| Greetings!
Happy New Year from the National Center on UDL!
Check out our News You Can Use column for resources from the National Center for Technology Innovation (NCTI) conference, a New York Times article on UDL and assistive technologies, and an opportunity to provide feedback on a proposed standard for assessment items, called the Accessible Portable Item Profile (APIP). Please share this newsletter with your colleagues and networks and encourage your friends to start 2011 by subscribing to the UDL FOCUS.
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 Help Revise the UDL Guidelines | 
The National UDL Center is seeking feedback from UDL advocates, practitioners, and researchers to proposed revisions to the UDL Guidelines. The guidelines help educators implement UDL by including checkpoints and examples linked to resources and research.
The Center would like to know what YOU think. Are they understandable? Comprehensive? Supportive? Starting February 1st, revisions will be gradually released on UDL Connect, the center's new community section.
We look forward to YOUR ideas and suggestions!
Watch a Video: Center Director David Rose asks for feedback on UDL Guidelines 2.0. |
 Senate HELP Committee Considers UDL
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 On December 2, the Senate HELP Committee staff hosted a briefing on UDL to learn more about its implementation at school and classroom levels. The UDL framework, principles, and impact were presented by Patti Ralabate, Boston College UDL Postdoctoral Fellow in residence at CAST and George Van Horn, Director of Special Education for the Bartholomew Special Services Cooperative in Columbus, IN. During the briefing, representatives of the National UDL Task Force urged the Senate committee to include UDL in the LEARN Act, ESEA reauthorization and other education legislation under consideration during this year's Congressional session.
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 A new tool to assess how your Alternate Assessment applies UDL principles |
 A CAST team led by Tracey Hall worked with the National Alternate Assessment Center (NAAC) - a federally funded research project focused on developing high-quality alternate assessments - to design an online UDL Evaluation Tool that assists states to improve assessments.The UDL-AA-AAS Evaluation Tool is a great example of how the UDL Guidelines can be applied to inform assessment decision-making. Not only does the online tool model aspects of UDL in its presentation and interactive features, it has professional development, evaluation, and implementation of UDL built into its accessible online environment.
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 Register now for UDL Summer Institute |
 Teaching Every Student in the Digital Age: Universal Design for Learning (UDL)
August 1 - 3, 2011 | CAST, Wakefield, MA
This three-day institute offers participants what they need to know about UDL to apply UDL principles to practice. In addition to hearing presentations from leaders in the field, participants will have the opportunity to actively engage in guided practice and hands-on experiences as they work on development of a lesson, unit of study, or action plan to integrate UDL into practice.
Register now. A maximum of 24 participants may attend. |
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Meet the UDL Faculty
CAST's UDL Faculty Cadre prepares educators to apply UDL to the general educaiton curriculum through on-site workshops and institutes. To learn more about UDL professional development opportunities, email pd@cast.org.
Phyllis Anderson | |
Phyllis Anderson taught high school and middle school science for fifteen years before becoming a school improvement consultant. She has facilitated professional development opportunities in science and gifted education for teachers, administrators, and college students. Her recent efforts have involved supporting districts as they begin to implement the new Iowa Core initiative. | |
Susan Silverman |
 Susan Silverman began her career as a professional educator in 1970. Before retiring in 2004 from the Comsewogue School District, Port Jefferson Station, NY, she worked as a classroom teacher for thirty years and as an Instructional Technology Integration Specialist for four years. She is currently an adjunct professor at New York Institute of Technology and a member of the Tom Snyder Professional Development Team
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This Month:
News You Can Use
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What hot topics were discussed at the NCTI Conference?
Workshop materials from the annual conference on the National Center for Technology Innovation (NCTI) are now available on-line.
Learn more!
Review the NCTI materials.
What do you think?
This New York Times article
highlights features, such as text-to-speech and speech-to-text, and suggests that UDL and assistive technologies should be available to all learners.
Learn more!
Read the article.
How can common standards for assessments impact standardized assessments?
Test development experts proposed a new industry standard for writing test items called the Accessible Portable Item Profile (APIP).
Learn more!
Read the article
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What do you think? Provide feedback on the proposed specs.
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