Episode 303: ATIA 2024 Recap (Part 1)

This week, we share Part 1 of Chris and Rachel’s recap of their recent trip to ATIA 2024! Chris and Rachel discuss a recent change to ATIA’s venue, share resources and takeaways from the conference, talk about what they covered in their own sessions, and more!

Key Ideas this week:

🔑 A lot of discussion at ATIA was about “Assistive Technology Myths and Facts” from the Office of Special Education Programs and the National Educational Technology Plan for 2024. They could be helpful as tools to demonstrate what you are sharing about AAC is supported by the federal government.

🔑 At his presentation, Lance McLemore shared about fear and anxiety using his device with unfamiliar people. For an AAC User, they don’t always know if the other person will do things like provide sufficient wait time. If you support an AAC User, be cognizant that an unfamiliar communication partner could be a possible source of stress.

🔑 Chris got to connect with Amanda Hartman, who is the author of two children’s books about AAC, “AAC Rhyme Time” and “I Talk in Different Ways”.  It could be used, for example, to introduce a classroom to AAC, build phonological awareness, or support literacy!

🔑 One thing to look into if you work with students - are the accessibility settings enabled or disabled by default on student computers and devices? Many students need things like text-to-speech, but enabling it requires several hurdles through the IT department (or they are totally locked out).

Transcript of the Episode

Please Note: This transcript was generated using speech recognition & AI tools; it may contain some grammatical and/or spelling errors.

00:00:08
Welcome to talking with tech. I'm your host, Rachel Madel, joined, as always, by Chris Bugaj. Hey, Chris.

00:00:13
Rachel, I have a quick question for you.

00:00:14
What?

00:00:16
Who has the meats?

00:00:18
Who has the meats? I have no idea.

00:00:24
I. Of course, what I'm referencing is the fact that we just got back from the Arby's 2024 convention in Orlando, Florida, which is just a little inside joke for anyone who was actually at Atia 2024. The Arby's franchise connection or conference was happening at the same time in a different portion of the conference. So they had Arby's shirts and Arby's posters and Arby's everything there. So the talking with tech podcast is not sponsored by Arby's yet growth mindset.

00:00:58
Rachel, maybe there was literally the world's largest arby's advertisement inside the hotel. I was like, this is really next level.

00:01:13
And that was sandwiched between. See what I did there?

00:01:17
I totally.

00:01:19
The Atia was sandwiched between Arby's and Sherman Williams. The Sherman Williams convention was there. So we got paint and Arby's and Atia sandwiched in between.

00:01:29
What more do you need?

00:01:35
Let's get into it, Rachel. This is the Atia 2024 recap episode. Who knows? Who knows how long this is going to go? It might be a two parter.

00:01:44
We'll have to see how long we talk about this. I made a little list here of things to discuss, and I thought we could kind of roll through them. How does that sound to you?

00:01:53
That sounds great. Let's dive in.

00:01:55
Okay. This was your third Atia, is that correct? Am I thinking.

00:01:59
Yes, that's correct.

00:02:01
Right. And maybe was the first one virtual, so this was.

00:02:04
No, that would be 4th.

00:02:08
First one virtual, then three in person. Yes. Got you. Okay. And I've been going for many years, being in assistive technology for many years.

00:02:18
So one of the big things that was different this year about Atia 24, probably the biggest thing was that it was in a new location. So for the eternity that I've been going to Atia, it's always been at the same hotel, the same conference center, and everyone sort of knew where things were, knew where the rooms were. You didn't have to hunt things down. It was sort of a smaller venue than this new place, which brought new opportunities but also new challenges. So did you have a sense or a feel about how the new space was?

00:02:53
Yeah, I mean, I think that, generally speaking, I'm not the best with navigating conferences, and so a new space was extra hurdles to kind of figure out where I was going. Although I feel like it was pretty well laid out and easy after the first day or two to kind of navigate. So I feel like the space was really great and it was just a different experience. It felt different. It didn't feel like ATaA in some ways, but then, of course, the people is really what make a conference.

00:03:25
So the people were all there. We had amazing experiences and yeah, it was really awesome.

00:03:31
Yeah, I would say that's the only thing that I really noticed about the new space is that we saw so many of our friends and so many people we met there for the first time. And yet, as I was reflecting after the fact, I was like, oh, but I didn't see that person. And I didn't see that person. I know that person was going to be there. They told us three days ago they were going to be there and we didn't see them.

00:03:55
I met people on the podcast that we just didn't see, but I know they were there because it was a larger venue. You had less opportunity to just sort of run into people. Yet we still ran into lots of people. Right. So that was a big change.

00:04:10
And then the other thing I think was the timing of it. So forever and always it was pre conferences on Tuesday and Wednesday, and then Thursday and Friday and Saturday morning were the actual rest of the conference. But because of whatever, I don't actually know why things happened. Maybe because Sherman Williams had a block of rooms. That might be my guess is that pre conferences still happened on Tuesday and Wednesday.

00:04:35
We did one on Wednesday, but the conference itself didn't start till Thursday morning at 01:00 which meant there was a whole block of time in the morning for either people to arrive or to have meetings or to just casually hang out. But that also meant that Saturday, to make sure the same amount of time was spent. Saturday was all day, and that certainly affected my conference going because I needed to get back on Saturday, not leave on Sunday. It's a whole extra expense to stay, an extra day, hotel and all that kind of stuff. And then my flights got changed and so I missed all of Saturday.

00:05:13
And I think you did too, right?

00:05:15
Yes. I was not there on Saturday. I had to wake up. I got very little sleep because I stayed up until one, and then I had to get up at 430 and I had to catch a flight very early out of Orlando. So I also did not get to experience Saturday at I.

00:05:32
I don't know.

00:05:33
How many other people are in that same experience. I guess that's feedback that Atia will get. I don't know how they'll capture numbers that way. Like, you know how many people registered, but you don't know that you know how many people left on that day unless they do. And I just don't know how they would know that.

00:05:49
So I'd be curious about getting feedback from our listening crew who was there, all the listeners. Did you have to leave on Saturday? Did you find that was the thing or. No, we actually stayed and it was no problem at all. So I think that's the first thing on the list.

00:06:05
New place, new time. And that brought about some. Just new experiences.

00:06:12
Yeah. I think that, like anything else, once you kind of experience something new, there's a little bit of, oh, what is this going to be like? Is this going to be as good? But ultimately, again, it circles back to the people. And I just love that community and had so much fun and so many amazing experiences.

00:06:33
So you said the people. That's the next thing on my list. Okay. Is that I think hands down the highlight of Atia 2024 was meeting Michaela Ball in person. Would you agree?

00:06:46
Absolutely. Michaela, our amazing audio engineer, came to Atia and presented at Atia. And absolutely. That was my favorite part of Atia.

00:06:57
So that's the thing. Here's a question for you, Rachel. You know, I say this all the time. This is foreshadowing for later. If I say it's foreshadowing for later, am I spoiling the fact that it's foreshadowing?

00:07:08
I'm not sure, but probably. Maybe. Definitely not.

00:07:12
Well, then maybe I'll say it now, but we'll skip it later. Is that what Michaela was presenting on was a thing she's been working on with Rachel Langley, Tabi Jones-Wohleber, and Carol Zangari called stepping into AAC, and it is now a portion of it at the point of this recording is out in the wild for people to consume, enjoy and over. I'm sure Luke will put it in the show notes, but right now it's posted over on the Angelman syndrome Foundation website. Or you could just Google stepping into AAC and you'll be able to find it and what it is I'm going to try. Well, do you want to try and take a stab at explaining it?

00:07:52
Yeah. So I actually was connected with Carol Zangari, and Carol reached out saying, do you have anyone who can help with a video project? And I was like, I absolutely have someone I can ask. And I thought immediately of Michaela because of her background. And I'm super happy that I was able to connect Michaela to this project.

00:08:15
And essentially, it's a project where a series of videos have been released in an effort to teach AAC and particularly to parents. And I think that that is something that is near and dear to my heart. That's something that I have aspired to and also done a lot of in my own work online. And it's just we need more resources that are really powerful for parents, easy to digest information. And I feel like a video format is a really powerful way to do that.

00:08:50
We don't have enough time as slps and at specialists and so it's really important to figure out ways to teach this information asynchronously. So I'm really excited to really dive into that project and to learn more about it. And I think it's just a really invaluable resource to our community.

00:09:10
Yeah, I think videos are a large, central part of it. I think they also have documents that go along with it that break it down, like step by step, week by week. Here's what you can do. It really reminded me of during the pandemic, Mei Ling Chang asked us to do a presentation for the world on breaking down your right in hour by hour how you can do things to support language with AAC. And this is like, how can you break your life down by week by week about what to do?

00:09:47
It was. I'm really excited to. I mean, I went to the website and I kind of looked around and clicked on some things. I got a feel for it. Of course, I trust all of those people that are involved in it.

00:09:57
So it's like, yes, I cannot wait to explore it in even more depth.

00:10:03
Yeah, I'm just really excited that a resource like this was created. And I think it's incredibly powerful to have this step by step process. It's one of the things that makes AAC so challenging is that there's no kind of cookie cutter approach that you can use for all. So, you know, at least having some of this process, I guess, automated and the foundational pieces of information and concepts taught, I think is a huge time saver. And that allows us as clinicians and educators who are working alongside of students and their communication partners, it allows us to focus our time where it really matters, which is now, let's talk about your child and core language and your child and pausing longer like your child and modeling in everyday routines.

00:10:56
And I feel like that is just so powerful because again, we don't have enough time to do all the things. But if we have asynchronous learning opportunities, it just makes our job a lot easier.

00:11:09
Speaking about people besides Michaela, that also was a big highlight of Atia 2024, is that there were so many people that we met who we had not met before, of course, seeing old friends, but meeting new ones. And so many listeners of the talking with tech podcast. It's certainly the case where you and I would present together just two or three years ago, and we'd say, we're the hosts of the talking with tech podcast. How many people listen? And you'd get, let's say, of a room full of 50 to 100 people, somewhere like three to six people raising their hands that they're listeners, and the rest people go, no, tell us more.

00:11:48
And now, in a room full of 50 to 100 people, it's three to six people who haven't raised their hands right, who haven't said yes, which is super exciting for us, right? And so many people, when we were together and separately, came up to us and said, we love your work. We love what you're doing with talking with tech. Please keep going. We've learned so much.

00:12:09
Is that fair?

00:12:10
Yes. It was so great to meet so many of our listeners and to hear how the podcast has made an impact on them. And it really makes the work we do here feel really awesome. It makes me feel really awesome that we're making such an impact. And so I just want to say thank you to anyone who saw us and grabbed us and walked up to us or lingered around us as we were having other conversations.

00:12:37
It really was wonderful to meet you guys and to talk to you and to listen to your story. And it's just awesome because we do this podcast, Chris, and we don't always have the chance to talk with the people who are actually listening, who know consuming the content and actually doing things, know their own practice differently. So it's just really great when we have that opportunity.

00:13:02
Before we got to Atia, you and I were doing a presentation out in the American Southwest for a school district that many of the teachers were new. And so a lot of the concepts that we were presenting were some of the early foundational concepts because they had not really experienced, let's say, core vocabulary or motor planning in the way it would work with AAC. And so we were sharing some foundational concepts to people who are new to the field. But then we hop on multiple planes and we travel to Atia, where we do our design and deliver pre conference. And those are people that were mostly, not all, but mostly much further along in their journey with AAC.

00:13:45
It was a very different conversation with them. So I think we have to shout out Katie here, specifically Katie Butzu. And Katie, if we're saying your name wrong, it's b U t z u. Go look her up on x or all the places. But Katie came in.

00:14:02
Katie was wearing a t shirt that said, "Rachel Madel and Chris Bugaj for President." Some of you guys might have seen it. I posted on social media. We tagged talking with tech, but I was just in shock when I saw her t shirt.

00:14:18
Yes. That was to be the last thing I would expect to see. And the thing that made me smile from ear to ear. I could not believe someone made a shirt like that on their cricut machine. So, Katie, thank you so much.

00:14:31
And then during that presentation, certainly Katie and I found out that although we follow each other on x, that we're big into that. Both of us are big into steam and stem. And, like, during one of the breaks, we kind of got really into talking about, well, do you know about this program and this program? And she was sharing all sorts of stuff. But point being, great rich discussions about AAC with people from all over the world.

00:14:57
We had people from Canada. We had people from England. We had people from Hawaii. We had people from. We.

00:15:08
I think we did. People from Alaska. Yes, we did.

00:15:11
For sure.

00:15:11
Yeah. I doubted myself for a second, but I know we did. And then we also had people coming from Israel, which, of course, with everything going on at the time of this recording and in the last number of months, it just felt like I wanted to hug them so tight. So it was great that they were there and got to have this rich discussion with people all over the world about how to better consider and implement AAC.

00:15:40
Yeah, I loved that pre conference. It's so refreshing to spend time, a whole day with people who are just as passionate about AAC as I am. And I think that there's something that is somewhat isolating in the work that we do, because oftentimes we are the only AAC person in our district or in our organization. And to be around other people who totally get it. And we can kind of dive in to kind of some of our biggest roadblocks and challenges in this work.

00:16:16
Not only did we come up with some really awesome ideas, solutions, but I also just feel so much more connected to this work and to the people in that room, particularly. And there's something to that. There's something about that connectedness, like you're not in this alone. That is really powerful.

00:16:35
It's not a moment, it's a movement. And when you get to be with people that are part of that movement that you either haven't connected with before or you have just tangentially and you can really dig in deep for multiple hours about how we're going to then leave and continue that movement. It re energizes you. I certainly came back re energized.

00:16:54
Totally.

00:16:56
Okay, let me ask you this, Rachel. Every year when we come back from Atia, we sort of talk about the theme. Like everybody was talking about this. And I really struggled this year with, okay, what was the know? Did you have the something resonate to the top bubble to the top that you found that you're having multiple conversations about while in different sessions or as you're walking from place to place or around the poolside or at dinner at night, when you're up till one in the morning, is there something that just sort of like this kept coming up?

00:17:29
There was no real theme for me. I think that a theme that I noticed was AI, but that's because I was putting myself in sessions and situations where that was kind of the topic. So I was kind of putting myself in those conversations, but I didn't pick up on a theme this year.

00:17:52
Like I said, I struggle with that too. If there was one for me, it was two particular resources that weren't really launched at Atia, but they were launched around the same time as Atia. So I think it is important to mention it here so that people know about it. So the first one is that the Office of Special Education Programs, which is in the United States, that's like the federal government overseeing special education, recently launched kind of an updated assistive technology myths and facts PDF or documentation in multiple languages, sort of going through what are the myths and what are the facts around assistive technology consideration in the IEP and beyond. And when that came out, of course, we're at the assistive Technology Industry association conference.

00:18:42
So a lot of people were talking about that to me. I looked through it and I was, yep. But of course, for it's, it's stuff I knew. Right. But it was so important for the rest of the world to know this stuff and for it to be a spotlight on it and to share it widely with all the new people that are in education and all the people that have heard about assistive technology sort of, again, tangentially or in passing, or think that it's somebody else's responsibility.

00:19:15
This, again, is a nice booster shot for the world, specifically the country of the United States, about what is important about assistive technology. We haven't heard anything from the Office of Special Education programs in a long while specifically about assistive technology. So this was a nice refresher to rejuvenate everybody. And the second document that came out that has been a multi year project is the national ed tech plan. So what's important about the national ed tech plan of 2024 is that infused in this national ed tech plan is universal design and accessibility.

00:19:57
They are highlighted as the premier way to design instruction, not from a special Ed lens, from an everybody lens. This comes from, again, the United States federal government, the educational technology side. Right. The Office of Educational Technology. That's saying, this is how we design instruction in an inclusive way for everybody.

00:20:19
This is how it should be done. And that, again, is a great document for any school district anywhere in the world, really, who's saying, okay, we want to change how we're doing things. Let's look at what the federal government is saying to do. And the thing is, the national ed tech plan has not just with one administration, meaning it has been around for a while, and it's just updated to the new version. And accessibility and universal design have been part of the theme of that through multiple presidential administrations.

00:20:54
It has not changed based on whether you have a republican president or a democratic president or something else. It's been the same for many years, that this is the way to do education. And so if you have not heard of the national ed tech plan, we would invite you to go and peruse it and use it and spread it and use it as a tool for you to champion inclusive practices in universal design, for learning to say, hey, it's not just us that are in this movement. The federal government says to do it this way. Right?

00:21:24
Look, it's written here, like, 44 times in this document, giving examples of how school districts are doing it. So it's not just us. You can do it, too, and other places have done it. We can emulate what these other places have done. So I think that's what I heard most frequently people talking about is these national level documents that have come out with this fervor and excitement around how they could be used to push the envelope and change how we do instruction generally for everybody.

00:21:52
I think it's really awesome that now we have this resource from, like you said, the federal government or resources and just how much weight that pulls, because I feel like we've all been in situations where we're really trying to advocate, and we feel like we're the only one in our little neck of the woods that's trying to do this work and that it can feel like a very much an uphill battle. So to be able to cite a federal resource when you're advocating on behalf of making some of these changes when you're sitting in an IEP meeting, it's just really helpful to kind of put some oomph behind what you're saying.

00:22:32
Now, I would like to just discuss this point about the national attack plan real quick. Like I said, multiple administrations. It's been around for a while. This is just the new version of it. Right?

00:22:43
And the old versions also had universal design for learning and accessibility woven through it. It was a theme. And there's this wide gap between how the federal government and many administrators see how education can be designed and the actual teacher in the classroom teaching kids. There's this wide gap in between, like, okay, yeah, I see where you're pointing us to. How do we actually get there?

00:23:10
Which is why I would invite our listeners to look at that national tech plan. Show it to your assistant principals, your principals, your superintendents. Make sure they're aware of it so that we can start to narrow that gap that exists, so that we can show the teachers in the actual learning spaces and schools how they can design things differently.

00:23:35
Love it, Chris. All right, what else you got for me?

00:23:38
All right, let's talk about sessions you had. Sessions I had didn't. Besides our design and deliver, we didn't have sessions together. So you want to go first? Let's talk about your session that you did with a couple colleagues.

00:23:50
Yes, I had the absolute pleasure of presenting with Sarah Gregory, Ashley Larissey, and Kelly Key, all big names in the AAC world. And I was so excited that we were all able to come together. It actually started last year at Agia when we decided, hey, we should all present together. And we actually made it happen. So our session was really around AAC implementation barriers, and we designed the session to really just crowdsource everyone's biggest barriers and then talk through them and give ideas and share resources.

00:24:26
We had an amazing padlet where people were populating ideas, strategies, resources, and it was me running around, Chris, with the microphone, asking questions and getting people's ideas. And so it was a really engaging session and was really awesome to share that experience with some people in the field that I highly respect.

00:24:49
Yeah, I love that you got your steps in and can run around with the mic, and people got to share their experiences in multiple formats, either saying things out loud or putting them on the padlet again, that's modeling universal design for learning where you have multiple means of expression. So sounds like it was awesome. I'm sad I couldn't be there. I had to be in a different session at that time. I did come by and say, wish you all good luck, but I think maybe could you share that padlet with me?

00:25:17
I would love to take a look at what people said.

00:25:19
Totally. Yes.

00:25:21
Okay. One of the reasons I couldn't be there is because I had sessions of my own. I presented twice with our inclusive 365 crew. Mike Marata, sadly, so sadly, couldn't be there. He had stuff going on that he couldn't be at Atia.

00:25:33
We missed him. For those of you that know Mike Morata, he's a big influence at Atia. And he was there in spirit and a little cardboard cutout.

00:25:42
He was everywhere. He was on the dance floor. He was eating dinner with us. He was still there.

00:25:48
Yeah. And he's one of the inclusive 365 crew that helped write one of the authors of the inclusive learning 365 book. So Beth and Karen and I presented twice, and they were extremely well attended sessions like out the door, packed. Sadly, I think people had to be turned away because they couldn't fit in the rooms where we were talking about inclusive mindsets. And then the first one was like, how to develop an inclusive mindset and really how to be an ambassador for change in your neck of the woods.

00:26:26
Clearly, you come into Atia, you probably have an inclusive mindset, or you're well on your way on that journey where the people back at home who are not at really needs to hear those messages. So we talked a little bit about how to become an activist in that area. And then the second one was on literacy instruction and designing inclusive literacy spaces. Both of these, I should say, were sponsored by text help. So we were in the text help room, and again, rich discussions about different tools and strategies that you can use to put in place.

00:27:03
And at one of those sessions, sitting in the front of the room was Amanda Hartman. Now, do you know Amanda Hartman?

00:27:09
I do. I actually had the pleasure of meeting Amanda Hartman at Atia this year.

00:27:13
Oh, is this the first time you met her?

00:27:15
Yeah. I've never met.

00:27:16
Yeah. So Amanda works for assistiveware and has created many videos on YouTube and has done presentations and has written a couple books. And she gave me a couple of her books that she's done. So I just want to shout her out real quick to thank her for her books. Now, her books are children's books to teach people about AAC.

00:27:35
So one of them is called AAC rhyme time, and the other one is, I talk in different ways. So these are great children's books that I was gifted. Thank you, Amanda. And if you haven't seen them, they're a great way to teach whole classrooms of kids about AAC.

00:27:52
Yeah, I actually had the pleasure of right at the end of AAA when I was staying up until one in the morning, Chris, I was talking to Amanda Hartman. I actually was down at the bar, and we were all kind of hanging out, and I had the pleasure of talking to her and talking to her about her books. What you don't know, Chris, is that when you had dropped off those books and I think you had to, I don't know, run to the restroom or something, and I was, huh, what are these books? And I was like, I've seen these books. And so I got to page through the books that Amanda had gifted you.

00:28:24
And then I had the opportunity to talk to her about how she created those books, and it was so cool to hear the backstory. And they're actually really awesome books to teach about AAC, to teach literacy, phonological awareness for her rhymetime one. So, yeah, definitely excited that I was able to meet her and excited to get her books.

00:28:44
What other of my stuff did you look through when I walked away?

00:28:47
Everything. I was really just searching through all of your belongings whenever you weren't in the room.

00:28:53
Thank you for keeping them safe. And yes, let me ask you about this. So you and I did get to go to couple sessions together. One of them was Jordan Zimmerman's session, right? We were sitting in the back.

00:29:07
What did you think?

00:29:08
I mean, one of my favorite things about ATA is having ample opportunities to go to sessions by users. Like, that's the best thing about AA, in my opinion, is just being able to listen to a lived experience from people that are using AAC to communicate. And so I was excited to check out Jordan's session. Jordan's been on the podcast. Definitely recommend listening to that episode if you haven't listened already.

00:29:37
And I feel like not only does Jordan share really awesome information about inclusion and advocacy for AAC, but she's also just really fun and funny. I feel like that was so fun to see how in between comments, she would make a joke. And so I love listening to Jordan. I feel like she's not only really informative, but also really entertaining. And I feel like that is the mark of a really great.

00:30:11
Sadly, I mean, after that session, in the context of how spread out the conference was, we didn't see Jordan again, or at least I didn't. Did you run into Jordan?

00:30:22
I did, actually. So one of the things that she joked about was going down the waterslide. So that was a joke that she made during the session. And then I got to see her right after she had gone down the waterslide. She was literally soaking wet and so excited to talk about going down the waterslide and had a video of her going down the waterslide.

00:30:39
So that was the one time after her session that I did see her.

00:30:43
So I didn't run into her again in the conference, but after leaving Saturday morning and getting through security and getting through on my way to my gate, who was sitting at a gate, like four or five gates away, but Jordan Zimmerman sitting by herself. So I walked up. I was like, Jordan, it's me. And she was like, chris. And so we chatted for maybe 15 minutes there at the gate, which is a nice, happy accident to happen.

00:31:07
She showed me the pictures of the water slide, and it's like, you missed out, buddy. You could have been down those water slides, too, which, you know, I'm a fan. I'm a fan of water.

00:31:13
I know this about you, Chris.

00:31:16
So I'm sad that I missed it, and she totally rubbed it in my face that I wasn't there. And so one of the things that she mentioned while we were chatting, though, which is I felt her pain, and that is she had to bounce between the conference of Atia and FETC. So FETC is the future educators technology conference that also is in Orlando, and it's more of an ed tech focused conference. And for many years now, many of us who have been going to Atia when it's on the same time, have this difficult choice of making, like, do I go to FETC and become that activist ambassador to more people that aren't really necessarily thinking of inclusion the way we are and inclusive practices the way we are. Do we become evangelists there, or do we spend more time over here doing the deep dive in assistive technology and inclusive design with these folks?

00:32:16
And I've definitely done the thing where I've been hopped. I've had to go from one, find an Uber or Lyft, go over to FETC, do some presentations, come on back. And that was Jordan's experience this year of being like, I can't be everywhere at once. I'm trying to be every once because so many people need to hear this, and I want to be with this conference, and I want to be with this conference. So we just sort of commiserated about that for a little while, about how we have to wear these both hats and have to try and spread the word.

00:32:47
Yeah, I know. I think what happens, too, in my experience, and I'm sure yours, Chris, when we go to these conferences, it's like a whirlwind. It's like we're presenting and then we have this meeting and then we have this interview, and then we have to be at this thing and it just can feel like very much, oh, my goodness, what just happened to me? A lot of those things are really great things, but sometimes when, know, walking around and trying to rush from this place to that or following this really strict schedule, I'm like, remember when I was fresh out of grad school and I went to ASHA and I just would sit in the sessions and then I'd be like, it's a totally different experience. And I'm grateful for that experience because I feel like it's so cool to meet all the people that I meet and get the opportunities to do everything that I get the opportunity to do.

00:33:38
But there's definitely a hustle associated with conference life and, yeah, I feel energized and at the same time completely exhausted.

00:33:50
Yes, that's exactly the feeling I would say, too. And also to that notion that I certainly said those messages to many of the new people at Atia. And let me just comment on that for a second. Somewhere, someone told us the statistic that about 40% of the people at Atia were new, meaning they were the new to Atia. It's their first time attending the conference.

00:34:16
And that was certainly my experience. They were all wearing these multicolored badges and like, oh, your first time? And I'd see them in the elevator and I'd see them around and a message that we said in some of our sessions, the inclusive 365 sessions, but then beyond was, you might be thinking when you're new here, that you go and you sit and you take the information down and then you use those tools or resources back with your practice, which is certainly a case, but that's only like level one. Level two is being that evangelist, that activist, that ambassador for making change in your area. So challenge yourself to see, when I go back, am I going to write a blog post?

00:34:52
Am I going to create a podcast? Am I going to do a presentation? Am I going to find a champion teacher and say, hey, you and I, let's do this thing together? Because I learned this thing at Atia, but you got to take it back and spread the word.

00:35:06
And I'll add to know, being open to the idea of you becoming a presenter yourself. I feel like so often I have been at conferences or listened to people share really awesome ideas and I'm like, okay, so when are you going to present? And it's like, it's always usually met with like, oh, I couldn't possibly do that. I'm not a presenter. And so I just encourage you guys, if you have awesome ideas, if you feel passionate about this work, don't be afraid to submit a proposal to speak and present your work.

00:35:40
We were all, at one point or another, all of the people who you listen to present at these conferences were not presenters. We all had the moment where we were like, okay, I guess I'll submit a proposal. I guess I'll create a presentation, I guess, know. Keep doing know. And so it just really hopefully can inspire you guys who are listening to share your work.

00:36:04
If you're going to go to Atia, you might as well submit a proposal and try to present at Atia, too.

00:36:10
I could not agree more back to Jordan for a second. One of the other things that we were talking about at that gate was she asked me some questions about Chris. In general, when you're working with different school districts, what do you see with their chromebooks or their Apple devices, whatever they're using as their tier one support for schools in general, what do you see as their accessibility settings? Are they shut off? Are they turned on by default?

00:36:40
And I said, I don't know. Generally, she said, because I'm seeing a lot of people come up and talk to me. I'm hearing a lot of people come up and talk to me about how the default setting is. The accessibility features in the operating systems are unchecked, right? Like some administrator on the informational side know the it side has that some student might use that in some nefarious way, or maybe it's, I don't know, whatever the.

00:37:07
I don't know the rationale, but they might uncheck the box and that turns it off for all the iPads or all the Chromebooks, right? And she was like, Chris, we got to make sure those are turned on. And I was like, well, yes, I agree with that. And Pachev Jordan, it's not just the accessibility features, because there's a number of things in the accessibility. So in any operating system, there'll be a thing that says a category that says accessibility settings.

00:37:35
And yes, you don't want those locked out, we want those turned on. But it can't be just those because there's so many different usability settings in other areas. Maybe how you access the trackpad or display options or different ways you can manipulate text that might be hidden in other features. So you really got to look through the operating system, look at all the features and say, okay, it's not just the accessibility, but there's these other things that need to be turned on as well. So I just wanted to mention that on the podcast as that that's a thing that you could be looking at.

00:38:09
And maybe it's a takeaway from this podcast is like, yeah, by default in our school district, what is turned off and what is turned on and why is it that way? And could I advocate if it is turned off, could I advocate for it to be turned on? And Jordan and I were like, high five on know.

00:38:27
Totally. I mean, I completely agree. I think also the next step is teaching people how to use it, because I just feel like they just don't get. I so many times I'm like, have you seen this feature? Have you seen that?

00:38:38
And people are like, wow, how'd she do it? I'm like, this should just be common knowledge, right? We all learn how to use these devices in a limited capacity, in my opinion. We have the ability to really expand that, but it starts with just even knowing what these accessibility features are and how they can be used to help students. So it's just like, there's a lot of work that still needs to be done in this area.

00:39:03
It needs to be the default that all the accessibility features are turned on and also teaching people how to use them because they can be so profound and powerful for all students, not just students with disabilities.

00:39:17
Exactly why it needs to be turned on as a tier one support for everybody. All right, so we started to step into not just our sessions, but like we said, we went to Jordan's session. Were there other sessions that resonated with you that kind of stand out? And you're like, this was awesome, or this one challenged me in a certain way. What jumps to your mind?

00:39:34
I saw Lance McElmore present and he presented. I've seen him present before, and he, of course, has also been on the podcast. And I was excited to go to his session. I will say, Chris, they put him in one of the smallest rooms, and it was just like flowing out the door. And I thought to myself, like, why would they do like, he obviously is going to pull a crowd because he is a fantastic presenter.

00:40:02
He is an AAC user and has a lot of really great ideas, but I was excited to be in the front row and he presented on communication breakdowns, and I was really intrigued by this topic. I think it's a universally shared experience for an AAC user. I guess all of us to have communication breakdowns at some point or another, but to listen to his lived experience and how to navigate those communication breakdowns, I thought was really powerful. I also got to learn a lot about his kind of just history with AAC and some pieces of information about who he is and his journey towards AAC that I hadn't known. And so I thought his session was really great.

00:40:48
And it just got me thinking about AAC and communication partner training and all the things that I do in my own work and how I can tweak things to do it a little differently. One of the things that really stood out that he said know he had some fear and anxiety using his device with unfamiliar people, and so he had to kind of practice that with people that he felt more familiar with. And I feel like that's just a good reminder. We oftentimes are just like, well, just tell grandma what you ate yesterday. We're just kind of inadvertently forcing communication and especially with unfamiliar communication partners.

00:41:35
Right. And so it just was like an aha moment for me to think like, yes, that makes sense that with someone that you're not as practiced with, you might have some anxieties, especially knowing that people who you're not familiar with might have no idea about AAC and might not know how to provide enough wait time and how to engage. And so I thought that was really important. And a really important message is know our students using AAC in situations with familiar communication partners and then really be cognizant that an unfamiliar communication partner could be really stressful.

00:42:15
It makes total sense to me. It would also make sense to me. We hear all the time, he never uses that thing. Well, he may never use that thing with you because you're not using that thing. Right.

00:42:27
I think of that. I relate that to code switching, where I talk to certain people in a certain way in a certain setting and a different way to other people in a different setting. And that totally makes sense to me. I'm so glad that Lance was able to share that, and I'm so sad that I couldn't be there. I did get to see Lance in passing, like waving high, and I did go to the impact voices.

00:42:48
They had a get together on Friday night, but I guess that's another thing that was a difference about Atia is that many of the organizations that put together get togethers, or should I call them parties, I don't know exactly the best way to.

00:43:02
We were partying, Chris.

00:43:04
Yeah. Social get things. They were all stacked upon each other on Friday because Thursday night was this giant candy soiree where there was all these sugary tweets.

00:43:17
You're talking about the dance party, Chris. It was really a dance party, yes. Did you dance? Of course I danced. There's videos of me dancing.

00:43:26
Actually, there's a video of me dancing with Mike Murata's cardboard cutout.

00:43:31
How did I miss that? We were both in there. We didn't go there together, but we were both in that space, and we were, like, texting each other, trying to find each other. But, well, we could have danced. We could have done a talking with tech dance off.

00:43:42
It would have been awesome.

00:43:43
Next year, Chris. Next year.

00:43:45
But back to Lance, because that was all on Thursday night. There was no opportunity to have these other parties on that Thursday night. So all the parties were on Friday night, and they were all stacked on top of each other. So you had an event from building wings that was all about literacy foreshadowing. Did I spoil the foreshadowing?

00:44:05
Because they had a big announcement there. Impact voices was at that time. Textelp had a reception at that time, and Edcamp was at that time. They were all at the same time. Of course, those were four different places.

00:44:18
Clone, Chris, please. Because I wanted to be in all four of those different places. But so what I did was I went over to impact voices, said hi real quick. Lance was just getting started. He was in the front of the thing getting ready to get started, so I didn't want to interrupt him, so I didn't really get to chat with him at all.

00:44:34
I know it was really sad that there were all these competing parties at the same time just because, yeah, you want to do all the things. I had foMo. I was at Edcamp, and I was like, there's other things happening, though.

00:44:46
Yeah, exactly. I tried to bounce from one to the other just to say hi, meet a couple of people, and then not miss out on the next thing. And you never know. Atia could be two weeks long, and you'd still be feeling that fear of missing out. Well, Rachel, I guess, like I predicted at the beginning, maybe we'd have too much to talk about.

00:45:07
We've been talking for this for almost an hour now, and on my list, I certainly have more things to discuss with you. I'm certain that you have things that you want to discuss and share on the podcast. So I feel like this might be Atia 2024 part one, and then stay tuned. Come back to listen to Atia Recap, part two.