Event ID: 3106357 Event Started: 12/1/2016 7:00:00 PM ---------- Please stand by for realtime captions. >>Testing the captioning. Looks like we have captioning online. >> Thank you, Gail, congratulations. >> Good Morning or good afternoon depending on your geography its 11:00 so we should get started this is Gail Leslie with NCCB I wanted to welcome everyone going through housekeeping items before handing it over to Amy Parker and then Marina McCormick will be the presenter this afternoon. Just to let you know I have muted all of the phone lines. If you want to speak star six to on mute your phone, that alleviates background noise for people in Adobe. >> We will Dougal -- we will do question and answer session at the end of the presentation but if something comes up and you want to write it in the chat pod, that is fine. Amy and I will monitor the chat pod to make sure questions get answered in the timely way. The webinar will be recorded and archived for future viewing so to let you know you can revisit any content that has been presented here. I am going to start the recording now and you will hear an announcement and, Amy, you can take it away. Thank you, again, and welcome, everybody. >> We are honored to have Marina McCormick as our guest presenter today. Before I introduce her I want to welcome all of you and let you know that today's webinar is a shared webinar between the national Center on deafblindness and Council for exceptional children specifically and the division on visual impairment and deafblindness. Marina is a published author with the division of visual impairment and deafblindness and we are particularly thrilled to have her willing to share her time as an administrator in a busy school district in Houston it is no small feat to have an administrator passion and interested in students who are deafblind and willing to take the time to share her professional insights and expertise and her wisdom as an administrator in working with low incident population like deafblindness. This is a particular thrilling thing for us to be able to at the national Center and division on visual impairment and deafblindness to cohost this webinar. This webinar is free and will be recorded in the captions will be available to everyone and slides will be available to everyone and there is no cost. If people are interested in purchasing professional development units, those are available through the division on visual impairments and deafblindness and I believe it is a very nominal fee for the -- what you would receive as documentation you attended the webinar today and participated and it's basically professional development for the amount of time that you spend here with us today talking to Marina. I am really excited to say before I turn it over to her, Marina is going to be with us virtually online at the National Center on deafblindness. We are going to start a thread on the intervener and qualified personnel homepage. So expect communication from me after this event and you can access this presenter, Marino, an author and presenter -- Marina we will host and asynchronous discussion which is easy no matter what time you have something you have a question for her or there something you would like to discuss more in depth or you want to say great job I would like to stay in touch with you as we try this model as we explore it she will be available with us via a discussion forum. We are thrilled she is also willing to give some of her time probably for a week or week and a half after this webinar today to check and be responsive on the forum to any topics that come up. Without further ado, I am going to turn it over to our wonderful Marina McCormick and thank her again for your time today and I will go off camera. If you have questions as Gail said, put them in the chat pod. Marina will be taking questions at the end of her presentation and as Gail said we will be supporting her and make sure all of the questions get addressed. All right. Thank you, Marina. >> Thank you, Amy that was quite the introduction you honor me with your words. Good Morning and good afternoon everyone. I would like to thank the National Center on deafblindness and the Council for exceptional children for providing this opportunity for me to speak to all of you today. It is no small feat when you decide to bring change to an organization with a man -- that in mind it's my hope that you will find something of value in the telling of the story today that you can take back with you to help your program and your school and district. >> Amy did tell you a little about me but I'm going to take a deeper dive for you. Like she said my name is Marina McCormick I am the region 4 regional day school program for the deaf . I have six years of experience -- 16 years I was the teacher of the trust -- deaf in a self-contained classroom after three years I became an itinerant teacher and have the opportunity to work across 4-5 school districts. I did have the opportunity at that time to work with several students who were deafblindness but I have to admit it wasn't until I became an administrator that it occurred to me that more could and should be done for this unique population. After being an itinerant teacher for 80 years, I then accepted my first administrative role as a special education lead and I have the opportunity to work with four program services with students with auditory and in -- visual impairment preschool programs with children with disabilities and occupational and physical therapy. It was strenuous but rewarding work and it was during that time that I met the student with deafblindness that would change the course of my life forever. He challenged my thinking on what I knew about supporting students with deafblindness and supporting students who are deaf with additional disabilities. He helped me learn the real meaning of commitment and perseverance and taught me about advocacy and about teamwork. He is quite simply the reason why I am sitting in the chair right now having this conversation with you. And in a very real sense he's at the heart of the change effort that we are going through in our program right now. I once read the quote, lighthouses don't go running all over the island looking for boats to say they simply stand there coat shining and he helped me become a better educator and a better administrator simply by shining. >> So how am I going to help you shine today courts well, hopefully, by the end of our time together I will have helped you understand the importance of viewing change is a process and I will hopefully help you understand the importance of communicating your vision with the teams you support and work with. I will know if I have been successful if you can name the eight steps and John Carter's process for successful organizational change and if you can write a draft of your why statements. >> Before we go on it is important for you to know what is a regional day school program for the deaf or RDSPD. >> RDSPD is a unique programming option within Texas which school district or charter schools enter into shared service arrangements. I.e. legally binding contract to consolidate special education services for students who are deaf and hard of hearing. RDSPD with established in an attempt to provide effective and more efficient services due to the low incidence nature of hearing loss and eyes I progress through the presentation you may at times hear me say the abbreviation AI and that is also a term unique in the state of Texas and in Texas students with hearing loss can be eligible for special education services as a student with an auditory impairment for AI. >> What you see in front of you is a map of the area supported by the region 4 Education Service Ctr. and within this area we have eight regional day school programs for the deaf. The green arrow points to the region 4 RDSPD . >> Last year 2015, 2016 in our fourth year of operation, the region foursupported 244 students with hearing loss and right here in the heart of two -- Houston, Texas that the program covered 301 mi.² supported one local charter school and had 4 cluster site locations for cluster sites are campuses that have staff and resources that are allocated to them to support students with hearing loss. And our program we also had 34 certified teachers of the deaf and three audiologists as well as additional ancillary staff members such as evaluation specialists, social workers, speech language pathologists. We are also very fortunate to have three classrooms, one at the elementary, the middle, and the high school levels that are devoted to students who are identified as low functioning deaf. So during the 2014-2015 school year, our leadership team identified that we wanted to really improve our services for students who were deafblind. Spring 2015 we devised a plan and by the end of the 2015-2016 school year , we had some pretty spectacular wins as you can see they came from our communities, campuses, school districts and even in some ways the state. >> This is how we felt. Mike dropped, boom we are also but not quite how did this all of this really happen? Do people ever come up to you and ask you how do you do what you do and do you ever feel like saying to them it is magic. In reality you know it is not. That happened to our program that other districts and other RDSPD would come up to us and asked how are you doing that do kids magically succeed? Hardly. We know there are many people working tirelessly to ensure that our students fulfill their potential and end up at the top of the pyramid of success. >> Those windows that I shared with you did not just happen by themselves. Behind the scenes, many days and weeks of collaboration occurred between key individuals in our program. Just to make this a structural approach a reality. In the top left we have our certified orientation and mobility specialists, a part of our sensory team and our region four educational specialist for visual impairment and in the right corner we have our regional representative from the Texas school for the blind and visually impaired and itinerant teacher of the deafblind and at the bottom we have our sensory team and our programs, the woman in the middle is the teacher of the deaf who participate on that team. Our programs journey all started with an article written by April will Wizard of Oz and so without further ado, I would like to introduce you to him now. >> This is the man behind the curtain. This is Dr. John Kotter yes in 1995 he shared his a process of change within article titled leading change why transformation efforts fail and I have shared the link in the tripod for you to investigate further after this presentation. Since then for both his work at Harvard and his organization Kotter international he's assisted leaders and businesses to transform themselves for the better. And I have the good fortune to read his article while I was earning my certificate for principalship. Even though it was written with business management in mind, it's application was sent to other sectors as well including education. What is his eight step model for change? >> Here it is. I do not claim to be an expert on his eight step process for change what I did rely heavily on it as a -- guided my thinking when approaching the concern for students with deafblindness doesn't this theme is simple when you look at it it seems to say if you do all eight of the steps you can change your life, your school, your business, your fill in the blank and you will have success. It would be assuming of us to think of it as a simple process perhaps the most simple part of the process is writing the steps on the whiteboard as I have done here. For the remainder of our time together, I will be sharing it with you how we use Dr. Carter's process to drive change within the program to better serve students with deafblindness. >> So like all great stories let's start at the beginning. How did we develop a sense of urgency with our program and our district. >> Sometimes people like to ignore problems. >> Sometimes people like to admire problems. >> And then sometimes people have a very different sense of urgency excuse me and urgency about a problem that is very different from the one that you have identified. >> The spring of 2015, the first thing our leadership team did was we view our annual census data for students with deafblindness as we compared it to what our IEP's were telling us. >> The pie chart you see here reveals that our district had 22 students with deafblindness did during the 2014-2015 school year, for Region 4 RDSPD was directly serving only one of the 22 students. Having 22 students in one district was incredible, especially when you consider that nationwide in 2014, there was a total of 9384 students with deafblindness. Why was there only one student being directly supported by our program? >> Shawn, a partner at 80 Kearney says there are two personal reasons why people are resistant to change the laws aversion and conformity. Let's talk about loss aversion first. Research shows as individuals we prefer avoiding losses rather than going for a quibbling gains when presented with new opportunity. In the case of our program and how it had been serving students with deafblindness this was pretty clear typically what would happen within the district was teachers of the visually impaired will take the lead for students with deafblindness and without teachers of the deaf acting in supporting roles and in some instances teachers did not have enough information, concerning programming and service options and so the preference for the known, traditional model of serving students was more preferable than the risk of the unknown a couple -- coupled with a failed feeling when trying something new and that resulted in consultative rather than direct support for students. >> The second force conformity he points out is more insidious. When we began analyzing our students IEP's at various times, the question why is this happening, would come up and more often than not we would hear, well, that's how it's always been. Conformity begins at an individual level Bryan says and if it's left unchecked, is compounded at the organizational level. He goes on to say that change four organizations often come from a reactive rather than proactive state and so far our program we had a foot in both states as we look to bring about change for our students. It is incredibly difficult to stand alone especially when as with our situations we knew we could do better but we were not really sure how to go about doing it. I believe that people enter education because they really want to help children and they make the best decision that they can with the knowledge that they have at the time as my Angelou says, do the best you can until you know better and when you know better, do better. And we were about to do a whole lot better because within our database was an inherent challenge, how can the Region 4 RDSPD provide high-quality instructions with students with deafblindness. >> According to Kotter the second step in its process for change is forming a powerful coalition. You need your A-Team when you're going to bring about change because of your Bob the wrong people, then you will only end up spinning your wheels. Our program saw in practice is that we had a four person leadership team that was our initial guiding coalition. This consisted of myself, two program specialist for AI and a program manager for AI. I would two program specialist operate in a similar fashion to instructional coachesthe Program Manager manages the day-to-day aspects of the region 4 RDSPD whereas I manage the overall efficacy of the program from the region four efficacy of the program from the region 4 Education Service Ctr. This was the initial group of people responsible for bringing about the change movement but then over time our coalition grew depending upon the task that we were set up on doing. For example, to approve a position for the itinerant teacher of the deafblind for our program we needed the following people. We needed the Program Manager and the senior manager for AI services in the district and we needed myself and we also needed our RDSPD management board. Every RDSPD has a management board and one of their functions is to annually vote and approve our budget and that includes approving positions. >> Once we got the approval we then created the position and for that we need a myself again and we also utilized the region 4 education specialist for visual impairment, the Program Manager and senior managers for AI services and of course a human resources department in the district. >> When creating the job position and writing the job description we looked at these elements that you see here we embedded information from the CEC DVIDB knowledge and skills and since Texas does not have a certification for deafblindness, it was recommended that the position be listed as having certification for students with auditory or visual impairments with dual certification being preferred. We also know that this position would require intensive professional development also included in the description that they would be a partnership with the Texas deafblindness outreach team. And because this was to be an itinerant position it was important to know that the person had to have really great skills and collaborating teammates across multiple teams. >> Wants the position was posted and a suitable candidate found, we then created the coalition that we lovingly refer to as the sensory team. Our team design was based on why -- what I learned in the intervener team training, excuse me and two -- intervener T model training at the Texas school for the blind and visually impaired. There are minor modifications here. >> In the intervener T model the concept of a core and expanded team is discussed and this is our core team you see here. Our itinerant teacher or students with deafblindness has certification as a teacher for the visually impaired and to complement her to their skills we added a teacher of the deafblind -- deaf and mobility school that scales allow students who are deafblind to synthesize residual visual auditory and other sensory information to interpret their environment and we knew we had to have a O a ON a M on our team. This team as a whole had limited knowledge when it came to students with deafblindness but within one year they became a true powerhouse and it was really thanks to their commitment and dedication to children. >> On the administrator side of our core team we knew that due to the size of our member district we needed to have at least one of our program specialists assigned to the sensory team. Program Manager was also involved due to day-to-day concerns and my involvement with the team remains intensive in overseeing the professional development and coaching them in the application and the skills they've learned. >> And looking at Kotter's model our core guided -- our guiding coalition was a programs four person leadership team as I shared earlier but depending upon the task that we needed to do, for the change process we needed to include other individuals as needed. >> While step three in Kotter's process of creating a vision, I have to admit that we created our vision much sooner the process but once we decided we wanted to make a change, we were serving students with deafblindness, we went about creating the vision. Having a vision is critical because it tells people where you want them to go but having people buy into your destination can be a little tricky if you're not sure how to communicate that vision. >> Perhaps some of you recognize the man in the screen, his name is Simon -- he's a famous author and leadership consulted and his book start with why he says the inspired leaders and inspired organizations regardless of their size and regardless of their industry all communicate in the same manner, they communicate from the inside out. He goes on to say that people don't buy what you do, they bite why you do it. Inspired highly effective organizations are able to communicate in order the why and the how and the want of what they do and it is this type of communication that drives others to action what does that look like in education. >> Perhaps he may have heard of yes prep public schools. Yes prep isn't open enrollment public charter school system focusing on serving students grades 6-12 in the Houston area. It is most well-known for its mission of increasing the number of students from socioeconomically challenged communities who graduate from college. Every year a lottery is held and every year students wait and wait to see if they are going to receive a phone call from yes prep thing they will be given the chance to attend. Yes prep follows what he calls the Golden Circle of communication they communicate from the inside out. >> Yes prep tells you the why first and we exist to spend -- send 100% of students to college and they tell you how, our schools are small and integrated with specialized curriculum and we offer rigorous assessment and we host expanded school days -- extended school day vineyards and we offer numerous infringement opportunities -- enrichment opportunities and we have personalized college counseling for all of our students and after all of that, they mention what which so have is that we teach kids. Do you want to send your children to our school? Of course. So our guiding coalition had to discover what our why was. There are plenty of ways to do this but identifying your vision, your why is a topic we don't have time to get into today but if I could leave you with one piece of advice to take with you as you begin drafting your why statement it would be this, this sums it up for me. One time I was managing a team of special education teachers in the school district and we spent the day crafting our vision and I recall vividly what happens when I put the following statement on our brainstorm board. Students and -- it caused discussion one teacher -- teacher remarked one of the -- some students never really expensive education what we have that be part of the vision so I replied that dream never changes regardless of whether or not the student remains in special education for the entire educational career. >> Dreams are forever like the quote says. So what is your dream for your students? For our programs, after much discussion among our leadership, one clear, concise statement was made: -- >> Notice it doesn't tell you the how or what we will do but it's something that every staff member can get behind. And believe and had noticed it is a dream, it is something we can work toward every day and every moment. >> This is how we chose to communicate our vision, our why. One we began communicating from the inside out as CEC DVIDB calls that our by an increased even though this is third in Kotter's process, our guiding coalition actually graded our vision after analyzing our baseline data so in our opinion we needed to be able to communicate a plan to our stakeholders and having our why solidified help with the critical conversation. As I just led developing and communicating your vision are topics that really could be best addressed in a two day seminar and I will be skimming the surface of those ideas but communicating your vision and sharing how the program is step 4 in the process. >> You have to communicate your vision around the clock, 24/7. It is important that you get creative and how you're going to communicate your vision Kotter's says in his article you should be able to communicate your vision to others in less than five minutes. >> In my experience one sentence is really what you are shooting for. It's an approach referred to as an elevator pitch. For those who might be unfamiliar with that, an elevator pitch is a short, concise summary of a process, product or organization and the promise of value. You don't have a lot of time on the elevator, so you have to get right to the point. If you had to explain your vision, your why to someone you met on the elevator, what would you say? >> The reason why the elevator pitch is so helpful in my opinion is because you will be communicating your why a lot. You want people to be able to articulate the wise so that they can internalize the line. If you spend -- the why, if you spend five minutes describing the why to some of the chances are they will walk away with an idea of what the vision is about but it is possible that they might walk away with a different understanding than what you intended. One sentence a person can repeat over and over, time and time again, in good times and in bad, when berries appear and when explanations are needed, is powerful. >> For us we focus a lot of our communication of the vision at weekly meetings with the sensory team. And phone, email conversations at regular -- I regularly cited the while making the connection between the work of the purpose. And critical conversations as the team worked through the year applying their learning, the why we shared. This year we moved our communication forward by having a program logo designed and we of encouraging staff to participate -- purchase T-shirts and looking into redesigning our webpage to further share the vision. I would also add that it's important to be consistent. If your actions do not match words, individuals will not buy into your why nor will they support your change efforts. Again it is important to identify the why you can fully support as you move forward. >> People will endeavor toward difficult goals if they know and believe the work is purposeful. Our work is undoubtably challenging so to this and, in my opinion, and you never say your why enough. >> Just like the rubble alive, communicate the vision of a free universe and empowered small band of fighters to resist the empire, so too did do you need to empower others to act on your vision. Your why. When we created our sensory team, we knew there would be some logistical changes in how we do business but we could not anticipated all of the things that we needed to change that our staff throughout the program were incredibly helpful as they asked questions and shared concerns. >> Obvious obstacles we were able to predict were IEP meeting this up -- participation including required attendance, documentation on the schedule of services page. And required signatures but we also knew our sensory team would need to have time to collaborate with one another so weekly meetings were established from the beginning. >> Not so obvious barriers that we discovered along the way were how to address the identification of students with deafblindness at their initial evaluations and how to free up our teacher of the deafblind to collaborate with multiple teams and how to use a data driven Dreyfus for determining the need for what we call a one-to-one aide or in other programs may be referred to as intervenor. How to ensure that other itinerant in our program as well as itinerant teachers of the visually impaired for adhering to the same recommendations and same philosophy we were using now that these are barriers that we continue to work on as we entered or moved through year 2. >> Imagine if someone said to you, we are going on a trip to India tomorrow. But by the way we will not take the flight were going by car and boat. You would probably be initially excited about the things they would get to see and explore on your way to India. As the journey progressed, it might be more difficult to maintain the level of excitement especially if your cell phone broke from the pictures you were taking. Or maybe you got a flat tire and you were stuck on the side of the road. That is why it's important to celebrate all of the wonderful things that are happening around you as you make your trip to India and as you might expect, some of those small things happening to you along the way might be more magnificent than the Taj Mahal. >> As a change agent, it's not enough to hope that your team will accomplish your vision, your why. You have to give the team something to shoot for but it cannot be something so difficult that the team abandons the Isaiah because I cannot reach the goal -- the idea because the team cannot reach the goal. >> From leadership perspectives we wanted to increase the number of students with deafblindness being directly served by the program and so I encourage this by setting up the following explicit opportunities. At the beginning of the 2015-2060 school year, the sensory team reviews of programming for five candidates as part of choosing their focus student for the Texas teacher of the deafblind Pilot Project. >> I facilitated the review, the team discovered on their own that students with deafblindness received consultative rather than direct services. For both auditory and visual needs. I utilized cognitive coaching strategies with team Everest to encourage their learning and drawing their own conclusions when looking at student issues. For example, when our teachers of the deafblind asked me how much service time she should consider preserving a student, I often asked her, given what the student's goals and objectives are, how much time do you think you would need in order to accomplish these goals and objectives. Unless is administrative, team members typically no I do not readily answer many of their questions directly. >> I also recognize that members of the sensory team needed more professional development concerning instructional programming and services for students with deafblindness. So we focused on providing that by showing them what teachers of the visually impaired or teachers of the deaf or orientation mobility specialist can do to support students who are deafblind in their learning. >> Every student we added was a huge celebration. That was a wonderful short-term win, but there was more. Remember these from the beginning, Kotter says in his article the short-term wiggles are served within 24 months of your initial change efforts and they are all short-term wiggles completed within 12 months of when we started our journey. >> So let's go cross continental. When South Africa renounced apartheid and freed Nelson Mandela these changes did not automatically unite the nation they were steps in the right direction, more changes needed to help solidify the change process. Especially to help the healing process of years of racial hostility and division. Nelson Mandela knew this and when he was elected president, he decided to use the most unlikely vehicle in that country. He decided to use the South African rugby team, the spring Fox and this is their logo to the left. >> Although South Africa was instrumental emigration of the rugby world cup competition, springbok did not compete in 1987 and 1991 because of anti-apartheid sporting boycotts that occurred could Nelson Mandela was then elected president of South Africa in 1994 and the next year the South African rugby team made the World Cup debut when the newly democratic South African -- excuse me South Africa hosted the World Cup tournament. Facing criticism from black South Africans, Mandela was determined to bring his country did together and he was fearful that they were going to erupt into a civil war and he saw a rugby as the mechanism to bring them together. So he met with this captain François and forged a friendship proving critical along with other players and staff members they changed the attitude of the country into one of reconciliation and togetherness. In the picture you can see Nelson Mandela wearing the hat and jersey of the team. This jersey was assembled to black South Africans of oppression, privilege and separation. For Mandela to wear this jersey symbolized that he was simultaneously one with his own people and one with his oppressors. >> It was a tremendously emotional moment when people saw him in the jersey. Springboks defeated the New Zealand all Blacks 15-12 in the final and it's remembered as one of the greatest moments in South African sporting history. It's watershed moment and opposed apartheid nation building process. If you would like to see the story and 2009 Morgan Freeman, Matt Damon tell the story of the springboks in dramatic fashion. In the movie convict is -- Invicuts. >> Mandela new abolishment was not enough to bring about change that South African new needed -- needed any consolidated the improvements I said through rugby. Currently our team is working on this stage it's important we maintain a sense of urgency more so now than before especially after having made when Kos otherwise we run the risk of losing momentum. Now we are -- the waves otherwise we run the risk of losing momentum that we cannot afford to skip the parts off we are working to leverage short-term wins to make changes with systems and structures and working on this by building credibility and identifying those things that need deeper intervention for example teacher of the deafblind currently has the caseload of 10 students with deafblindness not every student in our district has the opportunity to directly receive services from her so perhaps a second teacher of the deafblind is needed perhaps a second sensory team , ensuring consistency when it comes to programming decisions is a critical issue for us. Sensory teams need to be involved with initial evaluations and re-evaluations for students with deafblindness and we are currently investigating how to make that happen. >> When at any of us enter into a new organization we know right away whether or not leadership has established a healthy work culture or not. Culture is a shared set of beliefs and values expressed through common behaviors and attitudes culture is what truly makes your change efforts permanent. As a leader you on your team want to be in control of creating and shaping the culture that you do not want to leave it to chance because if -- as the picture indicates, you may not like the end result of that whites critical you solidify the change you are creating by making it a part of the work culture how to go about doing that? >> Most recently I asked our team the following question. If one of you were to leave to find a new path in life, with this team, the approach continue? The answer was unanimous, no, it would not. And they are right. If our sensory team is not accepted by the district leadership as a permanent fixture, it is on very shaky ground should any of us find a new adventure. >> Kotter says that the stage it's important to show people how the new approach is led to big improvements that we are becoming more explicit and how we share success, with higher leadership and we want to make sure that everyone sees the connections that we see. As I mentioned earlier, every RDSPD has a management board and I meet with my management board at least twice per year. I make sure I highlight all of the things that the sensory team is doing at each meeting. And I look for opportunities to tell our story. While webinars as these are wonderful platform to do that, I'm referring to a day-to-day interaction that I have within my professional circle to this power in the telling of the stories that highlight what the sensory team is doing and why it is succeeding. It takes them from a fad to a fixture that additional ways that we can do this are using new employee orientation to the program to value work -- establish how valuable of the team as and by promoting members and by having them dissipate and influential a visible events for example, our itinerant teacher of the deafblind will be speaking at our statewide deafblind symposium in March . >> There is heavier lifting, though, than the previously mentioned suggestions. To help make our sensory team business as usual for our program, we are working on creating operating guidelines and as of today the team is finished the guidelines for evaluations currently working on guidelines related to continuum of placement options, assisted technology, determination of instructional and related services. >> The team is also working with other departments in the district to help develop and document procedures, such as how the team will be involved in reevaluation. Finally, the team has joined a larger regional collaborative that focuses on supporting teams for students with deafblindness. Connecting with other professionals that have passed through our Texas teacher of the deafblind Pilot Project. Our sensory team has expressed that this collaborative has been valuable because it's validated their experience and empowered them to take the next steps in change. Mostly because they are with the network know of professionals who have the same experience they do. -- Experiences they do. >> Here it is. The starting point for your journey to change. My hope is as you listen to the story today, you found yourself becoming inspired and perhaps you noted what your concern was and how you were going to be able to move forward with a few key steps. Perhaps you were able to jot down some members are of the initial guiding coalition. Maybe you even began drafting your wife's statement. I wish you the best of luck as you journey -- as you journey continues working to transfer instruction for your students and if I can be of any help along the way, please feel free to reach out to me. >> This is Amy. Wow. I don't know if you are like me but I want to watch this beautiful presentation again. I am amazed by Marina's ability to weave in points including Nelson Mandela. Change in the world. What is so refreshing to me about this, I promise I will not take up all of the question time because we have good questions in the Chuck Todd. I'm peeking out -- and be jackpot. I'm peeking out. In deafblindness sometimes we are isolated. Marina what she has done is think about the change model including intravenous, teachers of the deafblind , what is going to help children at the local level is part of an administrative effort and culture. As she had do so many rich examples and beautiful slides so I want to Thank you, Marina, for taking us almost on a Google Earth view of this and really thinking about what you know about leadership, administrative best practices, thinking about how to make the model work because that is what will do it. Let's go through some questions, Marina, Thank you. Let's look at the Chuck Todd. It was active and I want to remind people in the Chuck Todd if you -- chat pod if you scrolled through the top links are there a link to the article published with CEC DVIDB is there a free issue and Ted Talk sheet reference and let's scroll down some want to watch this again and watch the recording and share the recording which was captioned and available and will be presented on the library. Gail can share information about where to find that. I think Jessica had a thought-provoking question. Here's a question. Obviously each student is individualized but do you know the average amount of time your letter oh letter 0M deafblind teacher serves students I know you mentioned a caseload of 10 your teacher of the deafblind was serving 10 children. Do want to address Jessica's question from your perspective, Marina Sure. Currently our itinerant teacher of the deafblind has been utilizing the visit along with other data to come up with recommendations for service times. Most of her students are seeing 1-2 times of week for 45 minutes. On average they run 90 minutes direct. And she also incorporates and direct time into her service recommendation are typically it's an additional 45 minutes to work with teachers and other staff members. Like the student's goals and objectives are. >> Okay. And the question about orientation and mobility. >> It was about the same. >> All right. And that is why to Jake Marina can you reflect, you were talking about the paraprofessionals teaching assistants who have had intervenor training or may be called by different term but basically functioning as intervenors how do you see these professionals particularly teacher of deafblind NBO and M interfacing with the constant person -- letter oh and M who's constantly -- how would you reflect on the role? >> In our program what we look at is continuum support regarding the accommodation for students we try to help other campus teams understand there's a real difference between paraprofessional working one-on-one with students who have no knowledge of deafblindness and a paraprofessional who does have as you mentioned increase training in deafblindness who can function similar to an intervenor and then at the right end of the spectrum a true intervenor and what they are able to provide. I see that as a real powerful support system for students. Our teacher of the deafblind works closely with all of those skilled one-to-one aides working as an intervenor reviewing strategies with them, reviewing signs that have been developed by the students to represent moments in their routines. She had the skilled one-to-one aides are incredible in providing support for students that need that. >> Beautiful. I love the way that you explained the continuum to . >> that was well said -- too paraprofessionals with some training, no training and some pair professionals that are intervenors and the role of the teacher. Let's go to this question. Leland says that's 22 deafblindness students in your region are they placed in home Is is and what kind of classrooms and how are they serviced by the itinerant teacher of deafblind. You may have addressed somebody can expound . >> It's not 22 students in the region just a clarification is 22 students in one school district. >> Okay. >> That is important to note. And how they are served within the program, you are correct, some are on their home campuses receiving itinerant support from the team. Some students are receiving support in the three classrooms I mentioned at the beginning of the presentation. Of the three classrooms in our regional program for the deaf devoted to student that are deaf of multiple disabilities whose needs are in the severe to profound range and some of our students are being served in our classrooms that are dedicated to self-contained Jeffrey education approaches. -- Deafblind education approaches. Students need support for a student -- teachers of the deaf. And our sensory team go in and support them and some of our students, a few, not many but there's one or two that are getting ready to move into the mainstream, general education and they are going to be on their home campus receiving support from the team as well. It's a full continuum of placement options that we try to provide for students. >> Thank you, Marina, quick follow-up, when the students transition into their home campuses, what kind -- do you provide outreach is there a continuum that you are still providing services to the local teachers and administrators. Is that correct? >> Yes, absolutely. >> Okay. There may be other questions. Celia, Chris from your team featured in your presentation are talking about what the visit actually is as an assessment tool. One other quick question I have for you as animist rater -- administrator, what advice would you give to administrators who may have one deafblind blind -- deafblind child in the district or school. The challenge you have developed this beautiful model and recognized the real need and assembled your team and created a sense of urgency and building a culture how does another type of administrative lives in Alaska who has a child that shows up, how -- what advice would you offer for them in terms of meeting unique needs of students who are deafblind. >> I would say you would follow all of these steps. One thing I always kept in mind in my previous position was -- and this is my own personal philosophy -- what you are able to do for a child who has some of the most significant needs is some of these children do is a demonstration of what you are capable of providing for all students. If you can get it right with that one student, you can get it right for any student. So holding onto that belief that it is worth it, I feel like there is a great trust put in public schools by the communities. To provide a free and appropriate public education and that is a great trust we need to uphold and honor. >> Man, what a beautiful response. I see Gayle has said in the chat pod, if anyone would like to on mute their line and ask a verbal question you are welcomed to do that. Shannon has a question. I don't know if you can see the chat pod. Good afternoon, Marina. I will be good for you. One would applications for the next deafblindness cohort be available . Shannon Dunlap. >> I do not know. Perhaps Chris can answer that. What do we mean by cohort? >> Shannon, do you want to elaborate or Chris, would you like to un-mute yourself by star six and responding? >> I think Shannon -- >> Hey, I have been in conversation with Jeanie Lyles she's been telling me about this deafblindness program and I think it is fabulous. I wanted to follow through on possibly becoming certified in the deafblindness area . >> Okay. I think Cecilio Robinson or Chris Montgomery, if they are in the top pod would be best answered that. I'm not sure what the dates would be so to give you additional information. I'm sorry. >> I appreciate the response I can get in touch with them, Thank you. >> Shannon this is Chris Montgomery. I may have missed some of what you said because I was getting beeps and stuff as I was on muting my phone but can you say where you are from? >> Spring ISD, Houston, Texas. I knows is here. >> Okay. Call us about that. We won't take up everyone's time that's a long answer to your question. >> Okay. >> Interesting point, and interesting model that Texas has developed to grow teachers of the deafblind. And not to put you on the spot, Chris, but I know that partnership not only happened with Marina as an administrator it happened with partnerships with higher ed intensive service you offered in two practicing teachers interested in this role. >> And Marina was talking about it but in a brief -- it's a 2 year pilot program for teachers of the deafblind. As Marina said we do not have a certificate chain -- certification or licensure in Texas but we figured we would go forward anyway and try to through the Texas deaf Blodgett -- project great a program and give intense service and technical assistance so that we can homegrown these people around the state. So that is what we have been doing with Marina and other teams around state. >> Okay. We look forward to, Chris, to your joining the online discussion we will have after this call. Gayle is going to help post in the library the recording and I'm going to take the recording of the webinar and put it up on our intervenor group page intervenor qualified personnel I should say. She has shared some of that information in the chat pod. Watch for it you can join Marina and hopefully Chris, Cecilia , anyone else caring to talk about the topic and explore it further after this webinar. I am going to do a time check that we are at the top of the hour. If there aren't any more questions, I would like to encourage everyone to thank Marina for the obvious time, passion and commitment in creating this beautiful model and sharing it with us. We Thank you so much for spending your time with us, Marina, sharing what you have learned . >> Well, Thank you. I'm happy to do so. >> Wonderful. You will probably see -- if you want to stop sharing your PowerPoint presentation, you can see the chat pod. There are many thanks coming from across the country here. >> Very sweet. >> All right, everyone, Joanne from Washington DC project officer is commenting as well as others from across the country. >> Thank you, everyone. >> We look forward to staying in touch with Marina online and sharing the presentation . >> Okay. >> Hope everyone has a great day. Take care. >> Thank you, Marina . >> You are welcome. >> [ Event Concluded ] >>