Welcome back everyone. This is Andrew McPeek and joining me is of course the wonderful, the incredible Gina Watts. Hey, hey, hey. So folks, if you believe that school should be more than just about essays and GPAs, if you believe that EQs are just as important as IQs, if you expect amazing things from the next generation, then you're in the right place because we believe that too. Absolutely, Andrew. Today we are diving into a topic that's incredibly important, I know personally to you and to me. And it's about how schools can support students with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Yes, it's going to be a really good topic. We have an amazing person we interviewed. But first, before we get into it, Gina, we need to do our opening question. So here it is. What is your favorite memory from school? This is a good question. And I have so many directions I can go, but the one I'm going to choose... is I attended parochial school in the 80s. And my very first day of Catholic school in a time where corporal discipline was allowed. Very first day of kindergarten, I was paddled. Really? Yes. Very first day. For doing some of the same things we see you doing now? Talking. Yep, that's I was gonna guess. I was gonna say, I can't imagine, but then I thought about, yeah, talking. And I never told my parents that it happened until, I don't even know how old I was, and the teacher became really close friends with my mom and told her the story. And my mom was like, what are you talking about? You never bothered telling her. No, I loved Catholic school, I love it. I love that school to this day. Wasn't the best first day, but yeah. it's a funny story. That is funny. How about you? Well, mine was when I went to high school. and there was a group of my best friends in the world. There were five of us, and we all went to the same high school for the two years of it. And so there were just so many memories of playing funny songs through each other in the hallways and joking around and then trying to take classes together. We all took shop, all that stuff. But we would also do really just funny, silly things. Not like destruction of property. We didn't go that far, but we would do lots of funny, silly things. So I have this vivid memory. I would always pass my friend in the hallway. He was going from one class to the other, and I was going the other direction. And one day he had tied a string from his classroom that he was coming from and he walked it. I promise you, our hallway was so long, like probably a quarter mile almost. And he went all the way down to the other hallway and tied the other end of the string to his next classroom. And I just thought, who even thinks of this to do this? I just like my high school memories were full of a lot of funny things like that where we just had a great time. School is such a fun time in general. think, I mean, I know that We all have different experiences that we can think of, good and bad, but I think overall, I'm very grateful that I had a really positive upbringing. Me too. Everybody doesn't get that, but it's really amazing when it happens. Yeah, it is. It is. Well, it seems like your friend was super confident or maybe... we all had confidence. We thought we were amazing. Okay. I was going to say, it could be confidence or it could be, you know, like questionable, I don't know, thinking. of himself. Might have been some of that. It was one of that. But if we focus on the good and we think of it as confidence, today's guest is amazing. And we're so excited for you to meet Dr. Ashley Johnnessy, who will share how she's helping students with disabilities thrive in school and beyond. Ashley is quite amazing. Dr. Ashley Johnnessy is the proud, very proud, emphasis on proud, principal of Hall Creek Elementary. Dr. Johnnessy began her career actually as a kindergarten paraprofessional at Settlesbridge Elementary. And since she's taught kindergarten and fifth grade at one elementary school, later joined Lambert High School and she was in the English department there. She also began to serve at Lambert as an assistant administrator, assistant principal. So she had two doctorate degrees in education from the University of Georgia. Dr. Johnsey has also developed over this time, she was doing all of this kind of like, quote unquote, regular education stuff, being a teacher here and administrator there, but she has begun to believe over the course of her career, more and more in the power of following open doors, embracing new opportunities and that has led her to a lot of really cool opportunities, particularly with the students in her building that have intellectual and developmental disabilities. But if you were to ask her about her journey, her path to becoming an educator was anything but direct. So I started not in education. I was actually a speech communication major at UGA. My mom was a guidance counselor, a... vocational guidance counselor, if that matters. And so when I was going through high school, my mom was like, you can do anything, just don't be a teacher. And I think that that's important because people hear that message a lot these days. It's such an amazing profession that I can't help but plug what I'm doing now. So I went into business and I was in marketing and I came home and I told my mom, I hate business, I hate my job. And she said, well, why didn't you go into education? And I said, mom, you're a vocational counselor. You told me do not go into education. And she goes, you've never listened to me before. Why did you listen to me now? So I then went in and became a kindergarten paraprofessional. I interviewed thinking I was going to get a teaching job without a license, which is a fun place to go, which you can do now these days. But I ended up going in and I met with this principal. And his name is Gary Davison. And he said, good teachers can teach anything. And he put me in the classroom with a master teacher. And I fell completely in love with teaching. I had an awesome. two years with my master teacher Sylvia Gates, and then I got my own classroom and I became a teacher at a Title I elementary school. I say this because going from a high performing, high achieving blue ribbon school of excellence to a Title I school, I felt like education was teaching me about education while I was on the job. And there were so many new opportunities to serve kids. It was such an exciting time. I worked there for several years and then... my old principal called and said, hey, I'm opening a high school. And I said, I teach elementary school now. And he said, good teachers. Good teachers can teach anything. And here I came. So I joined Lambert High School in 2011. I taught English. I coached. I loved the high school experience. And then I had the opportunity to become an assistant administrator, which led me to my assistant principal role there. And that's when I started to get to work directly with special education. Man, this woman has done. it all. Yes, she has and it shows both, I mean, in the way she talks, of course, but also in the way her building is. I actually got to visit her school earlier this year. That's where I originally met her and I saw the massive amount of respect that her teachers have for her. They know they have someone in their corner, leader who really fights for them. In the same way, I think that her teachers get energized by her presence. Dr. Johnnessy has started to become energized by the students that she has met. And specifically in those special education classrooms, what she would say is that the joy and energy, because of her unique way of mobilizing people, has become something else entirely. And I will tell you what I found is that as much as I loved all students in my building, when I needed my soul restored, I went to a couple of classrooms. And it was my mild and moderate intellectual disabilities classrooms. And I would sit in those classes and talk to the kids and... really cultivate different relationships because they had a really strong relationship with their teacher. They were with one teacher all day. And so I don't know, I just ended up spending a lot of time there. And then I started working on transition plans. And the question became, what do we do when we reach 22? Because there's not necessarily a college plan for all of those students. And how do we get them involved in the community? And what does work look like for them? Because these are outstanding human beings who have amazing gifts to offer the world, and I just wanted to know what we could do to help. So then we started working at Lambert. We started with some therapy dogs. And my class who had the therapy dogs wasn't able to go into the community due to COVID for our community -based vocation trips. Everybody was closed indoors. So we got creative, and that teacher and her para, the most amazing humans I know, decided we were going to make dog treats and sell them. And then it became a school -wide project. So then they started working with our marketing students on how to market their dog treats, our culinary arts students on how we were going to make the treats. So they actually worked on refining a recipe by working with these kids. Our food science lab students on how we were going to package the treats. And so soon it became a school -wide project and we were running a business. Then we wanted to know, dog treats aren't for everybody, but our kids who really love the dogs, how could we maybe get them involved in the community? How could we get them a job? So they started working on dog training with our dogs. So practice is every day, right? Dogs need repetition and lots of practice. And our kids were able to do that. And so we started, we called it recess. The kids thought it was fun. We were working on social skills, on speech communication skills. We were working on... gross and fine motor skills. And we just kept seeing all the great things we could do with this program. And so then we decided we were going to build a dog park. And I think we might be the only school in the state of Georgia that decided, hey, you know how we're going to extend learning? think there's a good chance you are the only school who did that. We're going to make a dog park. And it was an obstacle course for the dogs. So the students had to start working more on command and control of the dogs. And it was really a phenomenal experience. That's cool. And I would have happily stayed there for the rest of my life. but I got the phone call that they had another school for me to go to and I became a principal. You know, Andrew, the dog treats and the dog park projects sound amazing. Yes. In many schools, these kids are often forgotten or ignored. And not only are they not forgotten, they are being given a chance to showcase their potential. And these projects, these experiences are just truly transformational, you know, not only to the students, but also to the teachers. I would argue to the families of the students and then the broader community. These are great examples where everyone gets involved. While Dr. Johnnessy is great, to me it's also very apparent that for the ideas as big as these, you actually need a whole team of teachers who see things the same way that you do as a leader. And that was another big question that she and I talked about. How do you train other teachers who don't have a background in working with students with disabilities and get them ready to engage these students in a positive way that meets the culture of the school, all that kind of stuff? So as you're probably gathering by now, Gina, and listening to Dr. Jadisee's responses, she had a few thoughts. think the thing that is the linchpin to working with students with intellectual disabilities is coaching. It all comes back to coaching. The teachers who are working with these students are master teachers. They have a toolkit that is just, I mean, incomparable. They know the students so deeply because they've gotten to know their stories, so that relationship piece is so big. But I have to say, my biggest thing was when you asked the question, what if, like when this teacher came to me and said, what if we had a therapy dog in our building? Well, why not? Is kind of my response. This makes me a very hard principal to work with because I'm always like, sure, we can do that. And then people are like, there are actual walls we can't move. And I'm like, Today? What about tomorrow? So when talking to these teachers, it was a lot about where they were finding obstacles. Like, what is it that you would love to do if time and money were not a problem? How can we make this happen? And everyone wants that community connection, that there is a goal. Like, when you have a traditional student in today's organizations, they're removing kids from high school to the workforce or to college and career. It's college and career readiness is the whole purpose. So why don't we have college and career readiness for our students with intellectual disabilities? Because they're going to need to be ready for our communities. And these are amazing humans. I mean, I learn the most lessons when I hang out with these kids. And sometimes they challenge by thinking because they will tell me I am wrong and I will be wrong. And they love that, by the way. Nothing like telling the principal she's wrong. So I think the big key for me has been leaning into the people who are working with these kids. They really know their skills and they really know where they're missing opportunities to use them. The other thing is you gotta create a community of people who are gonna support those kids. I walked into this school, I have to say this is the coolest thing ever. Special Olympics is, I mean if you've never met an Olympian, you can come to my school and we open Special Olympics, everyone of those kids is an Olympic athlete that day. And my entire school turns out, and I had never seen this before and it was the coolest thing my first year. I had no idea what to expect, like Special Olympics send off, I'm like okay, so we've got some people in the bus lanes, like let me tell you. My entire school. lines the hallways, we play music over the announcements, the teachers have organized this, all of my students have signs and banners. And my question at the last year when I first year saw it, I cried, I couldn't stop. This is absolutely amazing. Dr. Johnnessy is amazing, her school, the teachers, the students, everyone. Why aren't more schools doing this? That's a really great question. I have wondered myself. I remember walking through the classroom hallways, meeting even some of her students. And I'm sure other people are doing really amazing things with these students as well. But it just felt like the first time I had ever experienced that, right? It seems like to me, a lot of it just comes down to vision. Like if your school is one of those where the students are in the basement, right? So I think back to my high school experience, we were remembering our high school experience. They put all of these students with developmental disabilities quite literally in the basement and they never ventured out. They never joined the other things that were going on. It's hard, if you're one of those schools that does that, it's hard for the rest of the staff, the rest of the students, anybody else who's in the building, to catch the vision for what these students can do in that case. And I think with Dr. Johnnessy in particular and this school, she is modeling the behavior. People do what people see and how they connect. Yeah. So another question I had, Gina, was obviously some amazing things are going on in the building. And really that's the part that's in Dr. Johnnessy's control. the principal, she's leading the way. But my next question for her was about parent engagement. Like, how does this innovative approach translate to what's going on from the school hallways to what's going on at home? And she had some great answers around that too. One of the things that we work really hard on is communicating opportunities to families. You know, I will say I have a special needs niece, I have special needs cousins, and the hardest thing is to be able to navigate where opportunities exist. So for us, anytime there's an opportunity, our district also does this thing called the Penguin Project. If you're familiar, it's a really cool musical or a play. And what you have are the coaches, who are the typical peers, and you have your student actors, who are your students with intellectual disabilities. I'm gonna tell you right now, we did two presentations and it has been the coolest thing ever. But if you don't know that there are auditions coming up, then your kid didn't have an opportunity. So really, really focusing in on. Where's the messaging and how are we getting that in their hands? The other thing is what is an obstacle for your child to participate and how can we remove that? So some families, just to be transparent, it can be very exhausting between medical appointments, between physical therapy, speech therapy, outside, inside, other therapies, and then now you're trying to add an activity. So how can we make those things applicable? What barriers can we help remove? And it really just comes back to that relationship building. but my teachers are the most incredible advocates for their kids. And so they just get to know the families. And again, these families are going to have different challenges and questions than your typical peer. You know, when we're talking about, I going to score well on the end of school test, these kids are like, are we making the adaptive skills necessary for me be more independent in my life goals? So a lot of that is, hey, this is a strategy that we find us working in our building. Let's model it for you. And then you can practice it at home. Love it. One of the last things that Dr. Johnnessy and I spoke about was what many people who work in this space call the cliff. I don't know if you've heard that term, Gina, before. Many of our listeners probably haven't, but it's that thing that happens once kids who have intellectual or developmental disabilities, once they hit 22 years old. All of the public funds, the public money, the resources, they dry up overnight. Like literally your birthday comes and now there's no support. It's a moment that most parents of students with disabilities dread. And in fact, they kind of have to prepare for culturally in their family, financially, right? They kind of have to get ready for that moment. really can't imagine that weight that the parents have and really the caring teachers and the school environments that are like, what can we do next? So. How are they approaching this differently? Yeah, that was one of the things I was most shocked by because she's well aware of that challenge, obviously, because she started working with these students when she was still at Lambert High School. But what amazed me is how they're beginning to think about the cliff at age 22, but they're starting to prepare their students for it in elementary school. So I'll tell you, I find that a lot of times people end up with a barrier because they didn't ask, has anyone thought about this differently? So unfortunately for the people who work with me, like I said, I am a little bit of a challenge because I just don't see it as a stop. I see it as a right now, this is a problem. But my next question is, who can help me make that problem go away? So for families who are in elementary school, a lot of them are just learning to understand the diagnosis of their child. It's a very different place. I think that being able to be a resource, including recognizing that there are tons of things that schools don't know, we have great partners called social workers. And guess what? We have one in our building. So partnering our social worker to help families with everything from support groups for families. As a parent coming in and thinking your child is going to be a typical peer and realizing they have a diagnosis of autism that is presenting later or is presenting in a different manner because you haven't been in our country, that's also incredible challenge. So how do we navigate that with support, with kindness, with And that's involving resources that are in our community. The next thing is, is that when we have your child, we are going to teach them to use their voice, whether that's through an assistive technology device or if it's their actual voice. And we're going to teach them the coping mechanisms, the self -regulation that they need so that you're not having a tantrum. You're explaining to the person, I need help here. And so we work a lot on that. I'm going to tell you the unsung heroes in my building are my SLPs and my paraprofessionals. My speech language pathologists are incredible and they're like strategists, right? Because they are coming up with a child who may struggle to communicate what is the path forward and it may not be vocalization. They're also working with our paraprofessionals. So paraprofessionals are literally designed to help students adapt to the school environment. Well, the school environment is only helpful if you're in school. but what about going out in our community? So when we have those community opportunities, whether it's a field trip with typical peers, whether it's a community -based trip that we do through our special education program, they'll notice things. Like, have you ever noticed that so -and -so child might struggle with, and it's gonna be anything from ordering their own meal? Well, sometimes the parent says, it's because it's hard to understand them when they speak, so we order for them. So we come up with a partnership strategy. We need to help them. Have you thought about using a visual cue? Have you thought about planning ahead? Executive functioning is something that's very simple if you're planning for it. But generally, you have to think through those things from a different lens. So when we're talking about self -advocacy, it might look totally different for a kid who uses a talking device, and usually that's an iPad. But they're also perfectly capable of being able to download pictures of things they like. And let me tell you, they love to be using technology as a tool once they get an opportunity. But we don't discredit that they're trying to vocalize if they're struggling. We want to provide that opportunity. And when they practice more and they have confidence to do it, they will improve. And those are probably some of the things that we would do. sounds so much like a lot of this comes down to how much do you believe in what they're capable of, right? More than you can imagine. I feel like we need our hype button, you know, like... We don't hit that thing enough. I think we have one. Yeah, we do. Here it is. I love it. This interview is probably one of my faves. me too. I remember I had the privilege of getting to see her in action in her school, spend a lot of time with her, and then of course sit down in this interview. This woman is deserving of every accolade coming her way. And the best part about it is she doesn't see it that way, right? She's looking at all the other people in her building and going, they're the true heroes. They're the ones making this happen. And I'm like, hey, every great school needs a great leader. She won't hurt. Be careful. because I think she's going to get a few phone calls and emails and all the things after this. Yes, I think so. There might be a job offer or two coming her way. But luckily, I think she also has a few ideas if that interested school leader out there who might try and hire her but can't, right, how they might start to implement some of these strategies themselves because I really think it's possible to do this kind of thing in any school. And Dr. Johnnessy has some amazing ideas about how to do that. My first thing is go meet them. Because I'm gonna tell you right now, you're gonna fall in love with them, you're gonna know their stories, and then there is nothing that will get in the way of you wanting to bring them out into the light. Love it. Our kids have, hands down, been the most amazing culture shift for my building. And if I try to put my kids in a different place, or you come into that building and you try to put those kids where they are not front and center, you're gonna get stopped. Yeah. Because they are forces of nature. But if you go and meet them, you're gonna find a way. Maybe it's not dog treats. I know I am the crazy dog lady. I have seven dogs in my building now. Yes. Okay, I totally know. My high school had 11. People look at me and they're like, you're the dog lady. But I'm really the opportunity person. That was just a vehicle for you. It was just a place. Yeah. So go meet your kids. Go to their IEP meetings and meet their families. You will be floored about what you hear about how easy it is to make a collaborative change. The next thing is introduce them to your friends. So when you're walking down the hallway and you have the elite athlete and the elite athlete in your high school becomes a peer partner in your specialized instruction classrooms, now it's cool. Yep. Now we've unlocked something. I will also say if you get them a dog, they are the most popular kids on school. Like everyone's going to visit them. That did help us a little bit in our high school situation. Get them a dog. Make a dog park. I just really think that as a principal who may not be comfortable with students with intellectual disabilities, or I would even go... to a severe and profound behavior or physical medical need classroom. Your fear is so much worse than getting to know your kids. And your kids are gonna be, man, they are like little tendrils in your heart. You will never get rid of those children. They will be with you forever. But it doesn't have to be a huge, whole scale business proposition, but you can make them leaders. You can put them out on your recess partners. They can be your ambassadors. They can meet people when you have them come to your campus. Like when you met my kids. It's just a matter of not saying, well, all the things that are the obstacle, but saying, what's one thing I can remove? But when you meet them, go meet those kids. You will do anything for them. And then you too will want to attend your plan for a career pathway for them when they leave your building. Dr. Johnnessy, she just... gave such great nuggets, such great advice to all of us, to all school leaders. And for those of you listening and thinking about ways that you can take these ideas to your schools and make them even better. I love so much about what she said, but if I'm being honest, that was a lot of great ideas, like almost too much information that we got today. Are you sure it was too much information? It was definitely. Don't do it. You can feel it coming, can't you? Don't do it. We got TMI, Gina. It's time for DMI. I love it. You guys, if you've been following us for any length of time, you know that DMI stands for Don't Miss It. Andrew and I both will highlight one thing from today's episode that we don't think you should miss. Andrew, do want to kick us off? What was the best thing that you heard today? Absolutely. So there's so many great things that she said. To me, I think the big thing that this comes down to is visibility. And I know I mentioned it a couple of times in our conversation about today's episode, but... The heart behind what she's doing is taking these kids who most of the time nobody knows what to do with, putting them front and center in front of other people. And it has completely changed the opinion of everyone because she knew when I spent time with these kids, they totally changed how I thought about this whole situation, right? It went from how do we help them to how do we let them help us, right? And the difference in that was just visibility, right? As soon as people could see them, experience them, be around them. the rest of it kind of took care of itself. If an educator walked away with just one thing today would be make those folks more visible in your school. That's good. That's really good. When I think about this call, I try not to get emotional. I am not someone who has an intellectual or developmental disability or am caring for someone with one. But I've had the opportunity to work with individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities. And so I'll try not to get emotional. But one thing that as Dr. Johnnessy said, she said, you know, as much as I loved all the students in my building, when I needed my soul restored, I went to a couple of classrooms. And that really opened her eyes to the body of students, the full body of students, not just our traditional or typical students. And I think if we just continue to what you said, you know, it kind of underlines the point that you shared about the visibility, but not just the visibility, but the actually seeing people and seeing all people, not only will it care for those people, it will restore each one of us. Like that. don't cry, Tina. Don't cry. That was a good one. Thank you, Dr. Johnnessy. Thank you so much. Yeah. I feel like this was such an incredible conversation. There were so many things that we could pull out of it, but I certainly hope when our leaders who are listening think about leading beyond the classroom that they realize that This is such a huge component of that. Are you engaging every student in your school? And are you believing in the potential of every student in your school? Can't think of a better way to have this conversation than that. Well, thank you guys so much for joining us today. Thank you again to Dr. Johnnessy. Incredible, incredible stuff that she's doing every single day. And we're really honored to be talking about this on the School on a Mission podcast. Now, before you hit skip onto your next episode, we got to challenge you a little bit. So grab a pen, notebook, sticky note, back of your hand, whatever you've got, and write down an action step you're gonna take this week. Maybe it's something you're gonna do, and by the way, she gave you really good idea of what to do. Go on down there, right? If you haven't done that in a while, go down there. Maybe it's something you're going to investigate, something you're gonna read more about, a person in your building or somebody in your community you wanna meet with, whatever it is, write it down. Got it? Perfect. Okay, we want you to DM us on social media. Let us know what action step you're going to take. We cannot wait to hear all the amazing things that you're up to. Until next time, folks, stay curious, stay bold, and keep leading your school on a mission.