Needs Assessment

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Needs Assessment UDL
- and what you need to know
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Today

• What is it?
• Why and how a needs assessment works
• What needs to be considered
• The assessor, their role?
• When and where

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There ain't nothin' worse than being stuck. ?
Butch, in Living in the State of Stuck
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What success looks like

• http//youtu.be/Kg2wcklkDBY

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Needs Assessment

• What is it?
• A systematic process for the collection of
  information upon which to base an accurate
  description of abilities, strengths and support
  requirements of an individual
• It is about becoming unstuck

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Needs Assessment? Why?

• Because its a Systematic process!
• Matching students to all essential aspects of the
  course
• Identifies potential gaps in performance
• Psychological reports, OT speech and language
  assessments
• Identifies accommodations/supports required
• Forms basis for planning ahead
• Fulfills legal obligations

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Assessment of Need
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How does a Needs Assessment Work?

• 3 Main Elements
• Program of Study content
• Needs identification
• using relevent professional reports
• Statement of needs report

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1. Analysing what needs to be done

• Review course content
• Actual skills required
• Communication skills
• Cognitive Skills
• Physical Demands
• Environment
• Other Influencing factors
• Fatigue
• Memory

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2. Needs Identification

• Identify any gaps
• Any difficulties being experienced
• Effect of these difficulties
• What specific accommodations are required
• What strategies have worked in the past
• What resources are available

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3. Statement of Needs Report

• Candidate details
• Contact details
• Considerations when contacting them eg texting
• Assessment of impact of disability against course
  elements summary

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Report

• Recommendations
• This can be a separate sheet for the students use
• This is what most people are interested in
• The what I need to know
• Considerations around recomendations
• Contract for recording devices
• Principles for using technological aids
• Review as it is a continuous process

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Report

• Confidential
• Shared with those who needs to know as agreed
  with student
• Responsability for this can lie with student
• Consultative
• involves and includes the student

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Report

• Facts not opinions in a Standarised format
• Challenging for professional areas
• Fact versus conjecture
• Fact Belgium hold the most Tour de France
  victories of any country except France
• Conjecture Belgium will wear the yellow jersey
  this year!

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Report

• Individualised
• Each students is different
• The impact of dyslexia for one student is
  different to another
• Accurate
• A snapshot in time may need to be revisited
• Student agrees with it
• Professional (non-therapeutic relationship)

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From a students point of view

• http//youtu.be/g6myoXl0aQc

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Examples of Accomodations

• Allowing note-taking at meetings
• Verbal instructions where there is difficulty
  following written instructions
• Consider how someone needs to get from place to
  place
• Assistive technology can raise standard of
  performance
• Gives greater freedom and independence
• Enables person to compete on an even footing

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• Cases studies

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Universal Design For Learning

• An outgrowth of the UD model, Universal Design
  for Learning (UDL) uses UD principles, to design
  courses
• to be usable by all people, to the greatest
• extent possible, without the need for adaptation
• or specialized design.

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Universal Design
Accommodation Approach

• The system/environment is designed, to
  thegreatest extent possible, to be usable by all
• Proactive Access
• Inclusive
• Access, as part of the environmental design,
  issustainable

• Access is achieved through accommodations
  and/orretrofitting existing requirements
• Retroactive Access
• Special treatment
• Access must be reconsidered each time i.e. is
  consumable

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Disability Services
Old
New

• Disability Support Services Problems
• The terms support and services are more
  medical model terms.
• Imply that students with disabilities need
  support
• Keep the focus on the student as the problem
  rather than the focus on the environmental
  barriers.

• Disability Resource Center
• a resource to students and to the campus
  community - provide services to both.
• Assist the campus community in creating more
  usable and inclusive environments..
• Disability as an aspect of diversity that is
  integral to the community of learners

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Who is the assessor?

• A Professional Filter
• A counsellor for staff and students and
  employers
• A listener
• A communicator
• Somebody who tells students
• You can win all you need is khud ye kapeen

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A thought....

• The problem is not how to wipe out all
  differences, but how to unite with all
  differences intact
• - RabindraNath Tagore

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References

• www.ahead.ie
• NC State University http//www.ncsu.edu/dso/genera
  l/universal-design.html
• University of Arkanas, Little Rock
• http//www.ualr.edu/pace/index.php/shift/