at the same time, I don't think you realize how much. How little sleep you get when you do one of these activities and these, like, overnight activities until you are trying to record a podcast, like, you know, a number of hours later. So here we go. We're going to get back into it.

[Jackie McDonald]

I'm Jazz. I can't tell you how Jazz.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I'm not unjazzed about the topic. I just. And then I picked a very boring chore to do that I did for, like, four hours straight. So I'm gonna get my mind.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

That's on you.

[Robert Perry Crews]

That's on me. I thought it was gonna take 30 minutes. It did not.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

No. You've been down here for, like, four hours.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yes. It's a very long and boring task.

[Unknown Speaker]

Yeah.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I wondered what happened to you.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I went downstairs and I did a boring task where I tried to sort a very boring thing so I can.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

File it up the living room and the kitchen, and kids put the clothes away and make cookies.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Those clothes got folded by me.

[Jackie McDonald]

Everyone is so excited about your schedule.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah. You forgot they might be we're recording. They might be.

[Jackie McDonald]

That's true.

[Robert Perry Crews]

They might be. I don't know. Do we Just restart this whole thing or just.

[Jackie McDonald]

No, turn into the skids.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Turn into the skids here.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Perfect.

[Robert Perry Crews]

We're human. We're humans too. And we're going to be talking about respecting all humans for all of their differences today on this episode where we're discussing Ableism in schools.

[Jackie McDonald]

Yay.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yay to Ableism in schools. Jackie, I'm shocked. I thought you'd say that. That's the twist.

[Jackie McDonald]

I'm excited that we're talking.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Oh, okay.

[Jackie McDonald]

Not that it's happening.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Not excited about Ableism.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

That's fair.

[Jackie McDonald]

Yeah.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

It's an important topic and I'm glad we're talking about it too.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yeah. Well, I figured you would jump in because you have spoken a lot about this topic. Not just, you know, podcast related, but a lot of presentation materials. I know it's something that professionally you've been very interested in. It's one of those terms that I sort of just lumped into the. Yes, these are types of discrimination. But I don't think I'd thought about it till I know. You were, you were sharing some slides. I was, I was doing a presentation and you said I did one similar to that and I said I'd love to get some ideas. And so you shared some resources and there's Ableism. And I realized, man, we're not talking about this as much as we should be.

[Jackie McDonald]

So, so true.

[Robert Perry Crews]

So, so true.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Here we are. Pull back the curtain.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Where did you get into it? Where did you get into Ableism? The topic of Ableism, I should say. Or discussing it?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Oh, that's a good question that I wasn't really prepared for because I think that I've been looking at this type of research and folks opinions on it for quite a while and I probably got in, into, into it through varying social media groups or posts that I saw. And so I, I joined varying groups of folks who had different backgrounds, different perspectives and read a lot of information. I did a lot of my own background reading and research. And then in the context of teaching, I teach a class where we spend a lot of time talking about the history of autism, disability rights, ableism, neurodiversity and the social versus the medical model of disability. And so through that process, I think I ended up reading quite a bit about this topic. And I think it's really important and certainly if folks are longtime listeners of the show.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

You can, I would think, see a shift in our focus and our perspectives over time because we've been doing this for eight years. X number of years. Eight years.

[Jackie McDonald]

Eight years, says Jackie.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Eight years now.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And so nine in February. Certainly like my understanding of this topic and the way in which we might approach, you know, research and working in our field has, has grown and changed over that time. And our field has grown and changed over that time. So I don't think it would be surprising to anyone to hear that we've done this type of background work and reading through that time period.

[Jackie McDonald]

I know that I became interested in this topic when I actually taught Diana's class. So I hadn't, I hadn't delved into it. I mean, I heard, you know, that we were being ableist and. But I didn't really understand what that meant until I had to teach it by teaching Diana's class alongside her. So I'm still learning though. I learned a ton from these articles. Full disclosure. Yeah, I was so excited to read them and I thought they were also well written and they laid out the problem and the solutions better than most articles I feel. So I was, I was very, very impressed.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Cool.

[Robert Perry Crews]

So I, I have a confession to make. Yes, here we go. So ableism as a form of discrimination is certainly one that I've always lumped into all the forms of discrimination. Bad. Don't do that. That's awful. And in reading these articles, I found them very challenging in a number of ways to reflect on because unlike I think we've talked a lot about forms of discrimination on the show over the years and while having like hard conversations can be uncomfortable, they've certainly been in topics that do at least you know, I'm going to speak for myself due to my own privilege. Could I could sort of see as like, oh, that's something we're thinking about, we're talking about as a nation, like I could distance myself from them to some extent even when having those conversations. And I've learned a lot in that process. So I expected when we picked this topic, I'm reading the articles, oh, this is going to be such an easy. Because I'm so much better at talking about these. I don't feel that comfortable talking about ableism because unlike I think some of our conversations where we're learning, we're still listening. This is a topic where some of the areas where these are ableist practices. It was like a slap in the face of, hey, and guess what, I'm describing something that you personally, as someone who taught as a special education teacher still are in the field of special education do said possibly are. And I found myself with a lot of the. Here's some Ideas or here's some ways we could move away from that. Really struggling with. Yeah, but like, I really, yeah. Butted so much of these articles and you know, you've sort of got that, I don't know if you've had that in other topics, that sort of that dual mind of I want to make the change. Yeah, but do I need to make. So I, I found this a very challenging topic to come to and I really did not. I expected this to be, you know, slammed up. We've been talking about this. I'm, I'm so excited to be someone I think has really learned about so many of the injustices in the world and a much more an ally to change and against those who wouldn't change. And man, this is the first time in a while I think it just felt like, oh, I don't know, am, am I as good at, am I going to be as good talking about this or am I going to be a barrier? I don't think I will be a barrier. Certainly we're also just talking around a microphone, but it was a little scary to think about. Oh man, I could be, I could be one of the people that I've been increasingly frustrated with in the world.

[Jackie McDonald]

I, I, I can say I, I feel your point because when I was reading the articles, I found, I saw, I found myself reflected in many of the articles and what I have been writing and what I have been saying and without even thinking, right. Because our language is embedded in our society. And I found that when looking at the history and why and why we talk about that and what that language might mean for, you know, the autistic community and how it came about, I, I have found that I, I also need to do a lot of work in that area. So I felt you, I also felt that it was hard, but for me it was a little more invigorating. Like, oh, look, I'm noticing something that I could be doing better at. And now I need to do better. Right. And, and trying to think of, like, ways that I can do that while still working in the confines of, right. My job and, you know, insurance companies and, but in a way that can be, you know, affirming. So, yeah.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And you know, the good news is to that, respect, Jackie, I think that there is a lot of room that we have right. To do exactly what you're saying. And then with respect to what you said, Rob, earlier, in reference to something different, you were saying turn into the skid. But I actually think that that is applicable here as well. When we're having these hard types of conversations. Because there is a point where, whether it's this or some other bias, unconscious bias, that you may find, you know, find yourself caring or kind of discover, you do actually have to turn into the skit. You have to be like, oh, that is something I've been thinking. Or that is a way that I've been practicing. And I didn't, I didn't mean to. It's just what I had learned in the past. And if you want to, you know, I'm bad at driving on ice, but I'm pretty sure that that's what you do, right? You have to. If you're sliding on ice, you have to turn.

[Robert Perry Crews]

You turn into the skid.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Turn into the skid in order to.

[Unknown Speaker]

Write your car, Right?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So it isn't actually a very apt metaphor because if you keep fighting against it and say, that's not me, I don't do those things, not my aba, right? Etc, then you're just going to make it worse. And if we as individuals and as a field want to get ourselves out of a potential skid, then we have to acknowledge what's going on, what maybe we've not been doing as well at in the past so that we can actually kind of, you know, right ourselves and get going in the way that we want to go. So how's that for a little segue?

[Jackie McDonald]

So good to.

[Robert Perry Crews]

What? What articles?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Probably the articles. No, it was this. It was this. It was a roundabout segue from the earlier thing. That's a callback.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Oh, yeah.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Would you like to know the articles?

[Robert Perry Crews]

I'd love to.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Oh, okay, sure. Then we have three. We have. Actually, I found a lot of articles, but we are going to attempt to focus our conversation more specifically to schools at this present moment in time. Ableism in schools. There's a lot of good articles out there that we like, would like to cover in the future. But the three that we really want to focus on today are as follows. Combating Ableism in Schools by Story. Published in Preventing School failure back in 2007. Also recognizing ableism in educational initiatives. Reading between the lines. That's by Timberlake, Published in Research in Educational Policy and management in 2020. And avoiding ableist Language Suggestions for Autism Researchers by Botama, Butel, Cap, Lester, Sassen and Hand. And that was published in Autism in adulthood. Also 2020. Big year.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Big Year. All right, so when we talk about Ableism, what exactly are we talking about?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah, So I feel like the easiest way to describe Ableism is thinking about Discrimination against disability. And disability could be defined a lot of different ways. So it could be a physical disability, it could be an intellectual disability, or it could be, you know, maybe an invisible disability as we sometimes refer to, which could encompass all sorts of things, including having a different neurotype such as autism, that may make it such that your interactions with the world are different than what the general population's expectation might be. And in the story article, they give us a definition from Rauscher and McClintock and I'll tell you what that is. They said, quote, pervasive. Ableism is a pervasive system of discrimination and exclusion that oppresses people who have mental, emotional and physical disabilities. This, these are deeply rooted beliefs and involve creating an environment that is often hostile to those whose physical, mental, cognitive or sensory abilities fall out of the scope of what is currently defined as socially acceptable. So I think that my definition matches up pretty well with that.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And so just like other isms, right, we have ableism just like we have racism, just like we have. I was going to say misogynism, but I'm not sure that is actually a word. Right, but we have ageism.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I mean, it's a word, I guess, right?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

What word am I wanting to use when I talk about like gender discrimination?

[Jackie McDonald]

I think you just say gender discrimination.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So it's not an ism. So that was a terrible example. But it still falls into the knee.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Is, is a, is a concern as well.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Still falls underneath this, the same area.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And so certainly when we think about discrimination based on race, for example, like that is pretty well understood within our society. And ableism is just as present as racism, ageism, genderism, etc, but we, it might not be part of our sort of general consciousness when we have conversations about these things. It's just as other isms are developed and maintained by society at large and the cultures that we live in, it doesn't require one individual person to say, hey, I don't like people with disabilities and I'm going to go out of my way to make sure their lives are harder.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

That is not required. It doesn't need to be some type of overt discrimination, but rather it is embedded and enmeshed within our understanding of how the world works, within how the world actually does work, because it hasn't been designed for people with disabilities. And even in the language that we speak right there, as Jackie's going to talk about that later, there are a lot of built in components of our language that function as discrimination against people with disabilities. So these things are all just permeated within our society. And it doesn't require someone to consciously be acting in a discriminatory manner. Rather, it is just kind of baked in to. To the whole situation. Right. So you don't have to say like, well, of course I'm not ableist. Like, I work with people with disabilities and I care about all the people that I work with. It may be the case, just as in past discussions we've had about race, let's say, right, that due to your own personal histories and your own personal upbringing and the fact that you live within a society that permeates and, you know, perpetuates these types of discriminations, that you may find yourself holding similar biases against people with disabilities without realizing it. And even if you are, you know, don't want to be like that, right. Or haven't ever thought that you were doing that before, it is important to pause and reflect, to think, well, is that potentially the case for me or in some of my actions? And that's kind of like the first step that one might need to take in order to then be able to actively work against what may be the biases that you hold through no fault of your own except the environment you. You were raised in.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right?

[Jackie McDonald]

Yeah. That's really good. That's a really good review.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Thanks.

[Jackie McDonald]

Summary.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Okay, I know one of the concepts that I kept coming back to in reading these articles and we'll talk about it, you know, more specifically in the Timberlake article really comes down to how much of our. How many of our structures are just built with the assumption of, well, this is for the normal people and this was the best way to do things. Therefore, you know, we'll make accommodations, I suppose. But there's almost this weird begrudging nature to like, well, we've created these things for the average person. And by average, I mean normal. And by normal, I mean they're able to walk without, you know, assistive technology or with assistive devices, and they're able to communicate vocally, and they have an IQ of 100 or so or 85 to 115, and maybe higher, but definitely not lower. And things should be made for this group because this is the main group. And if you're not in this group, well, that's unfortunate for you. And I guess we'll throw you a bone by maybe having some pictures or some ramps and. And that's to help you, though, because you should have probably thought better about your disability before you had it, or, I don't know it just feels like there's a very. This weird concept that I don't think unlike, you know, certainly talking about racism and talking about systemic racism, there's a lot hidden there. But I think with disability and ableism, there's almost like a weird increased perniciousness to just the banality of the type of discrimination. It's just, well, that's just how it is, right? Schools have to be this way. That's how they are. We wish, therefore, you know, we wish we could do more, but that's just how it's going to be. Sorry, people with a disability, I don't know what to tell you, as opposed to saying, well, why does school have to be that way? Why do roads and sidewalks have to be a certain way? Why do we have to build things that way? And then sort of just having people stare at you. If you bring that question up, like, well, that's how we've always done it here, right?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And when you say that's how we've always done it, it's because in the past, folks with disabilities had no voice, right? So people were institutionalized or who knows what and didn't have the opportunity to have their positions in society experienced by anybody else because nobody saw them, right? So when you're saying Rob, like, oh, like sometimes there are ramps, like even those modifications had to be really hard fought for and won at great expense to the people who were attempting to get those what we would view as basic equal rights and availabilities open to them. So you're absolutely right that it's been a, a hidden group that hasn't really been able to get the same experiences that they would need to as other people for a whole variety of reasons. And in the story article he put a quote, quote in here from Gill 1995, that I really liked that. And the quote is he's talking about non disabled people. So he says they are so smug about the centrality of their experience. And that was just a great summary, I think, of what this whole ableist perspective is. Right, okay, so we talked about ableism generally and I think we want to move ourselves into how we may see this present in schools specifically.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And just like other isms, it's possible that teachers or administrators or folks who are in charge of designing our schools, school buildings, the curricula themselves, the assessments that are involved, the decisions about who is going to get what type of education, whether it's regular education or special education, or what type of supports they're going to get any of Those folks are. Are fallible.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

They're humans.

[Unknown Speaker]

You.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

They all have their own learning history. And it's possible that they may carry or harbor some perhaps unconscious ableist bias against groups with disabilities, whatever that disability might be. So, you know, the, the story article talks about that there may be negative cultural assumptions about disability. Negative stereotypes present a lack of understanding about disability issues. So again, huge doesn't have to be pernicious like you're saying.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

But if you haven't had that on your own experience and your own learning related to disability, then you just may not know what. What you should be doing.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

And one thing I'm gonna pull this in. This is from the betel bomb. Is that how you say it? My article botama. But yeah, butema. I can't say I'm not great with. I always ask Diana for last names. Is that it makes sense from a language perspective that disabilities would fall under this ableist approach because many of the disabilities were discovered by medical doctors and by researchers. Right. And they were labeled as a deficiency in what erred from. From the neurotypical or non autistic population. And so.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

So right from the get go, when they said, okay, you have this, this disability, they were automatically characterized as less than.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

Because of the language that was surrounded by it. And could you imagine how different our world would be if like, say in the 40s, when the researchers discovered the characteristic autism, they said, oh, this is a superpower. How different our language would be based on how those researchers described it then and how, how, how, how easier it might be for people if it was this, if it was described initially as a strength instead of weakness.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah. And not everyone feels as though autism is a superpower. And for. No, it's.

[Jackie McDonald]

No, no.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yes.

[Robert Perry Crews]

But I'm just talking about that hypothetical mind experiment. If they'd said, this is so different. This must be a new evolution of.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Just the human mind, like another way to be.

[Jackie McDonald]

Another way to be, period. Imagining if it had started there instead and start instead of started out of place from deficiencies.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah, yeah.

[Jackie McDonald]

Indifference.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And I think that it might be good for us to do a whole episode talking about the medical model of disability, etc. But in I all I also wanted to note in the story article, I see changes in, I think, how we think about things now versus that article then, because that was in 2007 and in that article they were talking about why we want to work on like, quote unquote, eliminating stereotypes. And I feel like we've kind of moved past that type of language in our discussions here. So, you know, previously we've talked about the difference between cultural competence and cultural responsiveness.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And with cultural competence, it's the basic idea there is that I can learn everything about other cultures, and once I know everything about that culture, I'll. I'll know how to interact with them. But you really, truly cannot know about somebody else's culture because you can only know, truly know what your own experience has spent. You only can come from your own individual perspective. So cultural responsiveness or cultural humility is about basically, honestly, it's about understanding that fact first and foremost and always bearing in mind that, you know, what my personal cultural background is, is individual to me. And the person who I'm interact with, it's. Their background is going to be individual to them. And my best bet here to bridge that gap is to be open, honest, listening. Yeah. And finding out what's important to them in order to. To have us interact in a way that's meaningful for both of us. So I feel like that same exact model is applicable here too.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So, like, eliminating stereotypes, like, that's really pie in the sky.

[Jackie McDonald]

And it's never gonna happen.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

It just doesn't have to do with the real life.

[Jackie McDonald]

Right. And it's not gonna happen. Right. Because we all engage in, like, unconscious stereo, like, stereotyping of people based on our history of reinforcement and punishment.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

So, yeah, that just. That's just a thing that's gonna happen. Right. Because we're people and we're human, but that doesn't mean that we can't also be responsive to difference.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I feel like when we talk about getting rid of stereotypes, we're also talking about we need to change people's verbal behavior around a sub. Than looking at, you know, root causes of stereotype or how does one's impression of otherness impact their interest in changing policy or, you know, increasing access to resources?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah. It's almost like I don't see color type of phrasing.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Therefore, I'm done, which is ridiculous as well. So, you know, understanding, like my. My perspective of how I operate in the world and what supports I may or may not need in order to do the things I want to do in my life is individual to me. And I can't fully know what someone else's experience is like without interacting with them, asking them, and observing what that experience is for them. For them. Exactly. I don't know.

[Jackie McDonald]

I forgot what else I was gonna.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Say regarding that point.

[Jackie McDonald]

I know. I think that's Great. Something that you said though. I, I'm. I've been thinking about this all day and I'm wondering if merely changing our verbal behavior might then change society's view on things.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

Because how we're talking about something may then change how we're talking about something to someone else may then change the perception. I don't know.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Possibly.

[Jackie McDonald]

I think that would be a really cool research.

[Robert Perry Crews]

We then sort of get into. Does changing one's verbal behavior change it in terms of like your frames around, you know, either or, you know, some of those versus I just understand what audiences. I can be a real jerk. I can talk about these like things obnoxiously and I know that they'll reinforce that stereotypical language and the ones I need to be nicer around or I need to not use that language.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Well, sure, but I don't think so.

[Jackie McDonald]

I don't think so either because I'm really thinking like if I change how I'm discussing needs, for instance, how we're talking about being anti ableist.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

If I'm talking about specific needs and not talking about special ed and I'm not talking about the symptoms of autism, but the specific supports that the student, the student needs in order to be successful in the classroom, will then that change the verbal behavior or the actions of others, the listener?

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

Due to the history now of contacting reinforcement through my language. I don't know, I just think it would be a really cool dissertation. Probably not. Not a master.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I'm just curious. I mean it might come down sort of to like the motivation.

[Unknown Speaker]

It might.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Where's the change coming from? I am changing because I want to, you know, be a better ally, be a better advocate, work better with individuals in my care with disability.

[Jackie McDonald]

Maybe versus versus your community.

[Robert Perry Crews]

My community is just like getting on my case. It's like, fine, you want to use these new terms, I'll use them in front of you. But it's not going to change, you.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Know, and yeah, well that's still related to your past history. Right then. And different cultures have different understandings of disability based on how the language is used within that culture. Culture and what the connotations are related to disability and even what words they have for disability. So I think that there's truth to this.

[Jackie McDonald]

I think, I think, I don't know any research looking at this, but my article highly suggests that just changing our language may then help to change the societal norms that we are experiencing now. So I just think that would be a fascinating research and maybe if we can do something like, I don't know, in a small group and see what happens. But I don't know. It's shower thought.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I like it. I did remember the other thing I wanted to say, so this is great because I was saying, like, oh, it's like a. I don't see color type of idea.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Which I think embedded within that is the idea that disability is a bad thing.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

It's coded as bad, and we want to get away from that. There's nothing wrong with disability. You can use the words disability, you can use the words disable. And we want to understand what is someone else's experience as much as they can tell us what that experience is like, right. So that we can identify what are going to be the supports that are helpful for them, what can we do to alter or alter the environment, accommodate them, et cetera, so that they can experience the world in the way that they want to, in a way that is ultimately most fulfilling for them. So it's okay to use those words. We don't need to shy away from it, as Jackie's probably going to say as well. And to tie this into schools like this is pervasive in schools. So even.

[Jackie McDonald]

Even the term special ed. Yes. Is Right. Is less than.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

It's, you know, special in some way.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Which is like, what's that word euphemism, Right. I don't know the right word. Rob.

[Jackie McDonald]

Rob would know.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yeah.

[Jackie McDonald]

I don't know words like that.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

It's like dancing around, trying to say something.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right, right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Because you think it's a bad thing to say. That's the core of what's going on there. So schools just like the psychological model, are kind of built in the same way where if someone's not learning the way that you might anticipate, then they get kicked over to, you know, special, quote, unquote, special area and additional testing. And then, you know, directions are taken to try to make assistance there.

[Robert Perry Crews]

But it still always comes back to. I think what we're talking about is when you're in special education, there's two kinds of special education teachers. You either are teaching individuals who. They're never going to be doing the same things as our normal students, therefore give them their own scope and sequence, which to some extent, while I think that does come from some ableist assumptions about what everyone should be learning, it also does sort of allow for more individualization, which to some extent might be slightly more liberating of like, well, I don't care that you're not going to learn this thing because you don't seem to care and you seem interested in the following things. I'll help you learn those things. Right. It's a little more person. It could be, I don't want to say it is. It could be more person derived. And the other type of special education is you're, you know, behind and my job is to catch you up. Which again also points to why do they need to be caught up? Why doesn't the regular ed teacher just teach better? And, and I say that, you know, and, and I know if, if you are someone who has special ed teacher.

[Jackie McDonald]

Right now that's driving in their car, they're like slapping you through the, you know, complicated issue.

[Robert Perry Crews]

It's very complicated. If you're a general education teacher, it is very hard to be like, well, you have to both teach children with and without disabilities. And depending on the intensity of that disability or how it impacts the thing that you have been told you need to teach, it does become like, well now it is impossible. I can't teach, you know, 20 children in 20 different ways. And that is true. And then that's a resource issue. But that comes back to sort of how do we want to envision education? How do we want to fund education? You know, I mean, if we want to have more teachers, perhaps it would be so that we can group students by level of interest in topics rather than, well, you have special needs, therefore you need a special teacher with patience versus, you know, a regular teacher, I guess, has no patience.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah, I think it. And often when you are having this type of hypothetical exercise that you're doing, you end up at the point of saying, well, why are we teaching the things that we teach to the general education students as well? Many of them are quite non functional and aren't going to assist them in their day to day lives.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So why is it that if that we're making that distinction too? If you have an intellectual disability, then we're going to teach you things that are functional in your life. And if you don't, then you got to learn trigonometry, which is quite useless unless you're going to build a bridge. Maybe I don't even know.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I think we have a lot of educational systems and then it's also hard to track. Like at what point are we just, well, you students aren't high achieving, therefore you shouldn't get to learn trigonometry, you should work on your tradesmanship. But again, there's a difference between helping individuals find the things they're passionate about so that they can continue learning what they want to learn throughout their life versus these are an arbitrary set of standards that I guess we have decided if you know all of the things, you therefore can excel in a very European, western centered capitalist society. So it goes beyond. I mean, I think the easiest way to deal with ableism would be to tear down a lot of the systems.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

That we have in place.

[Robert Perry Crews]

But that'll be true about most of the is.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

You end up at a radical place when you go through this exercise because it also, I think is. Is ableist as well to say, well, this person has a disability and therefore they. We are not going to ask them to do these things that other. We're asking other people to do them. We're already making this assumption about them. That's not fair either.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Either way it has to be approached individually. Okay, so maybe I set some groundwork.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I think so. I think we have a sense of what the definition is. And one last thing is, and this was something that I sort of was kind of struggling with in terms of looking at solutions is when we talk about ableism, we are talking about such a wide range of disabilities, some disabilities impacting an individual's ability to communicate their interests. So when we are talking about such a wide, wide community, much of what we'll be discussing is sort of some general ideas and principles around sort of our language and possible directions to go in. But we're not spe, you know, we're not going to be able to speak for every single group for a number of reasons. Certainly there are many different disability types. But also because, you know, that's. Yes, you know, not our, not our story to tell. Well, let's take a little break and then when we come back, let's look a little more directly at some of the ableist practices that exist in our kind of schools and research areas. We'll be right back.

[Jackie McDonald]

Hi. Do you want to be a bcba, also known as a board Certified Behavior Analyst?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Sure, we all do.

[Jackie McDonald]

Now you can come to Regis College in Weston, Massachusetts to get your graduate degree just minutes outside of Boston.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Choose from any one of these Masters.

[Jackie McDonald]

Of Science in Applied Behavior Analysis, Master's.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Of Science in Special Education, dual degree in Special Ed and aba, or be.

[Jackie McDonald]

Eligible for your Postmaster certificate.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

You can complete your degree and be ready to sit for the exam in two years.

[Jackie McDonald]

And our 2022 graduates had a 92% pass rate on the BACB exam.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Come enjoy approved fieldwork, placements, ethics, mini handbooks, PhD levels, professors, small class sizes and a service trip to Iceland if interested.

[Jackie McDonald]

And don't forget, our program is accredited by the association of Behavior Analysis International or ABAI as a Tier 1 master's degree program.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Don't delay. Supplies are limited. Learn more at regiscollege.edu.

[Jackie McDonald]

Again, that's www.regiscollege.edu regiscollege.edu. one more time, www.regiscollege.edu.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

See you there.

[Robert Perry Crews]

And we are back talking about Ableism in schools. And before we continue our conversation, I want to remind our listeners that Aba InsideTrack is ACE and Kwaba approved. By listening, you're able to earn one learning credit. All you need to do is finish listening and then go to our website, abainsidetrack.com or you can click the link in your show notes to put in some key information for ces. One of those pieces of information is going to be our code keywords. I'm gonna give you the first one now. It's chai. C H A I. It's the spice that they put in the tea to make chai tea.

[Jackie McDonald]

But you know, chai actually means tea. So when you say chai tea, you're doing tea tea. And I always do it and I always giggle. Titi.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Really?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

There's a lot of different spices. That's not a spice.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Oh, chai's not a spice.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

No, it's delicious.

[Robert Perry Crews]

It's a group of spices.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah, it's got, I don't know, cinnamon, ginger, cardamom, black pepper.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I just thought it was like a thing that.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So delicious. Cardamom is what makes it.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Okay.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

The code word is chai.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yep, Chai. All right. So we can't talk about Ableism in schools without talking about various efforts to improve schools. And so we're going to be discussing the Timberlake 2020 article, which I think will leave everyone slightly frustrated in that it is an article of here's some ways to improve education, and what if every single one of those ways inherently was ableist? What fun. What a lot of work that lots of people put in to just continue to perpetuate discrimination. Yay. That's what you want to hear when you're done with a big project of great job, you haven't accomplished anything, and things might be more discriminated than they were before. Jerk. You got to add the jerk to really just nail it in there.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Not Timberlake, though. This is a good article.

[Robert Perry Crews]

No, Timberlake's not saying you're a jerk.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And we're not saying they're a jerk.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I'm not saying anyone's a jerk. That's a hypothetical. Okay, you're a hypothetical jerk. So when we look at educational reforms, certainly there have always been educational reforms, and not all of them have resulted in just basic, you know, change in terms of the purported outcome. But many of them also have had sort of downstream effects that were not either not planned for, not cared about, or were actually really thought well of. And it just still didn't work out. I mean, I think like Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, I think they did a lot of, like, funded a lot of research, and a lot of the programs that they were funding turned out to have pretty crummy results. So it's not like private, private equity can also screw this up. So since 1975, where we had idea, so there was a real legal requirement to educate all learners, there's always been the question of, like, how do we improve the learning of all students? How do we. How do we create environments for high change? And one of the challenges that comes into looking for high and rigorous achievement is those terms tend to be very loaded to high and rigorous achievement for non disabled individuals. And I guess that it's okay if everyone also achieves high rigorous, but it's not necessarily always the group that is of most interest, I think, to some of the policymakers creating these programs, or they're not thinking hard enough about it to make sure that they're building systems and environments that allow for a high degree of growth for all learners. They're sort of thinking about it from a very much, we need the test scores to go up. So when we look at these initiatives, we have three that are discussed here. And I think these are kind of from a New York perspective because I think Timberlake is a New York researcher.

[Jackie McDonald]

Hey, so, hey, where's my pie?

[Robert Perry Crews]

So there are a few examples here that pizza pie I naturally just tried to turn into what's the equivalent in Massachusetts. And sometimes there was a pretty good one to one correspondence, sometimes there was not. But the three that he discusses are alternate assessments which are part of no Child Left behind and from 2002 and then the reauthorization of IDEA in 2004, because there was a huge push of why are our students doing so bad when compared to other countries in a number of tests?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And we solved it.

[Robert Perry Crews]

And we. I don't think we did. No. And one of the pieces was, what if we tie funding for schools directly into these standardized tests, which pretty much all states have? And then the question says, but what about our students who don't really do well on tests for a number of reasons. Some of them could be they just struggle with tests, but a lot of it is going to be around. Well, they have disabilities that make the taking of these computer tests very, very difficult or they're not able to access as much of the content as it is taught. How are they supposed to demonstrate growth and knowledge? And the thought was, well, we have a great solution. They'll take some sort of an alternate assessment, which is usually some sort of a work portfolio, at least in Massachusetts. It's some sort of a work portfolio that's tied into the kind of educational frameworks and scope and sequence at the different grade levels. And so you create these modified activities that the student demonstrates proficiency with and that demonstrates that they are being challenged to learn the same materials as their non disabled peers. Okay, that sounds good. Right? We don't want to leave out our disabled students with this test that they might fail because they're not used to taking tests or that's not typically how they're assessed. So let's come up with an alternate assessment. Okay, right, that, that sounds good. The second initiative that Timberlake talks about are these scripted curricular modules. And I really wish he gave more examples. I sort of looked into some of Timberlake's other research and he'd had some other articles about Engage New York, which I guess were these New York based modules. Again, why I'm thinking he's a New York researcher, at least familiar with New York education, which is not, I think the same as. Because when I heard scripted modules I was thinking like direct instruction modules. Like those don't seem to like those directly target all learners. Like they're, they're. I would consider them the most, the least ablest curricula. So I think he's, he's thinking more about just more sort of scripted. Like what if I took the sort of inherently ableist curricula that exists and I scripted it more so teachers had to follow the same rules. So what if I took the teaching the teachers did and I took out the individualization or the options for individualization. So again, I think there's some districts that use these curricula. I know I've seen a number of them recently and my first thought is why are we using these? How are we supposed to use these? I hear a lot of like, I can't change them for any of the students. I have to do it as is. And so I'm thinking it's, it's more those types of, of modules of like Here is a stock thing that you have to use. And I guess it's better than some things, but not necessarily what I would consider the best match for all students. But anyway, that's the, that's the second one. But again, if all teachers have the same material that they use for all students, then shouldn't all students do well, regardless of their teacher? I guess, maybe. Let's see. And then finally the third was project based Learning, which kind of felt like he just wanted to have three, because this one, this one didn't really strike. Oh, sorry. Is she here? I hear Timberlake and I just think.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Justin, this is Maria.

[Jackie McDonald]

Oh, no. Maria, the concert is ruined. You ruined the concert, Rob.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Sorry, that's my bad.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

He doesn't know what you're talking about.

[Robert Perry Crews]

So the third was project was learning, which I, I, it felt like she just, you know, rules of three, we gotta have a third one. So Project based Learning, that's kind of bad, isn't it? I don't know. So that one didn't feel quite as, as unexpected consequences. That just seemed like nobody really liked this one. Spoiler for Project based learning. But again, the idea of if students are guided to study things of interest to them, then again, doesn't that make all education more accessible? Isn't that more individualized?

[Jackie McDonald]

Tidbit. I did a class where I had a project based learning opportunity when I was a senior in high school in New York. And I created. It was physics. And I made, I made a canoe. Did you like a real canoe?

[Robert Perry Crews]

Did you find it to be helpful in terms of your knowledge of physics?

[Jackie McDonald]

Yeah.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Okay.

[Jackie McDonald]

Like really helpful. And the canoe floated and I still have it and I won't let my dad get rid of it. And it's so heavy, just so you know.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Is it like out of a tree trunk?

[Jackie McDonald]

It is out of, like a machine. No, I'm not that good. It was out of plywood, but still real cool.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I mean, you remembered it.

[Jackie McDonald]

I remembered it, and I won't let ever let him get rid of it, even though it is the biggest thing I have ever. And I don't have it here because I have nowhere to put it.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

But you're not. Like, one time in school I did some reading and then I wrote an essay.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

No, no.

[Jackie McDonald]

I used physics to create a canoe.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah.

[Robert Perry Crews]

All right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

That's project based learning, all right.

[Robert Perry Crews]

And Timberlake had done other research on these three topics and sort of looked at what were the results of that research and how does it relate to a view of ableist practices. Whether inadvertent or potentially directly ableist practices. And looking at those, you sort of see, you know, the focus wasn't necessarily on like what, what was the average result from all of these areas. More by asking teachers about what did you think of this process or how did it go with the students sort of looking for more thematic analyses around what did people think of them as initiatives and what language was used to describe them when talking about special education services and how did that or not demonstrate ableist kind of thought process. So when you looked at questions, they'd have different ones. So like for the portfolio or the alternate assessment you'd have how did these change how you teach? Tell me a story about how, you know, how this helped you teach in curricular modules. You know, you know, how are they working for students? Share an example. And again, for you know, project based learning, what are some observations you've made about student responses to it? Right. And so a lot of different questions for each of the different topics. What were the original studies? And surprise, since that's the point of the article, there were examples of ableism in all three studies and initiative. And a lot of it had to do with again like you, you know, you talked about Jackie, that medicalized perspective of disability and as being a weakness and we need to be focusing our education on how we fix those disabilities for the students. And a lot of real concepts about how the students in order to access these ideally equitable practices really just ended up with a lot of the students with disabilities being othered from the other groups. And again a lot of language reflecting those kinds of ideals. She, she kept bringing up the term neoliberal emphasis, which I wasn't quite sure. I didn't quite understand how that fit into some of the topics because a lot of where she was seeing ableist language I would consider more kind of associated with like some of the right wing movements that we see in the country. Unless it's sort of the neoliberal idea of like neoliberal would be someone who believes in progressivism, but only in the sense of their verbal behavior is progressive, but their actions continue to remain stuck in the past. But maybe, yeah, but again the idea that education is a commodity kind of came up a lot with the alternate assessments. The teachers were kind of all just like, I don't know what to do, there's no way to teach everybody. And the students with disabilities are seen as disruptive. So I have to take them out of class and I have to teach them separately. And so now they don't get to be a part of the classroom anymore. And you know, they can't do most of the work. So both the teachers ended up both doing things that could have resulted in better access to education by more individualization. But there was also kind of a sense that the teachers were doing this out of a sense of, well, my students are different, therefore they have to learn differently and they can't do the same things as the other students. But I have to try to keep them up. But to do that, I have to take them away from their peers and I have to create, you know, something different. So again, real otherness to the program and also devaluing. So not really thinking about it in terms of why do they have to learn these things? Why should anyone have not. Why should they. Why should anyone have to learn some of these topics? Why is this an appropriate assessment of learning? Or are there other more appropriate assessments of learning versus well, I have to do this thing and they can't do, you know, the curriculum as written. So I guess I have to give them some other portfolio type work. So not really a sense of education is. Is not working. But the students aren't working in the education system and that's the way it's got to be. So the real otherness there, there was a phrase that one of the teachers said we, we can't just dump them in regular classes where everything's over their head and they won't get anything out of it. Which I think when I first heard that, I said, yes, of course it doesn't make sense to make students who don't know how to do something just sit there and watch everyone else know how to do something. But then looking at Timberlake's response that that in itself just saying that although there might be some, some like anti ableist sentiment there, it still really looks at the idea of like, well, why are you assuming the students, A can't just do these things, B, why are you supporting a system where, where the expectation is if they can't do these things, there's something wrong with the student due to their disability. And then the one that I was a little less this, you know, okay, works. The phrase of dumping them as seeing the students as being like objects. That one, I was a little like that. That feels like you're reaching a little bit there. But the first two really did make me think about how that is a phrase I have said.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Whenever you find yourself referring to a group people as them, you probably want to pause that sentence and reflect the.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Curricular modifications Again, I think I kind of mentioned. Or I spoiled the lead in terms of all of the new programs really weren't made with the idea how are we going to teach all of our students so much as we just want to teach things in a way that like, perhaps some of our students will better be able to access. And it rarely was going to be the students who had disabilities. A lot of teachers actually did feel that these programs were very equal because everyone got the same thing. But as we know, just giving everyone the exact same program doesn't result in equality so much as. I don't know.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I don't even know what that is. Equality, but it's not equity.

[Unknown Speaker]

Okay, Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So equality would be. I think I'm getting this right. Giving everyone the same thing, but equity would be giving everyone what they need.

[Robert Perry Crews]

So it's not equitable, but it is. It is. Equal, but not equal.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yes, yes.

[Jackie McDonald]

Which is not helpful for a lot of people.

[Robert Perry Crews]

They should make up different terms because they sound too similar. So again, there's nothing about disability represented in the scripts and it. For students who couldn't access the scripted content that way. Well, Sol, for you students. So again, really wasn't. These practices weren't, weren't, weren't able. So they might have been rigorous from some perspectives, but not for all perspectives for students. And they were really not looking at the value of the curriculum itself. So it was this. It was like you said, Diana, it might have been, it might have been equal, but it was not equitable. And then finally with project based learning, it was more just a sense that everyone was kind of unclear as to what to do with them. Some teachers loved it, some didn't. Some felt that the students didn't know what to do. And this wasn't ableist. This was just all students. And you know, then it came back to the idea of like when we talk about 21st century skills that they are really based in this idea of, well, you need to have a job to have value, and you need to be able to enter the capitalist workplace in order to have value. And if you can't do that, then there's something wrong with you and you need to somehow be caught up versus the idea of why do we have to be in the capitalist workplace? Why does our job, where we sell things and how well we sell things relate to a value we have as a human being? So even though you might be setting up for individualization much better with project based learning, you're still coming at it from a perspective of. And your project Better make money or be something you can sell or a service you can trade or barter, which you know is a, they called a disconscious ableism here, which is a flawed awareness that allows that we can accept that the norms and privileges that come from our idea that normal is one thing and disabled is another, that that's just how it's going to be. And so it's not necessarily an active process, but it is something where you are continuing to, you know, promote a script that is going to continue being othering for many people. So again, all these initiatives were kind of crappy when it comes to ableism because they all were built on an idea of some quote unquote normal learner and not really using this information to create equitable practice or individualized practice because it always came from kind of this flawed root cause of everyone needs rigor. However, what rigor that's going to be is very much. Well, it's going to be western style test testing. And even with project based learning, it's like, well, you need to be able to enter the western ideal of meaning. And if you can't do that, well, you know, you're a burden to the rest of your poor teachers. Quote on your poor teachers. I don't feel bad.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

You got some air quotes going there.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I got some air quotes there.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I noticed in your notes too, you added another thing. Now I have to find it to say it correctly. But you had said what? How do we feel about giving the student with, with down syndrome the chance to make the field goal or the touchdown?

[Unknown Speaker]

Right?

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yeah. There was a period, maybe it was like a decade ago where like all the football teams, it seemed like every football team had that like, you know, Rudy story where like. And one of the students with disability who never got to play in the game where the team was already up or didn't matter if they won or lost the game. They did like the special play, you know, like the Billy player, whatever, you know, whatever the student's name was. And, and oh, and everyone just took a knee and let the student walk across the touchdown and there was cheering and applause. Yeah, and I hated those stories because it, it felt like. But I think I hate them for different reasons after really thinking about these articles than I did back then. It just felt like, well, you're, you're not really allowing the student to play. You're just sort of putting them as a show and they might not know that that's what's happening. And that just seems very like pat on the back of Yourself and your normalness. And aren't you great because you took a day out of your normal game to allow them to be a part of something which I'm sure they enjoyed, but also you're not really making them a part of your team. It's like a. It's like a trick. It's. It just seemed gross to me and now I'm thinking it's even worse because. Well, yeah. Why do we have so many activities that are specifically set up for only certain people to be able to play? And, you know, there's room for lots of different games. So why don't we have more games where people can really participate rather than just like carve out some sort of like show time or some sort of televised time for just certain individuals because otherwise they wouldn't be able to access the activity. I don't know, it just always. It's always seemed weird to me. Like I. But I also don't want to leave someone out if they're really happy about it, you know, the individual disability. I also don't want to be like, well, you don't deserve to play as well. So it always felt like one of those complicated issues which I wasn't going to talk about. It seemed a little outside of our topic. But you brought it up because I wrote it in the notes just to.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I brought it up because you. Yeah, you put it in all caps there so it seems that you were interested in grinding gears.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Oh, I just put things in all caps when it is like, this is all my thoughts. Like, I'm not actually.

[Jackie McDonald]

This is not like it was all.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Part of the notes of the article. Like, if someone were looking at the.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Fair enough. Well, I mean, as. As people are maybe like trying to kind of sort through their own thoughts regarding ableism, like, this might be one that came up for them as something that maybe always made them feel weird or. Or what. And I think you're right. Like your initial thoughts are right.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

That you don't want to. It just feels icky and it has a name. So I wanted to bring it up too because it's called inspiration porn is what people call that. Because. Really? Yes.

[Jackie McDonald]

Oh, I didn't know it had a name.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So when you see those types of like, feel good stories that are basically told at the expense of the person with the disability and makes everyone else around them look so great for allowing them this opportunity or supporting them.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

That is like you said, like giving everybody else a pat on the back because they make. It makes Them feel good that they finally took the time to include this other person. That's what that's called. So you're right to feel weird about it. And we don't want to do that.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Oh, okay, good.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

We want to meaningfully include people.

[Robert Perry Crews]

That's good. You always worry when you have a weird feeling about something. Like, is it a weird feeling because it's a me problem, or is this like a societal problem that I'm uncomfortable with?

[Jackie McDonald]

It's a good question to ask. It's a great question to ask.

[Robert Perry Crews]

That's why I put it in all caps in my notes.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I mean, we have. There's more content that we can cover in this one episode, which is only fair. So, okay, we're moving on.

[Jackie McDonald]

I think we should move on. Yeah, okay, it's me. Yeah, you're moving on to me. And so while my article is the Batima Boutel I said it right, and colleagues, this is a more recent article. 2020. 2020, as we would say. And one thing that I really appreciate about this article is the introduction and how it places the value of language back from when, you know, autism was first discovered and places it very strictly into that medical model which we talked about. And so we don't really. I'm not going to really talk about the whole introduction, but I, I would love for people to read it because I found it really helpful. But one thing that these, these authors did is they gave you two things that I think are super helpful. The first thing is a series of eight questions that you can ask yourself when it's. I mean, it is for researchers, but I think that in schools you can ask this, you can ask these questions for yourself as well. And they say that as well. It's like this is written for researchers, but obviously caregivers and teachers could use this too. So I want to just tell you these questions and you can think about them yourself. It's on page eight. So the first one is, why would I use, would I use this language if I were in a conversation with an autistic person? That's a good, so good thing to ask yourself. And number two, does my language suggest that autistic people are inherently inferior to non autistic people or assert that they lack something fundamental to being human, which the research suggested in the 40s is what? Because they were emotionless. Right. And they weren't interacting in the same way that they lost the essence of being human, which is horrible. But I can see the language now reflect that. So did I write that in a.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Way very deficit based. The diagnosis is.

[Jackie McDonald]

Yep. And here.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Sorry I said that Yoda style.

[Jackie McDonald]

You did. I like it and I understood it, surprisingly. And so this is. Number three is something that I need to work on as a professional. Is, does my language suggest that autism is something to be fixed, cured, controlled or avoided? I don't feel those things, but my language is geared in that way. So I think I need to change my language in order to support my actual feelings and thoughts based on what I have in the past written. So that's interesting. Number four, does my language unnecessarily medicalize autism when describing educational supports? That one, I think is highly prevalent in, in, in our field. Number five, does my language suggest to lay people that the goal of my research is to behaviorally. Behavioral control and normalization rather than granting as much autonomy and agency to autistic people as reasonably possible. So am I looking to fix things? If I am, I should rethink my research and how I'm talking about it. Number six, am I, am I using particular words or phrases solely because it is a tradition in my field, even though autistic people have expressed that such language can be stigmatizing? Boom. We know we're all doing that and in various ways. And number seven, does my language unnecessarily other autistic people by suggesting that characteristic dixes of autism bear no relationships to characteristics of non autistic people? So these are really great questions. And I sat with them, sat with them hard. And I think that they're really, it's something that you could sit with, I think. And I learned a lot about myself and where I need to do better.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Some more community, participatory reason.

[Jackie McDonald]

Right, right. So that is, then they move forward, check yourself and they give some suggestions which I think are super helpful in table one on page three. And they say, okay, here are some things that we all can do to change our language around how we talk about autistic people or people with autism. So that's one of the ways, like one of the concerns is that there isn't consistency or accuracy when you say people with autism are autistic people and they don't really give an answer. They just like ask your audience, which is an answer. Right. But one thing that I've noticed researchers doing in our field, which I appreciate is, is using both. So switching back and forth, if you don't know who you're about to know.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

So I think I like, I like that I, I found that, you know, that helps hit everyone makes it more inclusive. So something else that they said, okay, maybe stop using patronizing language such as special interests. Right. So maybe you say areas of expertise or focus interest or passionate interest instead of special. Remember using that word special as a denoting, as something othered. We all have focus, interest.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

And so making it more normalizing. That I think is what they're looking for. Again, they said special needs. Maybe talk about description of the specific needs. So maybe special education now could be specific supports.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Instead of special education, targeted education.

[Jackie McDonald]

Oh, I love that. That's great. Yeah. And everyone can participate, right? Not just someone on iep, but everyone can participate in some sort of targeted education wherever they need it. Wouldn't that be great?

[Robert Perry Crews]

And then it would be less about like, oh, if you can't do this the way the teacher taught, would you just do, you know, some more targeted instructions or targeted education observed? That's fine. Everyone learns different skills different ways. I mean, again, not to. Not to discount that people have a disability, right?

[Jackie McDonald]

Absolutely. No, but everyone.

[Robert Perry Crews]

This is a part of learning. Everyone will learn differently.

[Jackie McDonald]

Right. And then that normalizes getting, you know, that normalizes and stops othering when people need more realize.

[Robert Perry Crews]

We tell everyone that all the time. All the students, everyone learns things differently. But not everyone gets called a special education student. So what's the message we're actually sending to the students of like, everyone learns differently unless you go out of the room to the special teacher, in which case you're really different from everybody else. Are we really signaling what we want to teach to students? No, that everyone has value right now and can find challenges and can overcome challenges.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Maybe we're making up challenges that don't need to be challenges because some of what we're teaching is pointless.

[Jackie McDonald]

You're feeling it right now. Rob's feeling it right now. He's fallen down the hole that I fell down earlier. They say, you know, instead of talking about challenging behavior, talk about the specific behavior that's happening. Right. Instead of problem behavior, just talk about the specific behavior and. And define that one.

[Robert Perry Crews]

I've tried to. I tried to do that one the week after I read all these articles and. Which was hard because I was used. I was trying to teach from a. A curriculum for, you know, de. Escalation of. Of challenging behavior. So I kept changing it. Every time I saw it, I was like, I don't like this term.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Robert Perry Crews]

So my class really appreciated that.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah, that's when I think that is.

[Jackie McDonald]

That can change.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I mean. Yeah, that's a hard one because it's very ingrained.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I try to say behavior targeted for decrease.

[Jackie McDonald]

Yeah. But it's hard.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

It's a tricky one. Yeah. So luckily, behavior can change.

[Jackie McDonald]

Behavior can change. That's so great. Right. And we all have behaviors that need to be increased or decreased. Instead of saying at risk for autism, say increased likelihood of autism. So it takes away that, like, nuance, like, this is a bad thing to have. And talking about suffering from autism, I've read that so many just say the impact or effect of autism.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Jackie McDonald]

Autism symptoms. Instead of saying that, say specific characteristics or traits that the person is having. Instead of using the word treatment, which I never thought of before and I'm not sure why. Instead of using treatment, say, here are the specific support service or educational strategies that we're using. Instead of saying treatment.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Oh, it's changing, which is tough. I mean, we have a whole section on our website called treatment.

[Jackie McDonald]

So we need to change that. Yeah. Boom. We need to change it.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And so absolutely pervasive in our field.

[Jackie McDonald]

It is. Yep. And so I'm gonna. I'm gonna take some of these off because I. I think, you know, they wouldn't be necessary for school. But one thing I think is autism as a puzzle. You know, no one loves that. So thinking about as a part of neurodiversity and then.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Or in case people haven't heard that, it is a criticism that's brought up because it implies that something is quote, unquote, missing from the person and that needs to be fixed. So it goes right back into that medical model.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Parents in the 2000s really loved it.

[Jackie McDonald]

They did love it. They did.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

But a lot of autistic individuals prefer the infinity symbol instead.

[Jackie McDonald]

Yeah. Okay. And then the final one that I think would be helpful for school is instead of saying autism as an epidemic and saying autism as increasingly recognized or diagnosed, so being more specific about it, instead of calling it like. Like it's Covid. Right. Like, that's kind of what it sounds like.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

It's a bad connotation.

[Jackie McDonald]

So I just love that they talk about how you giving specific examples of how you can change the way you talk about it to be more anti ableist than maybe with the change in language, we might see a change in behavior as well.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Well, let's. Let's come back around and enter the dissemination station. And I think, Diana. Well, I think we've all had a lot of opportunities for our own personal reflections. Do you. Why don't we wrap up with. With a return to story and looking at. Sounds like I know many of the recommendations about combating ableism and that that are mentioned in the article as well as certainly any that you, you, you feel could be added since 2007 when this was originally written.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah. And, and this article, written by story, is not specific to the population that we typically work with. So a lot of their recommendations are more, you know, wide ranging, perhaps related to folks with physical disabilities, etc. So I do think, you know, part of this episode would be an exercise for our listeners to think about what might be some ableist practices that they could see in schools that are more specific to an autism population.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And when I hear that comes up a lot as it just as an example is the expectation that you need to be sitting down and quietly listening in order to learn. That is kind of the, the norm in an educational setting. That is perhaps the way that a neurotypical person may learn best. But what we know from what autistic people have told us, who can tell us, is that they may learn better when they are moving around, when they have the opportunity to engage with fidget toys, when they are perhaps looking away from the person who's talking, etc. So some of these things that are like classroom rules or expectations could really hinder that person's learning rather than helping it. So the expectation that everyone's got to sit on the floor, crisscross applesauce with their hands in their lap, looking at the teacher could be an ableist expectation for someone whose neurotype is different and could learn in a different way. So that's just one example. Do y' all have any that you want to add?

[Robert Perry Crews]

I think certainly looking at kind of bias in a lot of the content curriculum and the school activities necessarily. And then there's been a really nice move towards more kind of unified activities that are sort of built around the idea of creating environments where individuals can kind of work together that are really taking in mind the concern that, well, if you just have a bunch of buddy groups, there's a chance that your non disabled peers just take over and it's like, isn't it nice that you're here, buddy? The people with disability get to be the sidekick to the other individual's activities. So I think there's a real thought as to how to avoid that while still making sure that there is a high level of inclusion and meaningful inclusion. But also just thinking about biases in terms of so much of the content in published curriculum when they celebrate people with disabilities, it's very much like, here's the Sidebar about how they overcame their disability. Like they cured themselves or even though they had a disability, they managed to do just as good as someone without a disability. Like what an exception to the normal disability narrative where they weren't able to do that. And how can we include that more? And some of it could just be, you know, thinking about disability as, you know, what does that mean to have a disability? And what is, you know, what, what are the positives of an individual as a human being who has a disability as well as, you know, story. So just making sure everything's not about. Here's the story. And it's got to be some sort of inspiring story. Just, you know, people living lives and finding joy in their life would be, I think, a very fascinating story. Not everyone has to be on the sidebar of your science textbook to have a meaning. And if you do make the sidebar, well, there's a chance that it's some sort of discriminatory reason that you're only in the sidebar.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah, I think that that can be the case a lot for anyone who's part of any minority group.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yeah.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

The representative for that group within whatever setting that they're in. And that is undue pressure and another form of discrimination as well. Cool. Good. Jackie, anything you want to add?

[Jackie McDonald]

No, I'm really hitting home on this language concept and how we use the language and talk about people on their IEPs and on their 504s and how we can make it more strength based approach while still providing the supports that students need.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Okay, yeah, sounds good. And that ties into another thing I think can happen a lot in schools is that we talk about people in front of them.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

As though they're not there. And that gets tied into. I know we've talked about it in the past in the Donaldson et al. Article from 2017. I think we talked about it in episode one. I wrote it down. Episode 251, I think. No, I think episode 268 is when we talked about it because I just love that article and it talks about a strength based approach and how we should incorporate that into neurodiversity perspectives. And they in that article talk about presuming competence.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And that's one key piece of it, is not talking about someone in front of them as though they're not standing there.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So if you were with someone with a disability, don't talk to their support worker, talk to them. It's just respectful. And that may be something perhaps if you are working in a school setting that you see because it. Is it quite pervasive? I think so. There's a second example of that and listeners at home may think of other things too. To circle back around to story, he talks about ways that we can potentially combat ableism in schools. And these are certainly places to start. So just really briefly he says we should be working on ability awareness. So making sure that everyone. We talk about disability, it's like part of the conversations that we're having. Again, it's not a bad thing. Everyone is different, people are coming in with differences. And as my own aside, it, it's okay too that someone needs more support in certain areas. So it's not like, oh, everyone's different, but we're all the same. Right. Like that's patronizing as well. It's. It's okay to say this person needs extra help in this area. It doesn't make them less. It's okay that they are different in that way. We still like them as a person.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

And they are still equal as a person. You're like Rob said, your value should not be based in your contributions to society. So then he talks about that. He talks about like something I'm not sure on, which is doing simulated activities regarding what it's like to have a disability.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yeah.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I don't know. I feel like that could go very wrong very fast.

[Robert Perry Crews]

What you can notice I did write in all caps right after.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I know, I see that all caps again.

[Jackie McDonald]

So other fields do do this in terms of like they have like the day. I know like some undergraduates, I can't remember if they're. I think they might be in therapeutic recreation where they have like they have to spend the whole day in a wheelchair. Yes, I have heard of those types of things I think but I'm. I'm not sure how. I mean I think it would bring.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

A very important perspective.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So you can imagine how that would change your perspective once you've done it. I just think you have to be plan ahead so that you do a good job.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yeah.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Because I think it could go really wrong.

[Robert Perry Crews]

It's an empathy building activity regardless. But I think unlike where it was originally, I think it was like that blue eye, brown eye, sort of.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yes.

[Robert Perry Crews]

You know, teacher game or activity, everyone sees. Well, that's not equitable, that's not fair. And when you're talking about more like discrimination based on race or ethnicity, I think it does build an empathy and then actionable steps. Whereas. Yeah, I agree Dan. I would worry that this would.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I would never want to Be like pretend you have an intellectual disability. That's. That's not cool.

[Robert Perry Crews]

But I think it could also like build an empathy, but not necessarily lead to sort of the actionable steps that you could take to change that. Because so much of where I, I see ableism coming in is just the sort of standardization of normal versus disabled, which I don't know if this activity necessarily would get at this.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Normal's not a great word.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yeah, well, no, no, I'm either. Right. Well, in terms of the articles we read, the terms used, normal versus disabled, in terms of how these, how disabilities are diagnosed. Not that I think there is a normal or a disabled. Well, there are disabled, but how there's like some magic normal. That's just. I'm just using the terminology.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah. Okay.

[Unknown Speaker]

All right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So maybe it could be done. Well. And next he talks about disability content and curriculum and school activities. We want to have opportunities to think about that there are common humanity across everyone, regardless of different groups you may exist in. I think I kind of touched on that on my own little soapbox there for a second. And Rob, you already touched on another point that they had here, that it's important that there are integration opportunities, but you also risk, like you said, the non disabled peer taking over or being like, you know, swooping in as the hero and helping the disabled peer experience something and that your job is to.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Help this person rather than your job here is to get to know together or to do something.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah. You guys are your team. Yeah. So the approach there has to be done carefully and correctly. And a lot of that has to do with how the teachers are introducing it, what their understanding of disability is and potential ableism pitfalls maybe. And how they're educating the students about. About disabilities as well. Which ties into the next one he recommends. Teacher in service. Everyone needs to get more training. We don't disagree on that one.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right? No.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

He talks about having disability literature available in the classroom and using positive role models of individuals with disabilities. Absolutely. Let's do more of that. He also talks about hiring teachers with disabilities too. Nothing is as meaningful for students than seeing someone like themselves in a role that they aspire to it. It just can't be replaced.

[Unknown Speaker]

Right.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

So how wonderful that we could potentially think ahead and plan for that type of opportunity as well.

[Robert Perry Crews]

One thing just going back to the in service time.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Oh sure.

[Robert Perry Crews]

As story mentions, is also as part of that in service, making sure that the speakers and the trainers are individuals who have disabilities when possible versus just. I'm the head of the Special education department. I'm going to tell you about this disability so that it comes off as hearing about someone's lived experiences and how our actions can support or really tear down certain individuals with disabilities versus just. Here is a list of things you should know about disability A, disability B.

[Jackie McDonald]

Disability C. Yeah, I think another thing you want to think about there too is maybe do as a combined effort so that you're not placing all of the load on the person with. With whatever is different in that way. So that could be something.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Yeah, absolutely. There's lots of work that one can do on their own to educate themselves and not rely on a person who's already, you know, potentially marginalized by society to engage in further emotional effort.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Will you be hiring someone whose job? Yes, my job. Yeah. No, I'm not just saying, like, find someone with a disability and make them be your special speaker. Like, find someone who says, my job is. I. I like to talk about my experience. I'm a trainer in this area.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

I like that idea. That's. That's good stuff. Okay. And then they end with saying just giving people skills and education isn't enough. It could allow them to continue to ignore ableism that exists within these settings. We need to, you know, really make concerted effort towards identifying this, allowing people to sit with it and move, move through it, so that they can then become, like you guys have said, anti ableism advocates and allies.

[Jackie McDonald]

Good one, everyone. Really good discussions today.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Great job ourselves.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Let's move on into pairings, shall we?

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Okay.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Yay.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

It's time for pairings in pairings, I tell you about past episodes you might want to check out if you found this topic of interest. So we have several articles. Not articles, sorry. Several episodes you could go back and listen to if you liked this one. Here they are, in no particular order. Episode 165, quality of life. Episode 160, incorporating unique interests with Tamika Meadows. Episode 251, self determination in IEP planning. Episode 236, ascent and self determination with Alex Kishbaugh and Dr. Haley Steinhauser. Episodes 268, 280 and 281, which was our recent neurodiversity series we did with a variety of guests as well, actually. And then episode 1001. The 1000 numbers are just book club episodes, so that's the two parter.

[Jackie McDonald]

It always gets me too. I'm like, what?

[Robert Perry Crews]

And not all the book clubs. Because we didn't think about that naming mention until we'd done a bunch of them already.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

That's true. But this one is a two hour episode on the Neurotribes book that you could go back and listen to. And then for pairings, I also like to recommend a snack to go with it. So the snack today, I'll tell you what it is and you can tell me why I chose it. Square pizza, corn and a carton of chocolate milk.

[Jackie McDonald]

Because that's what everybody gets at lunch when you're in elementary school.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

That's right, it's school lunch.

[Unknown Speaker]

Hooray.

[Robert Perry Crews]

Gotcha.

[Jackie McDonald]

That's Mondays for Shrewsbury.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Oh, nice.

[Jackie McDonald]

Yeah.

[Diana Perry Cruz]

Pairings, please enjoy.

[Robert Perry Crews]

All right, well, thanks everybody for joining us in the conversation. Thanks to all you listeners out there. If you like AB Inside Track, please subscribe to the show. You can also find us on a lot of places online where you can engage with conversations about episodes and what's not. We're online as ABA inside track on the socials ab insidetrack.com to find links to all the articles we discussed in this episode as well as our back catalog. You can also subscribe to get even more ABA Inside Track content on patreon.com ABA InsideTrack, where for $5 a month you're able to access all of our episodes a week ahead of time as well as access special videos of our quarterly listener choice episodes and get access to a chance to vote on those episodes. We actually have our winter polls coming out very, very soon. And if you want to hear things like those neurotribes type book clubs ahead of everybody else as well as get free CES for the listening, you can subscribe at our 10 premium level where you can just here our most recent book club. It should be coming out around the time of this episode on the Science of Consequences as well as all of our previous book clubs. And again, that's patreon.com ebainsidetrack and finally, if CES are your thing, you probably want our second secret code word. It is hot dogs. H O T D O G S. There's a space in between. I mean, put it in or don't put it in. Hot dogs. It's a delicious treat for some people. Not everyone likes hot dogs. I like hot dogs. I don't with stuff on them. I like to go to Spike's Hot Dogs down in Rhode island, get curly fries and a hot dog. Now I just want to go there for dinner. That's where we're going. Diana, quick, get in the car. We're going to get hot dogs in Providence. Hot dogs. All right. And then some final thanks. Big thanks to Dr. Jim Carr for recording our intro and outro music, Kyle Sturry for interstitial music, and Dan T.H. abbott of the podcast Doctors for his amazing editing work. We'll be back next week with another fun filled episode, but until then, keep responding.

[Jackie McDonald]

Bye Bye.