2020 TASH Conference - Virtual Edition: Full Schedule

Welcome to the 2020 TASH Conference - Virtual Edition website! We’re so glad you are here!

Each year, the TASH Conference brings together individuals with significant disabilities and their allies to share resources and success stories, learn about field-driven best practices, and network within a community engaged in shared values. The conference is attended by passionate advocates, leaders, and subject matter experts from every corner of the disability community. Conference attendees play an important role in supporting individuals with significant disabilities to overcome various barriers in order to live their best lives. Central to this work is the premise that individuals reach their optimal potential only when they are given the opportunity to live, work and thrive across the lifespan in the same communities we are all members of. The conference is intentionally designed to support the interests of professors and researchers from leading institutions; those involved in local, state, and federal governments and public policy; special and general educators, and school administrators; home and community-based service providers; students, family members, and most importantly, self-advocates with lived experience.

This year, while we are taking the conference virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we believe that our unique approach to providing exceptional first-rate content and building strong community ties and connections across various stakeholders will yield an extraordinary event! We have taken extra steps to bring people closer together during these times, as well as to create an amazing virtual environment that expands our knowledge, spurs our creative thinking, and focuses on healthy living and having fun! Our conference theme, Feel the Power of Inclusion, reinforces the importance of our continued commitment to promoting a world of equity and opportunity for all, and is predicated on the value of bringing together diverse perspectives and experiences in an effort to build strong human connectivity and spur collective action.

Need technical assistance during the conference? Please email our support staff at helpdesk@tash.org.

5:15pm EST

Paraprofessional Support in Inclusive School Settings: A Literature Review

The purpose of this review was to summarize single-case intervention studies involving paraprofessional-implemented interventions in inclusive school settings for students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). Studies were synthesized to summarize participant and setting characteristics, intervention characteristics, and the quality of the studies. Intervention effect across study participants also was calculated. Implications for practice, limitations, and areas for future research will be addressed.

Presenters

Virginia Walker

Associate Professor, Department of Special Education and Child Development, UNC Charlotte

Virginia L. Walker, PhD, BCBA-D, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Special Education and Child Development at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Dr. Walker began her career as a special education teacher of students with extensive support needs in Atlanta... Read More →

Jennifer Kurth

Associate Professor, University of Kansas

Inclusive Education

Kristin Joannou Lyon

Research Associate, University of Kansas

Megan Carpenter

Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Kansas

Megan Carpenter postdoctoral researcher at the Kansas University Center on Developmental Disabilities and a Board Certified Behavior Analyst. Prior to her current work, she was a special education teacher for K-8 students with extensive support needs. Her research focuses on educator... Read More →

Amy Clausen

Doctoral Candidate, University of North Carolina at Charlotte

I am a doctoral candidate at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. My research interests include general curriculum access for students with extensive support needs and personnel preparation, particularly preparing general education teachers to include students with extensive... Read More →

Elissa Lockman Turner

Assistant Teaching Professor, University of Kansas

Thursday December 3, 2020 5:15pm - 5:30pm EST
Virtual Platform Online

Poster Presentations

Primary Topic Inclusive Education
Themes Capacity Building for Inclusion
Tags SWPBIS, Positive Behavior Supports, Severe Disabilities, Extensive Support Needs, Inclusion
Format Research

5:15pm EST

Students with Severe Disabilities and SWPBIS: Educator and Administrator Perspectives

To explore how schools include students with severe disabilities in school-wide positive behavioral interventions and supports (SWPBIS), we interviewed 15 school administrators, special educators, and general educators from schools implementing SWPBIS during the 2019-2020 school year. We asked all school members to describe how students with severe disabilities were included in SWPBIS systems procedures, practices, and data collection. In addition to identifying specific strategies for promoting and barriers that hindered inclusion within SWPBIS, educators also described their willingness to implement evidence-based practices to promote inclusion in SWPBIS. In this presentation we will present themes that emerged from qualitative analysis and implications for research and practice pertaining to the inclusion of students with severe disabilities in SWPBIS.

Presenters