Ensuring that all children, youth, and adults with disabilities, and those receiving educational supports, are valued by and contribute to their communities of choice. |
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“Respect is Universal”: Olmsted County Taps Person-Centered Training
After decades working in law enforcement and years spent volunteering with Special Olympics, Capt. Macey Tesmer knew that if for some reason her young relative with Down syndrome ever got arrested or had to face police questioning, the relative would have a very difficult time answering in a way that many officers expect.
“Getting arrested is stressful for anyone, and for someone with disabilities it’s just that much more challenging,” said Tesmer, operations captain for the Olmsted County Sheriff’s Office. Tesmer also understands how officers can become frustrated when working with detainees who don’t seem to want to cooperate.
To improve officers’ understanding about disability, Olmsted’s Adult Detention Center has a dedicated team of 15 detention deputies trained in working with people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities (IDD). Most of them have loved ones with disabilities or previous experience in the disability field. On just about every work shift, there is someone on the team available to respond to people with disabilities.
Sgt. Aaron Budensiek, who has a teenage son with autism, helps direct the team and assisted Capt. Tesmer to advocate last year for some additional training resources from the Institute on Community Integration that explain disability history and the social services system.
“I look at it as, the more tools and training we have, the better,” Budensiek said.
Read more about person-centered practices in Olmsted County law enforcement. |
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Northrup King: New Art Exhibition
ICI’s Art for All is presenting a 16-artist exhibition at Minnesota’s largest art complex, the Northrup King Building, 1500 Jackson St. NE, Minneapolis, through March 30. Gallery hours are Thursdays from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. and Saturdays, noon to 4 p.m.
On Feb. 16 at 6 p.m., multidisciplinary artist Alison Bergblom Johnson will discuss, “Disability Justice Through the Lens of Art and Supporting Non-disability-focused Galleries Curating Art by Artists with Disabilities.” And on March 2 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m., Cow Tipping Press will host a book release and author reading. A closing reception and market is planned for 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. on March 30.
Emma Baldwin, a member of ICI’s Community Advisory Council, is a featured artist and will perform a reading during the Cow Tipping event.
The show, Art Glow, is designed to not just exhibit works of art, but to sell them at accessible price points.
“Art isn’t always about selling, but when you sell a piece, it does tend to feel purposeful and validating,” said Nik Fernholz, program manager for ICI’s Art for All, the Stephanie Evelo Program for Art Inclusion.
Invited artists chose the works they would display in the exhibition, but the theme in designing the space is meant to evoke a feeling of a 1920s fair or market, Fernholz said.
Read more about the new Art for All exhibition. |
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Awareness Raised in Congo
Wrapping up work on a U.S. State Department grant to combat human rights abuses in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), a team led by the Institute on Community Integration recorded an uptick in positive attitudes toward disability in a random survey of 1,000 people in the DRC’s fifth-largest urban area.
Compared with attitudes in the region as the two-year project began, respondents reported more positive behaviors and awareness of the rights of people with disabilities, said ICI’s Lynda Lahti Anderson, who, along with
Macdonald Metzger, led several initiatives to connect with local media and to support people with disabilities to tell their stories and learn media skills.
“We’re seeing a lot of organizations and movements step up for disability rights, demanding that the state be held accountable for ensuring that everyone has equal and meaningful access to essential services and employment opportunities,” said John Ntonta, founder of the Kadiwaku Family Foundation, who partnered with ICI on the work.
Read more about ICI’s work in Congo. |
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Learning, Not Judging
More than 200 Minnesota professionals, mostly K-12 school personnel, learned the latest techniques to support children and families affected by the opioid epidemic through a recent training series facilitated by the Institute on Community Integration.
The training was part of Project SCOPE (Supporting Children of the OPioid Epidemic), a national initiative focused on supporting children born with neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS) and/or neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome (NOWS). The series aims to build a community of practice among early childhood providers, but also connects other professionals and family members to help promote understanding about the effects of opioids on child development and provide a wide array of support services. A large number of attendees were from greater Minnesota, outside of the Minneapolis metro area.
“It just brought to the forefront that I need to consider trauma and the experiences of parents and children prior to my meeting them,” one attendee said of the training.
“This work is about building knowledge and skills in working with families experiencing addiction. It is not about judging parents. Recovery is hard work and it goes day by day,” Jennifer Hall-Lande said. “So, we try to recognize this and to bridge the worlds of healthcare and education.”
Read more about Project SCOPE. |
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Safia Dockter connected with a young Ukrainian refugee through an article she wrote about the Russian invasion of Ukraine. She is currently working to develop a handbook for schools who work with displaced students from Ukraine. Learn more: https://z.umn.edu/8ctv
[Note: The University of Minnesota’s LinkedIn page has more than 466,000 followers.] |
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Long-term Supports and Services for Persons with Intellectual or Developmental Disabilities: Status and Trends Through 2019
Authors: Sheryl Larson, Jonathan Neidorf, Sandra Pettingell, and Mary Sowers
Ever wonder how many people in the United States have intellectual or developmental disabilities (IDD), how many of them get publicly funded supports from state IDD agencies, or where people getting supports live? The 2022 report from the Residential Information Systems Project (RISP) describes Medicaid- and state-funded long-term supports and services for people with IDD of all ages. It includes both annual national and state-level data as well as key trends from 1977 through 2019. The report is used by researchers to provide a context for their research articles. It is used by policymakers and advocates to inform national and state policy. Digital copies of the report are available at
https://risp.umn.edu/. The RISP website includes state profiles, downloadable infographics, and
customizable tables and graphs. Published by ICI’s Research and Training Center on Community Living. |
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NCEO Brief 30: Suggestions for Involving Students in Selecting and Implementing Accommodations
Authors: Sheryl Lazarus, Kascinda Fleming, Virginia A Ressa, and
Gail Ghere
This Brief
provides an overview of how students’ insights on the usefulness and feasibility of various accessibility features and accommodations should be taken into account when identifying accessibility features and accommodations for instruction and assessment. Students are often the best source of information about their strengths and needs, and what helps. This Brief uses synthesized and summarized research NCEO conducted on the perceptions of students with disabilities regarding accommodations between 1999 and 2021, and provides suggestions for soliciting students’ perceptions on accommodations and involving them in advocating for their needs. Published by ICI’s National Center on Educational Outcomes (NCEO). |
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NCEO Data Analytics 15 and 16: State Assessment Participation and Performance of Students with IEPs for 2017–2018 and 2018–2019
Authors: Yi-Chen Wu and Sheryl Lazarus
These two interactive reports present data on the participation and performance of students receiving special education services in statewide assessments used for Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) accountability. Using federally submitted data from their respective school years, these two reports present information on participation and performance in reading and mathematics statewide assessments. The reports also include state profiles for students with disabilities’ participation rates and performance. Published by NCEO. |
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NCEO Newsletter: February 2023
This issue
highlights a disproportionality calculator tool that can be used to examine disproportionality with respect to student subgroup participation in the alternate assessment; a brief on including students with disabilities in K-2 assessments; a brief on involving students with disabilities in selecting accessibility features and accommodations; and a policy analysis of how states’ policies address the qualifications and training requirements for test administrators, proctors, and accommodations providers. This issue contains an updated list of accommodations included in the NCEO Accommodations Toolkit. It also provides information on upcoming conferences where NCEO staff will present. Published by NCEO. |
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Book Chapter Published
Šiška, J., & Tichá, R. (2023). Quality of disability support services matters: EU and U.S. perspectives. In L. Bertelmann, M. Kempf, M. F. Reichstein, & L. W. Rohrmann,
Planung und entwicklung von sozialen diensten für menschen mit behinderungen [Planning and development of social services for persons with disabilities] (57th ed., pp. 115–132). |
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Journal Articles Published
Anderson, L. L., Hall, S., Kramme, J. E. D., &
Stancliffe, R. (2023). Transition to retirement: The lived experiences of adults with intellectual disabilities. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities.
Johnstone, C., Schuelka, M. J., Choeki, Y., & Yetsho, T. (2023). Disability-inclusive education, development, and dialectics: Complex cases in Bhutan. Comparative Education Review, 67(1), 147–166.
Pettingell, S. L., Bershadsky, J., Hewitt, A.,
Anderson, L. L., & Zhang, A. (2023). Direct support professionals and COVID-19 vaccination: A comparison of vaccinated and unvaccinated direct support professionals. Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, 61(1), 1–15.
Schuelka, M. J. (2022). Media Review: Dreams of Birds Flying in the Sky directed by Arun Bhattarai and produced by Matthew Schuelka. Fora Films, 2021. 58 minutes. Comparative Education Review, 66(4).
Shaw, K. A., Williams, S., Hughes, M. M., Warren, Z., Bakian, A. V., Durkin, M. S., Esler, A., Hall-Lande, J., Salinas, A., Vehorn, A., Andrews, J. G., Baroud, T., Bilder, D. A., Dimian, A., Galindo, M., Hudson, A.,
Hallas, L., Lopez, M., Pokoski, O., Pettygrove, S., Rossow, K., Shenouda, J., Schwenk, Y. D., Zahorodny, W., Washington, A., & Maenner, M. J. (2023). Statewide county-level autism spectrum disorder prevalence estimates — seven U.S. states, 2018. Annals of Epidemiology, 79. |
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Virtual Trainings on "Direct Care Resilience"
Every other Wednesday
until March 29
1 pm – 2 pm, Central Time
The North Dakota Center for Persons with Disabilities and ICI are hosting the second Direct Care Resilience ECHO online training,
which aims to support mental health and well-being among direct support professionals (DSPs) and qualified service providers. This free training was developed with input from DSPs and executive directors across North Dakota and Minnesota, as a follow up to the leadership series that ended in November. We understand that the field is experiencing staff shortages, so all sessions will be recorded for later viewing if necessary. To get the most from the training, we recommend scheduling time for DSPs to watch the recorded sessions. Questions? Contact Krista Opstedal.
Register for this training. |
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Charting the LifeCourse Sessions
Parents developed Charting the LifeCourse to support the people they love to live a good life. Charting the LifeCourse prepares parents and their children to plan, communicate, and problem-solve about things that are important to them. These free online sessions are for families, teachers, paraprofessionals, case managers, support coordinators, and anyone who wants to know more about Charting the LifeCourse. Register for the sessions you want to attend. |
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MIHEC Learning Community Event: "The Portable Credential and Planning for Life After College"
March 14
3 pm Central Time
This free Zoom presentation
will feature Dr. Christi Kasa from the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs. She will share two important aspects of Colorado’s inclusive postsecondary education (IPSE) programs: the Portable Credential and Planning for Life After College. She will be joined by one of her students who will share their experience. First, Dr. Kasa will provide details about the portable credential available at three Colorado IPSEs where students earn a Comprehensive Higher Education Certificate and students’ area of study is noted on their official transcript. She will convey the philosophy and process behind this credential. Next, she will discuss ways for IPSEs to help students transition to life after college. While in college, students learn skills to plan and guide their own lives and succeed at the university and in the local community. Dr. Kasa will show how to support students to carry those important skills forward to build a life they love after
college. She will offer basic practices they have developed and discuss how to support students to keep using their college skills to create successful lives after graduation. This event is from the Minnesota Inclusive Higher Education Consortium (MIHEC). Everyone is welcome. Registration is open. |
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Sarah Hall and Roger Stancliffe. In January, Hall
(pictured) began her service as Chair of the Board of Directors for Accord, a disability service provider in Minnesota. On January 24, Hall and Stancliffe presented the webinar, “Retirement and End of Life for People with IDD,“ at the Qualified Intellectual Disability Professional (QIDP) Virtual Conference, hosted by The Arc of Illinois. |
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Megan Sanders, Barb Kleist, Amy Hewitt, Sandra Pettingell, and Chet Tschetter. On January 10–11, Sanders (pictured),
Kleist, Hewitt, and Pettingell
presented the in-person frontline supervisor training, “Implementing Training,“ to 48 frontline supervisors from the Community Provider Network of Rhode Island. On January 11, Kleist, Hewitt, and Sanders presented at the Leading at All Levels Conference sponsored by the Community Provider Network of Rhode Island in Providence, Rhode Island. On January 19, Sanders and Tschetter presented the virtual frontline supervisor training, “Employee Development and Coaching,“ to 47 frontline supervisors from the Community Provider Network of Rhode Island. |
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Betul Cakir Dilek. On January 27, Cakir Dilek presented the poster, “Early Intensive Developmental and Behavioral Interventions Provider Utilization of Telemedicine Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic,” at the University of Minnesota’s Graduate Student Research Day in Educational Psychology. The poster relates to her work at the TeleOutreach Center. |
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Opening Doors, and Minds
A massive open online course (MOOC) designed by Wendy Looman, a faculty member for ICI’s Minnesota Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Related Disabilities (MNLEND) program, focuses on families with young children, and how elements of their environment, such as housing or access to nutritious food, influence their lives.
The course is part of a Coursera specialization created by Karen Monsen and Daniel Pesut, both of the University of Minnesota’s School of Nursing. The specialization was recently listed as one of the 25 most popular free university courses by Class Central, a provider of online course listings.
“This course has been a great way to get this content out to a really wide viewership, both internationally and among people who wouldn’t typically have access to college-level classes,” she said. Coursera is one of the largest online learning platforms, with about 92 million registered users as of 2021.
Read more about Looman. |
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The University of Minnesota stands on Miní Sóta Makhóčhe, the rightful homelands of the Dakhóta Oyáte. ICI recognizes that the U.S. did not uphold its end of these land treaties. It is the current and continued displacement of the Dakhóta Oyáte
that allows the University to remain today. At ICI, we affirm our commitment to address systemic racism, ableism and all other inequalities and forms of oppression to ensure inclusive communities. |
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