Educators strive to provide an equitable and inclusive learning experience for all students, but some educator training doesn’t provide as much information on how to do so as one might like. Many teachers are familiar with the idea of accommodations like assistive technology (AT), but few receive detail about what options are out there, let alone how to utilize them, as part of their core education as a teacher. Below are three organizations that offer training on assistive technology for educators.

Assistive Technology Industry Association

The Assistive Technology Industry Association, or ATIA, is a leader in assistive technology education and research with the aim of ensuring that the best AT products and services are delivered to people with disabilities. ATIA as a robust Learning Center, where you can sign up for one of their many courses – some of which are free – or sign up for one of their webinars. ATIA’s educational materials feature a wide breadth of topics, from vision and hearing technologies, to physical access and participation, to web accessibility, and more. ATIA also hosts an annual conference with both in-person and virtual components, so educators have...

Podcasts are ever-growing in popularity, diversity, and volume of options. It’s no surprise that there are an increasing number of podcasts about disability, with topics ranging from disability culture and community, to history, to accessible design, and more. All the podcasts featured in this article are hosted and developed by people with disabilities; plus, in true disability-friendly fashion, they all provide transcripts for people who are deaf or hard-of-hearing.

Included: The Disability Equity Podcast

From the Johns Hopkins Disability Health Research Center, Included: The Disability Equity Podcast seeks to challenge the stereotypes surrounding disability, fight ableism, and share news. The podcast is hosted by Dr. Bonnielin Swenor and Dr. Nicholas Reed, and features diverse guests sharing personal stories, research data, and expertise on a wide range of disability topics. Episodes are available on their website, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts.

Barrier Free Futures

Barrier Free Futures is hosted by KSFR Santa Fe Public Radio presenter Bob Kafka, and has been putting out an episode nearly every week since February 2015. Each episode is a quick and digestible 30 minutes, and...

Transitioning from school to college or the workforce is often a challenging time in one’s life, and can be especially difficult for youth with disabilities. Developing a sense of community, applying for jobs and acquiring the training they need, and getting used to living independently can all be daunting steps to take on. Fortunately, they need not navigate this stage alone – below are just a few examples of organizations that help prepare youth with disabilities by providing training and mentorship.

Partners for Youth with Disabilities

Partners for Youth with Disabilities, or PYD, runs programs that provide mentoring and job readiness training for children and adolescents with disabilities, in addition to inclusivity and advocacy training for youth workers and organizations. On their website, one can access their programs, which include mentoring, career readiness, and leadership development; their training and consulting services, which are available both live and online; and their career readiness curriculum. PYD also has an advocacy initiative called the National Disability Mentoring Coalition (NDMC), which offers fellowship and scholarship programs, as well as a...

Here in the U.S., many of us receive benefits like medical insurance from our jobs. However, these can sometimes be insufficient or have gaps when it comes to disabilities. Social Security’s disability benefits can provide or supplement for students and/or employees with disabilities.

SSA Disability Blog

The disability section of the Social Security Administration (SSA) blog publishes information pertaining to Social Security benefits and policies regarding disabilities. Article topics range from benefits for specific disabilities, diseases, and conditions, to common questions, to program updates and changes. The blog also includes subjects about disabilities more broadly, including information and resources on rights, accommodations, financial literacy, and additional programs outside of Social Security that can help people with disabilities. Readers can subscribe to the SSA newsletter; connect with the SSA via Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and LinkedIn; access the SSA’s online services; and easily navigate to other SSA resources beyond disability.

Social Security Disability News

Social Security Disability News is run by the West Coast Disability Legal Center....

A seated woman reads a book and drinks coffee

As many of our posts have suggested, the history of disability is long, rich, and nowhere near as well known as it ought to be. Below are some websites and podcasts that illuminate the history of the people, laws and policies, medical and technological developments, and social movements that have shaped the world of disability that we have today.

Disability History Museum

The Disability History Museum (DHM) is a virtual project, seeking to help deepen people’s understanding of how shifting cultural values, notions of identity, laws, and policies have shaped the experience of people with disabilities, and how those experiences are vital to everyone’s lives. With a board and advisors made up largely of disability historians and activists, the DHM features a vast array of resources. Their library is made up of documents and visuals associated with the history of people with disabilities, which can be easily searched through by collection, format, source, keywords, and dates, or browsed by topic. The museum also provides educational lessons, each with their own objectives, materials, and study guide, as well as teaching tools. The DHM website also has a “feature” tab, which showcases...

Anxiety often cooccurs with autism, which can affect an autistic person's ability to focus and do their job

In our latest tip sheet from DeafTEC and AccessATE, we discussed accommodations and safety for autistic employees. The tip sheet briefly covers stress management. Here, we will dive deeper into the relationship between autism and anxiety, how autistic employees might handle stress at work, and how you as an employer can help.

Tip Sheet: Accommodations and Safety for Autistic Employees

Anxiety, as many of us know, is itself a reaction to stress and something many of us experience from time to time. Anxiety disorders, which last much longer than temporary worries and fears, are particularly common among people on the autism spectrum – in fact, they are the most common cooccurring disorder. Just as in allistic people, an autistic person’s anxiety can be especially triggered in the workplace. Generally speaking, there are four key areas that may especially relate to anxiety in autistic people.

The first is difficulty recognizing emotions in oneself and in others; this makes it hard to understand and process feelings of being scared or safe, which itself can be scary. It can also result in social anxiety due to difficulty with “reading” others, thus making social interaction feel...

Autistic and allistic people approach ideas differently, but can learn to communicate effectively.

In our latest tip sheet from DeafTEC and AccessATE, we discuss how communicating with employees with autism can require some adjustments. This, of course, doesn’t mean autistic people are bad communicators – simply that the way they process conversation is different than some of us may be used to. Here, we will further explore the differences between autistic and allistic communication.

Tip Sheet: Workplace Communication for Autistic Employees

For those unfamiliar, “allistic” refers to people who are not on the autism spectrum, and has become an increasingly popular term to help distinguish people from their autistic peers without using judgmental terms like “normal” in contrast to “autistic”. When interacting with an autistic employee, it’s important to remember that there is no one “right” way to communicate, which of course is true regardless of whether one is on the autism spectrum or not. It’s also important to bear in mind that misunderstandings are as frustrating for the autistic person as they are for you, and having a better understanding of autistic communication can prevent breakdowns for both parties.

While autism doesn’t look the same in all people who are on the...

A woman in a wheelchair reads a book with a cat in her lap

Our previous blog post discussed a number of websites that cover disability news, but for a closer look into life with disabilities, magazines can be one of the best sources. Disability magazines are often written by experts who research disabilities or work with people with disabilities, or by people with disabilities themselves. Below are a few outstanding disability periodicals that we recommend as possibly worthy of your time.

The ASHA Leader

The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association’s (ASHA) The ASHA Leader is a monthly magazine and website for and about audiologists, speech-language pathologists, and speech, language, and hearing scientists. The ASHA Leader publishes reports, essays, op-eds, and more. From their website, you can access everything published in the magazine and more. From the home page, you can quickly navigate to their latest and most read articles, quick reads, or narrow your options using the buttons in their “Topics” section on the lower right. You can also explore the major sections of The ASHA Leader via the navigation menu, which includes audiology, speech-language pathology, news, a link to their podcast, and a link to their magazine archives,...

Four people read books among a stack of giant books

The world of disability is constantly evolving and innovating. It seems like every week there are stories about new policies, technologies, and accommodations. All of this means that it can be hard to keep up! However, by picking a handful of good news sources to subscribe to or keep up with, staying up-to-speed on disability news becomes much easier. Here, we’ve assembled some ‘recommended reading’ to help you stay informed and aware.

New York Times

You’re likely familiar with the New York Times, considering it’s one of the most popular newspapers and news sites in the United States. But did you know their website has a robust disability news section? The “Disabilities” topic contains articles and stories ranging from political and social news to personal stories and op-eds. Averaging 14 disability-related articles per month in 2022 thus far, the Times is a reliable source of fresh stories by and for the world of disability. The New York Times does require registering an account to view their articles online, but doing so is free.

The Guardian

Like the New York Times, The Guardian is a popular newspaper and news website that does a good job of covering disability news,...

Two professionals communicate about their notes on a student who uses a wheelchair

The majority of colleges and universities have a disability resource center (DRC) or office that works to ensure that classes, programs, buildings and other facilities, and services are accessible to students and employees with disabilities. It is through the school’s DRC that a student makes a request for an accommodation when a given class, lab, or building isn’t accessible to them. While the DRC is responsible for these standards and accommodations, faculty can make use of the DRC as well, to improve their classes, classrooms, and labs.

A school’s DRC keeps detailed notes on students with disabilities who have registered with the center. These notes typically include historical and holistic information about the student and their experiences with their disability, as well as a record of previous accommodation requests, and any communication, evaluation, consultation, and approvals and denials thereof. While these notes are largely confidential, the DRC can still advise on what has worked for a given student in the past and any changes you as a faculty member might make to improve accessibility for them. Per the Association on Higher Education and Disability’s (AHEAD) white...