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S11 E18 Fostering Inclusion and Resilience in Education: The Impact of Circle of Friends | Otter.ai

S11 E18 Fostering Inclusion and Resilience in Education: The Impact of Circle of Friends

Tim Villegas56min

Tim Villegas

00:03

Hi friends, I'm Tim Vegas from the Maryland Coalition for Inclusive Education and you've hit play on thinking cluesive. Our podcast that brings you conversations about inclusive education, and what inclusion looks like in the real world. Inclusion isn't a program. But what if there were programs that fostered inclusion and resilience for every learner? If you want to help learners in your school, build genuine friendships, keep listening.

Tim Villegas

00:40

Robin stack Regan has improved systems and supports for children, youth and families for over 25 years. She is a lifelong advocate for children who struggle to make their gifts and needs known. Her first role model was Annie Sullivan, an Irish immigrant who overcame poverty, the loss of her family and blindness to become Helen Keller's teacher and friend. Robin has work with students experiencing multiple challenges in residential programs in high need urban schools, and provided training and consultation for youth workers, parents and educators. She is inspired by young people's resilience and potential for growth when they feel accepted, respected and connected at school. Robyn joined circle of friends in July of 2016. As Executive Director she expanded circle of friends focus to include students impacted by trauma and adapted workshops to an online component during COVID. In this episode of thinking cluesive, Robin and I discussed the mission of circle of friends, which is to promote inclusion for students with disabilities and those living with adversity. Robin shares the origins of the program and how it is expanded to support a wide range of students. We also discuss the impact of circle of friends chapters on individuals and families, as well as the misconceptions around inclusion. Robin highlights the importance of friendship and the power of positive experiences and creating a more inclusive environment. After the break my interview with Robin stack Regan and for free time this week, I've got one simple call to action. Stick around. We'll be right back.

Tim Villegas

02:38

Robin sack Reagan, welcome to the thick inclusive podcast.

Speaker 1

02:42

Thank you excited to be here. Virtually. Virtually.

Tim Villegas

02:46

I know. I know. Rarely rarely do in person interviews anymore. Yeah. Well, Robin, you are the CEO of circle of friends. And you actually sent me some information, you know, for, for me to look at and to, to ponder and think and reflect. And I just love this mission. Do you mind if I read it for our listeners? Oh, not at all. We're proud of it. All right. All right. So the mission is to promote inclusion for students with disabilities, and those living with adversity, to empower all students to appreciate differences, build genuine friendships, and stand up to bullying. So fantastic mission, Robin, with where did this all start? Like how did it all begin? Well,

Speaker 1

03:38

and it started in 1999. At Santa Monica High School in Southern California. There was a speech language pathologist named Barbara police. And she was called into an IEP meeting, because a mother of a young man named Alec, so he was our test case, who had Down syndrome and was in ninth grade, that his mother requested that he have a behavior goal on his IEP to make a friend. And in 1999, this dumped the IEP team, and they didn't know what to do with this request. So they brought Barb in because she was working with him. And they asked her to kind of figure that out, what would it look like and she'd been at Sam, Ohio for over a decade. So she really knew a lot of students. She reached out to some of the students that were natural leaders and told them the situation that that Alec needed social opportunities. He needed help with his communication, and asked if they'd be willing to commit to having lunch with him one day a week to help him build those skills and get to know Him. And that's where it started. It started with one student. It went so well that she had all of the students on their caseload do it and they developed Two to three. typically developing peers with a student with special needs was the original model. I think the second year, it was growing and the students, they saw it as a club. So they had officers and everything. And so the second year, the student leaders came to her and said, you know, the ninth graders coming in are really mean. And they're, you know, they're not they're not being cool with our friends. And Barb said, wow, that's, that's awful. What are you going to do about it? So she turned it right back over to them. The students developed a 20 minute ability awareness presentation, with students with and without disabilities, and got permission to present it to every ninth grade health class. And so, as a result of that, it became the most popular club on campus, the local CBS station came out to find out what was going on. And in 2005, when Bob retired, the parents of those early students said, This can't ride off into the sunset with you. This should be at every school. And that's when circle of friends worked towards becoming a nonprofit. You

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