Stevens questions DYCD on serving students with disabilities
Stevens asks how DYCD collaborates with DOE to support students with disabilities in Beacon and Cornerstone programs. Asherall says programs make reasonable accommodations and that Cornerstone staff have access to DOE's inclusive practice workshops from Summer Rising.
How does DYCD collaborate with DOE to support programs with students with disabilities?
I will say this.
Although I am not a fan of Summer Rising, everybody knows that I've never made a secret of it.
But I think one of the things that we really did benefit from summarizing is just seeing how students with disabilities should be serviced and being able to provide services.
And it wasn't so much unnecessarily, I feel like, in this RFP for after school, which I'm a little disappointed by, but like thinking about cornucopias and beacons moving forward, how do we kind of make sure that we are...
Including students with disabilities in this conversation and making sure that they are prioritized when we're thinking about these RFPs and rollout.
Because again,
It gets really hard for parents who with students with disabilities, they typically don't have programs to put their kids in.
Well, thank you.
That is definitely something that is at the core of our, you know, of the commissioner and kind of like looking across the spectrum.
The goal is to make every reasonable accommodation that ensures that every participant
has an opportunity to engage.
And so all of our programs are dedicated to working with young people of various disabilities.
And so we recognize the importance of addressing the unique needs of each individual to foster their growth and participation.
And so
We, you know, to your point about summer rising, I think, you know, one of the wins for me has been just the menu of offerings and workshops and info sessions that the DOE has made available.
And so although our cornerstone programs are not part of summer rising, right, we try to create spaces for
our cornerstone directors and staff to receive that information and learn about best practices and strategies of creating an inclusive environment during after school and evening hours.
So that's something that we're definitely committed to in ensuring that we infuse in our work.