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Special Education Department Comments to SEAT Center Advisory Group Draft The Special Education Department (SED) has been revising their curriculum to provide greater degrees of meaningful integration of assistive technology (AT) content within courses. SED recognizes and believes that SED teacher candidates must have a variety of hands-on experiences with a wide-range of AT as part of their individual teacher preparation program. As such, two one-hour dedicated courses related to AT along with multiple other courses containing, but not dedicated to, AT content have been proposed. The new curriculum brings multiple challenges. With regard to AT needs and technologies for diverse learners, SED has identified the following needs that need to be met in order to implement the revised curriculum: Access to AT expertise to support the development of AT-related content and experiences for both the dedicated AT courses and courses which integrate AT content. The need exists for the development of modules and other resources that can be integrated into coursework that will provide quality, contemporary, meaningful, and consistent learning experiences across course sections. Continued access to expertise would be needed to ensure the content remains current and reflects practices in the field. Access to current AT for course use and support to use the AT. Courses would need support to set-up equipment, ensure the working order of equipment, provide operational instructions for the equipment, and take down of the equipment. Efforts would need to be made to ensure that the equipment is up-to-date and reflects equipment used in PK-12 settings. Supports may include professional development for the course instructor, guest teaching in a course by someone with AT expertise, and/or co-teaching of content. o Some courses within the proposed curriculum are recommended to be taught in a space where easy and ongoing access to assistive technologies is provided. These courses include: SED Language and Literacy Applications (approximately 4-5 sections per semester) Education of Learners with Severe Disabilities (approximately 4-5 sections per semester) SED Foundations of Assistive Technology (1 credit hour course; approximately 5 sections per semester) SED Using Technology in Todays Classroom (1 credit hour course; approximately 4-5 sections per semester) LVB Assistive Technology courses (2 courses- 1 section each per year) o The SED Math Methods course (5-6 sections per semester) would need to be intermittently taught in a location where access to assistive technologies could be provided. o Some off-campus courses would need support for AT use through technical assistance, professional development, guest teaching of content, co-teaching of content and/or intermittent access to AT. These courses include: SED Content Application and Analysis (4 sections per semester) Advanced Clinical Experience (4 sections per semester)

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Access to professional development support for SED Faculty. Under the proposed curriculum, SED Faculty will need to develop knowledge and skills related to assistive technologies, assistive technology services, and technologies to support diverse learners. As such, a variety of professional development experiences will be needed including but not limited to o Workshops both face-to-face and virtual (the latter to support both on-campus and off-campus faculty) o Creation and support of professional learning communities o Web-based resources o Co-teaching of specific content/learning experiences o Other individualized supports Access to enrichment opportunities for SED teacher candidates. A variety of experiences should be available to allow future SED teachers to deepen their knowledge and skills with AT and technologies to support diverse learners.

Finally, SED would like to highlight some issues with the current location and set-up of the SEAT Center. Specifically, it is important to note that the current set-up of the SEAT Center rooms needs to reflect current thinking about learning space design. There are current limitations with regard to flexibility of set-up and ability to adapt to a variety of learning activities. This is largely in part due to issues with the infrastructure of the building. Cosmetic improvements could also be made to allow the SEAT Center to look and function like a modern technology-supported learning laboratory/classroom. Issues with heating and cooling provide issues with regard to noise and detract from instruction/learning.

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