Getting into, paying for, and navigating through college is rarely easy. For students who have been diagnosed with learning disabilities (LD), that struggle can take on even more dimension

we dug around YouTube and found nine videos that document success in the workplace for individuals with disabilities.

In recent years there has been a growing interest in adolescent literacy, especially as Americans become more concerned about the economic and civic health of the nation. Literacy skills are necessary more than ever to succeed in college and work, as well as to manage the everyday life demands of an increasingly more complex society and world economy. The best example of this focus is the tagline “college and career ready” from the Common Core State Standards (CCSS).

About 30 percent of children with autism have symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), but under current diagnostic guidelines they can only be diagnosed with one or the other1. That’s about to change.

Section 485 of the Higher Education Opportunity Act permits students with certain intellectual disabilities to receive Pell Grants, FSEOG, and Federal Work Study under certain circumstances for the first time.

Getting into, paying for, and navigating through college is rarely easy. For students who have been diagnosed with learning disabilities (LD), that struggle can take on even more dimensions. Learning-related issues such as dyslexia, dysgraphia, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) often lead to difficulties in traditional classrooms and on standardized tests; if scholarship applications look foremost at test scores and GPAs, it can mean that LD students lose out. Fortunately, there are resources and scholarships out there that can help.

There’s a fine line between a naturally active child and a child who is affected by hyperactivity disorder. Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) tends to become noticeable early on in childhood, at around 2 or three years old, but because most kids are naturally prone to daydreaming, fidgety behavior and a short attention span, ADHD is often not recognized until much later on in life.

Pediatricians and researchers at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) have developed a first-of-its kind tool to help parents and health care providers better treat ADHD (attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder). The new, three-part survey helps steer families and doctors toward “shared decision-making,” an approach proven to improve healthcare results in adults, but not widely used in pediatric settings. The results of the CHOP study are published in the journal Academic Pediatrics.

Much research probing the link between bullying and mental health has focused on how being bullied contributes to the development of issues like anxiety and depression. But a new study suggests the relationship goes both ways, finding that boys and girls with mental health disorders are three times more likely to be the bully.

A substantial number of children being treated for ADHD may not have the disorder, while many children who do have the symptoms are going untreated, according to the 10-year Project to Learn about ADHD in Youth (PLAY) study funded by the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention.

Project Endeavor is a program of CSD, funded by a two year contract with the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).   This program focuses on providing deaf and hard of hearing Americans with access to broadband or high speed internet through discounted internet service plans and internet devices.   Project Endeavor also provides an array of training materials and educational resources for deaf and hard of hearing people.  For more information about Project Endeavor, Click here. Click here to contact us to see if you qualify for discounted internet services and devices. 

Despite increased awareness of the various forms of bullying, and school-based programs to combat it, countless children continue to perpetuate intentional mean-spirited actions directed at peers and adults. Whether it takes place in the home, school bus, carpool, playground, or classroom, preying upon sensitivities of others and/or harsh rejecting efforts aimed to exclude others have become commonplace. Perhaps it’s time for parents and teachers to coach children in practicing socially inclusive behaviors that create conditions where bullying and exclusion are not reinforced by peers.

"My daughter has made little or no progress after years of special education. Her IEPs contain vague subjective goals and objectives. If our case goes to due process, is the school liable for not providing an appropriate education? Or, is this the responsibility of the parent who signed the IEP?"

As a teacher, how can I advocate for a third grade student who receives resource support services, but failed to make any progress in reading or math this year? Her parents paid for a daily specialized reading program for three months. She made astounding progress.

Managing behavior that is challenging can be very stressful for parents of children and adults with special needs. But it’s important to see it as a form of communication. Challenging behavior indicates there is a problem in learning and not in the person.

When Medicaid twice denied a SleepSafe Bed for Mikayla Wisher, her family, friends, community and many strangers stepped up. Mikayla Wisher is a 21-year-old Kalispell woman who can neither speak nor walk and who suffers multiple seizures and uncontrolled movement, Sabrina Wisher, Mikayla’s mom, said she was overwhelmed by the outpouring of love . “Strangers [have been] coming up to me and giving me hundreds of dollars,” she said. “The community and my family and friends have been huge.”

A first-of-its-kind study looking at a widely-used program designed to improve behavior finds that the strategy is proving effective for students with and without disabilities. Researchers at Johns Hopkins compared the experiences of students at 21 schools using the program known as School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports, or SWPBIS, to kids at 16 schools that did not use the program over four years.

The report, commissioned by the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading and the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation, offers a number of recommendations for policymakers and educators. They include: high expectations for all learners with accountability measures that indicate how individual students are doing; early-childhood programs that prepare children for reading and identify young children at risk of having reading problems; curricula, instructional practices and tools, and assessments that are science-based and accessible to all students; and teacher training and ongoing professional development that incorporate findings from neuroscience as well as best practices for how to teach reading.

There are several amazing websites that do an excellent job of incorporating Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles. As you know, UDL is all about creating learning environments that meet the needs of all types of learners—closed captioning for the hearing impaired, read-aloud capabilities for the visually impaired, for example.