As distance learning has unfolded across the nation, CEC members have pivoted quickly to support students. While many complex factors continue to impact how early intervention, special education instruction, and/or related therapies are provided to infants, children, and youth with disabilities, we wish to emphasize the ongoing needs and gaps that states and districts must address so that remote learning can be as successful as possible, as various situations may demand in the coming year.
Great inequities exist in remote learning for young children, students, and families, including access to technology, individualized supports to access virtual learning, and educators who need training and technical support to achieve technology literacy for their virtual visits and classrooms. In particular, we know that students with significant cognitive or intellectual disabilities, severe behavior disorders, and who are deaf or blind have not been well served during distance learning.
Infants, children, and youth with medical complications will need specific considerations because these students may still be learning remotely due to medical conditions that place them in the high-risk category, even after the return to in-person instruction. Finally, we remain extremely concerned about the infants, children, and youth that have not been reached since programs and schools closed.
To remedy these problems, we recommend:
A meaningful investment in access to Internet and technology, including assistive technology, so that all infants, children, and youth and their families can access their virtual services and classrooms when learning is remote.
Training and technical assistance for educators so they can fluently navigate technology and education delivery in a virtual setting.
Training and technical assistance for families of young children so they can fluently navigate technology and support their children, in partnership with educators, in a virtual setting.