Be on Offense: Navigating Inclusion and Accessibility with Dustin Giannelli ~ 1325

Dustin Giannelli:
You have to facilitate inclusion, further your accessibility journey. There’s no finish line to this work. It’s just a constant, ongoing learning process. I didn’t want my teammates to look at me as different, I just wanted to blend in. They just announced that I’d made the all-star team for my age group. I didn’t want this to be a barrier.

So instead, I just pretended to laugh when they laughed and pretended to smile when they smiled. Meanwhile, I missed an hour of everything my idol said, and that’s why my motto is be on offense. And I have to remind myself how to be on offense, when to be on offense. What does it mean, though? Any event that I go to, any podcast I’m on, are there captions? Am I able to read lips? What accommodations are out there for a big conference or even a boardroom setting or a restaurant? Be on offense and things get a little easier. Now, am I always on offense? No, it’s hard. Accommodating for yourself is a full-time job on top of your full-time job.

Tim Villegas:
Hi friends. Welcome back to Think Inclusive, real conversations about building schools where every learner belongs. I’m your host, Tim Villegas. Today’s episode is about what access really looks like when you slow down and pay attention, especially around hearing loss, communication, and the small choices that either include someone or quietly push them out.

We talk about why this matters in classrooms and school communities, and how inclusive isn’t just a value, it’s a set of everyday practices that help people participate. Our guest today is Dustin Giannelli, the CEO and founder of HearsDustin.com, a consultancy that helps organizations build more inclusive and accessible workplaces.

Dustin is profoundly deaf and has learned to navigate the world through things like lip reading, captions, and a whole lot of self-advocacy, bringing that lived experience into his speaking, coaching, and leadership work. We talk about his be on offense mindset, what it means to ask for what you need, and how educators can build access into classrooms without making it a big production.

And why tools like captions often help everyone, not just the people you would expect. And there’s a great side story involving a Michael Jordan basketball camp that really brings the idea of self-advocacy to life.

Before we meet our guest, I wanna tell you about our sponsor. This episode is brought to you by IXL. IXL is an all-in-one platform for K–12 that helps boost student achievement, empowers teachers, and tracks progress in one place.

As students practice, IXL adapts to their individual needs so that every learner gets just-right support and challenge, and each student gets a personalized learning plan to close gaps. Check it out at ixl.com/inclusive. Again, that’s ixl.com/inclusive.

All right, after a quick break, it’s time to think inclusive with Dustin Giannelli. Catch you on the other side.

Please join me in welcoming Dustin Giannelli, founder and CEO of hearsdustin.com, a consultancy helping organizations build more inclusive and accessible workplaces. Profoundly deaf since childhood, Dustin turned a perceived limitation into his greatest strength, the power to communicate, connect, and lead with empathy.

He’s a nationally recognized keynote speaker known for his authentic storytelling and insights on communication, inclusion, accessibility, and workplace culture. Today he’s here to challenge us to think differently about how we lead, listen, and show up for one another. Please welcome HEARS DUSTIN. Oh, that was awesome.

Dustin Giannelli:
Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. Yeah.

Tim Villegas:
Yes, thank you so much for being here. I’m just gonna move my window around so I can see the questions. Dustin, I’m so glad you’re here. One of the areas and topics that we as an organization at MCIE, and then also this podcast, we don’t talk enough about is hearing loss and just the deaf experience.

So, I’m very comfortable talking about autism, intellectual disability, multiple disabilities. I’m very comfortable talking about that. I am not comfortable talking about people who are deaf and hard of hearing. So that’s why I’m so glad you’re here and that you can just share your experience with us.

So, to get us started, just from hearing you talk and seeing some of the content that you’ve been putting out, you’ve mentioned that your grandfather played a significant role in shaping your mindset. So could we start there? What was it about your grandfather that influenced your approach to life and advocacy?

Dustin Giannelli:
Thank you for that opportunity. I always enjoy thinking of my grandfather, who was a big part of my life, my brother’s life, my whole family. And see, my grandfather was a double amputee. He got in a boat accident when he was in his mid-twenties, hit the propeller, and lost a hand and half his shin down.

So he had a wooden leg and a hook. Wow. And as a little kid, my earliest memories were helping him get dressed, helping him do everyday activities, get him a glass of water, walk it to his bedroom, or whatever it may have been. And I learned very quickly how to advocate for others and then advocate for myself.

And because my grandfather had a visible disability, he taught me the difference between invisible and visible disabilities. Whereas my hearing loss, you don’t really notice my hearing aids, especially seeing me on the screen. But I’m using my hearing aids for Bluetooth, I have the captions on, I’m reading your lips, Tim. That’s what makes this experience accessible.

But I have to explain that. Whereas my grandfather had a hook and you saw that and you’re like, oh, how can I accommodate you, sir? People don’t necessarily ask me because I look normal, right?

So that’s what my grandfather really taught me. But most of all, he taught me this: PMA. Do you know what PMA is?

Tim Villegas:
Enlighten me.

Dustin Giannelli:
Positive mental attitude. And life is tough, right? But he taught me how to look at the whole picture and not just the problem, find solutions, and turn negatives into positives. PMA.

Tim Villegas:
Now you were diagnosed with profound hearing loss at the age of five. Can you tell us a little bit about that experience? How did your friends and family support you in that transition?

Dustin Giannelli:
So for all the listeners out there who remember the school nurse’s hearing exams, all of us, right? Repeat the words after me. Raise your hand when you hear the beep. Right?

One year I passed, no problem. The following year, I remember standing in that line with all my classmates, because you remember it was a very public event.

Tim Villegas:
Mm-hmm.

Dustin Giannelli:
Yeah, are you deaf or not? And I just remember that second year there was a board or a divider on the table where the nurse was gonna be on the other side, and the student would line up behind that divider, taking away my ability to lip read. But it was registering in my brain in that moment that I was a lip reader, even though I didn’t know I was lip reading.

I didn’t even know what deaf really meant. No one in my family was hard of hearing or deaf. And I stepped up to the plate and did the best I could. But I remember the year before, I could see their arm move when they pressed the button to make the beep go off.

Interesting. And then I remember that year, I could read their lips, but I couldn’t, for the life of me, make out the individual words they were saying. I had no context. So ultimately, I failed and went back to my parents. They called my parents and they said, we think your son is deaf.

And they were like, what? That was where the journey began.

Tim Villegas:
Five years old. So it sounds like you had already experienced hearing loss before, so you got tested and diagnosed, right? And the year before, it sounds like you were compensating and didn’t even realize that you were doing those things to understand what was happening and what was being said.

So did your hearing loss happen even earlier, or had it always been there?

Dustin Giannelli:
It could have, and that is a theory. We haven’t been able to prove it. At the time, my doctor and my mother decided that it very well could have been the virus chickenpox.

Tim Villegas:
Hmm.

Dustin Giannelli:
Because it was a gradual decrease from age four or five. We don’t know. But it went down, down, down, all the way up until about 12 years old. It finally stabilized and it’s been about the same since, a profound loss in both ears, high frequency.

We don’t really know the exact reason why, but that’s what we think.

Tim Villegas:
Interesting. What was it like for your parents and your family once they realized that you were deaf or hard of hearing? How did they want to support you?

Dustin Giannelli:
You know, it was interesting because my grandfather kind of set the tone for the whole family. We knew what a disability was and we just had to act on it. My mother immediately took me to Boston Children’s for a real hearing exam, in the booth and everything. Same exact thing, I failed that.

They realized I was severely hard of hearing. So we just immediately did what we had to do. Step two was go to the audiologist, get fitted for hearing aids, see what was out there, figure out what insurance they had that could pay a portion of the hearing aids.

It’s very challenging, even today, with insurance. Sometimes you’re not covered at all and you have to pay out of pocket. So this was all new, but my parents jumped right in and just set me up for success.

Tim Villegas:
Yeah. So something else that I’ve heard you say is your motto: Be On Offense. I’m assuming that’s a sports reference.

Dustin Giannelli:
Nailed it.

Tim Villegas:
What about that motto is meaningful to you, and why choose Be On Offense?

Dustin Giannelli:
So like I just said, my parents set me up for success. I remember the four of us being in the audiologist room getting fitted for the first time. I actually just watched that old video cassette film of it. It was really special.

Be on offense actually came five or six years later. I was at a basketball camp in Chicago. It wasn’t just any basketball camp. It was Michael Jordan’s, the one and only Michael Jordan.

It was amazing. Of course, my older brother and I both idolized him. It was a week-long camp. My parents surprised us and we flew to Chicago, my first time in another major city.

Midweek, he put on an auditorium speech, like a keynote. It was gonna be one hour. This auditorium was huge, think a thousand campers from all over the world and the parents too.

I thought I had a good seat. I was about 30 or 40 feet from the stage. Everybody started clapping. It was loud. He said something I didn’t hear. Then he started talking and I couldn’t hear what he was saying.

I missed out for a full hour. It was up to me to ask the counselor walking up and down the aisle if I could move up front. But for whatever reason, I didn’t want my teammates to look at me as different. I just wanted to blend in. They had just announced I’d made the all-star team.

So I pretended to laugh when they laughed and smile when they smiled. Meanwhile, I missed an hour of everything my idol said. And that’s why my motto is be on offense.

Dustin Giannelli:
And I have to remind myself how to be on offense, when to be on offense. What does it mean, though? Any event that I go to, any podcast I’m on, are there captions? Am I able to read lips? What accommodations are out there for a big conference or even a boardroom setting or a restaurant? Be on offense and things get a little easier. Now, am I always on offense? No, it’s hard. Accommodating for yourself is a full-time job on top of your full-time job, you know?

And I own my own business, so it’s challenging. As a keynote speaker, I have to make sure I have the accommodations. But because I appreciate accommodations so much, I wanna make sure that the companies that I’m speaking to, like Sony and Liberty Mutual and Peloton and Converse and Ralph Lauren and all these companies that I have the opportunity to speak to, I wanna make sure their employees have the accommodations. Be on offense isn’t just about me, Tim, it’s about all of us. So that’s my motto. And if you take anything from this conversation, it’s be on offense.

Tim Villegas:
After the break, we dig into what inclusion looks like in everyday moments, how communication, self-advocacy, and simple tools like captions can change the experience for learners and educators alike. Dustin also shares stories from coaching, music, and work that push us to rethink how we build access without overcomplicating it.

This episode is sponsored by Adaptiverse. If you are a special education teacher, you already know the time problem. Every week, educators spend 15 to 20 hours manually adapting curriculum for students with complex communication needs, non-speaking learners, AAC users, and students with apraxia or language-based disabilities, creating personalized materials, building visual supports, and designing multiple expressive pathways.

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Tim Villegas:
I like that. I like that, Dustin. I think that especially for educators, because that is mostly who listens—there are other people, of course, who listen to this podcast—but let’s just talk to educators for a moment.

I think educators are, by nature, pretty good-natured people. They want the best for their students and they sacrifice a lot. And so sometimes what happens is they end up sacrificing their own personal time, their health and wellness, because they are trying to do right by their students and their school.

And what I like about what you say about be on offense is that it is really about advocating for yourself and advocating for your own needs, and then also not only advocating but recognizing what you actually need.

So for instance, what you’re talking about, being in that crowd and not understanding your idol, is you recognize the need that I need to be in a place where I can listen or I can read lips. And you didn’t take that opportunity. But next time, assessing what you need to do and then advocating for yourself for your own needs, that’s not selfish. It’s taking care of yourself.

And educators are notorious for not taking care of themselves. So I love it. Educators, be on offense. That’s a great motto.

Dustin Giannelli:
I’m glad you appreciate it as much as I do. And again, it’s not possible to be on offense every single day. But if you put yourself on offense, then you have that mentality. It becomes easier to be on offense every single day.

Tim Villegas:
Yeah, yeah. So you also coached basketball, is that right?

Dustin Giannelli:
I did.

Tim Villegas:
So tell me about that, because was there any sort of communication barrier? How did you accommodate for your needs as a coach, coaching basketball?

Dustin Giannelli:
You did your homework, didn’t you? I love it. And coaching AAU sixth-grade boys basketball was some of the best times. It was my first year. They didn’t know me. I didn’t know them. We’re all coming together for the first time.

I’m watching them shoot around before practice is about to begin. And you mentioned communication. The very first thing that we talked about was communication.

I brought everybody over. The kids are excited to shoot threes and toss up the ball. As they come over, they’re bouncing the balls. I’m like, hold the balls. Like, oh, sorry.

And I didn’t plan on saying this, but what naturally happened was that with the ball bouncing, it was gonna be challenging for me to hear in this echoey gym.

I said, alright guys, what’s the most important part of the game of basketball? Defense. Keep going. Ball handling. Not what I’m looking for. Keep going. Communication. What? Louder. Communication.

And I said, now how will you communicate with each other if you don’t know each other? It’s the first time you’re all meeting. How will you communicate without words? How will you communicate with your coach, who is profoundly deaf and might not be able to hear you?

That’s what we’re gonna learn. We’re gonna learn how to play without even talking. We’re gonna know where we have to be on the court. We’re gonna know each other’s plays. We’re gonna be connected, have fun, build a friendship, and communicate.

It was really cool to see that come to life. And they were like, wow. Sixth grade. Some of them didn’t even know what deaf meant.

So I said, I wear hearing aids. They help me hear just like glasses help you see. So when you speak, look at me so I can read your lips. And now I’m educating them on what lip reading is.

We didn’t even get to the sport yet. That’s how important the fundamentals and the foundation of communication are.

Tim Villegas:
What was your position in basketball? What did you play?

Dustin Giannelli:
I was point guard. So to your point, communicating, setting up the play, yelling all the time. It was very important to be vocal.

Tim Villegas:
That’s great. That’s great. Do you have a favorite—I’m getting off topic—but I played basketball in high school. I was like a swing man. I was on my varsity basketball team, but I was okay. Yep.

But some of my favorite players, this would be back in the nineties, Jordan, Barkley, Magic, Kobe. You know who I loved was Allen Iverson.

Dustin Giannelli:
Of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Tim Villegas:
Who were some of your favorite players?

Dustin Giannelli:
You named him. Jordan was number one, but I’m a Celtics fan. So you got Paul Pierce, Antoine Walker. You got some great characters in that era. The Celtics weren’t as good as they are now back in those days, but I missed the Larry Bird era.

But Paul Pierce, Rondo, Garnett, Ray Allen, those were the days too.

Tim Villegas:
Are you from New England?

Dustin Giannelli:
Yeah, I’m from Boston originally.

Tim Villegas:
You’re Boston, okay. Yes. I’ve got some Boston friends, so they’re very excited right now.

Dustin Giannelli:
I actually live in Fort Lauderdale now in Florida. A lot of Miami Heat fans down here. Of course. They got knocked out of the playoffs. I was hoping we’d play them, maybe in the final round, but they got knocked out.

Tim Villegas:
That’s all good. It’s all good. I’m curious, you said you use hearing aids. Was American Sign Language ever any part of your life and communication?

Dustin Giannelli:
I went to a summer school for the deaf. I went to mainstream school K through 12. But summers from probably age six to seven, very shortly after getting hearing aids, for like four or five years, every summer I went to this camp.

We did summer homework and reading assignments together. There were individuals that were capital D Deaf or lowercase d deaf. For those listening, if you don’t know the difference, capital D Deaf culture usually relies on sign language and may or may not be verbal.

An oral communicator like myself, while I’m profoundly deaf, a lot of people don’t even realize the significance of my hearing loss. Without my hearing aids, I don’t hear high pitches, so birds chirping, bells, whistles, alarms, car horns, trains beeping.

If I’m on a run without my hearing aids here in Florida, and it’s very hot so I usually take them out, I’m not hearing those sounds.

That being said, I associated myself with Deaf culture at a young age, but I never felt like that was my community. I just wanted to play basketball with my brother.

So I finally told my mom, and I was like, hey, I don’t think this is for me. And she said, okay, I just want you to know that this community is there for you. It exists. And this is your decision.

Tim Villegas:
Yeah. And I think that’s an important thing to remember, especially when we talk about self-determination. Listening to people’s voices and what they want.

So what I’m hearing is you’re saying this community exists, you’re glad it exists, but it’s not for you, at least not right now.

Dustin Giannelli:
Correct. And I’m not fluent in sign language. I made an effort to learn it. In sixth grade, I took a full semester in college. I practiced every now and then when I meet people that are part of the Deaf culture.

But now there’s so much technology and accessibility that allows us to bridge the gap. There’s actually an app for Zoom that you can invite an interpreter in real time.

There’s companies out there that have services for the blind and low vision community that expanded their services to serve the deaf and hard of hearing community and provide real-time ASL interpretation on your phone. That’s incredible.

The amount of innovation that’s happened, especially during the pandemic over the last four or five years, is fascinating. And we can only go up from here.

Tim Villegas:
Yeah. Yeah. I wanna tie what you said into this idea of inclusion because the whole purpose of why we exist as an organization and this podcast is that we want people to think inclusive.

We want people to look at their lives and their community, wherever they are, and ask the question, am I inclusive? Is this place, is this environment inclusive? Am I including everyone?

So do you have any thoughts about how educators can include learners who are deaf and hard of hearing in school?

Dustin Giannelli:
Absolutely. It’s a great question. One of the thoughts that came to mind was actually music related and having gone to a karaoke event.

When you think karaoke, we can all sing along because you can read the lyrics, right? How fun is that for the deaf community to realize what the artists actually sang in the song?

So last October, the company InnoCaption, one of my partners, invited me and a dozen others in the deaf and hard of hearing community to come together in California, spend time at their headquarters, and do different events. They held an entire retreat.

We did karaoke, we did go-kart racing, we did adaptive yoga where we had captions provided. It’s challenging to be in a downward dog position and be able to read lips, right? So I was able to look at the captions set up right next to my towel and my mat, and also see a piece of paper that had a picture of each position.

Visual learners appreciate visuals, right? So as an educator, that’s so important to think about how to make any experience adaptive and inclusive.

And InnoCaption did a fantastic job. If you don’t know InnoCaption, they’re an app I use for all my phone calls, especially when I’m in a loud setting. If I can’t hear what’s being said on the phone with my hearing aid Bluetooth, I can read through live automatic speech recognition or a live stenographer.

So I can read what’s being said, save the transcript, and review it later. If it’s an important bank call or a call with a doctor, you wanna be able to review it back. It is just an amazing company. They held that inclusive experience and I’ll never forget it.

Tim Villegas:
That is great. That is great. And you benefited from that, but imagine how many other people who maybe aren’t diagnosed, who are deaf or hard of hearing, but as people age, their hearing is reduced and diminished. All of these people would benefit from that type of support.

Dustin Giannelli:
You know, closed captions were designed and created for the deaf community years and years ago. But now 80-plus percent of people that use closed captions are not deaf or hard of hearing.

In other words, to your point, we all benefit from access. And that’s why I believe the key to success in life is communication.

Tim Villegas:
Hmm.

Dustin Giannelli:
And the key to communication is access. So whether you’re an educator in K through 12 or college, or in the professional world, that’s the key to success in life: communication and access.

Tim Villegas:
You mentioned music, and I’m wondering, I’m guessing our audience might have a question about how you experience music, because there are probably some assumptions being made. So I’m just gonna ask the question.

How do you experience music, having hearing loss?

Dustin Giannelli:
It’s a great question, and I love music and I love dancing. I feel it. When there’s a good song with good bass that has a good rhythm.

My family would always laugh and joke when I was young, like, you’re deaf, how are you such a good dancer? And I do have musical genes. My dad was a drummer. My mother was actually a baton twirler in high school. She still brings out the baton. She brought it out at my wedding. It was awesome.

And my Aunt Lucy, who’s 91 years old, she does Zumba every day. So you feel it.

And as a visual learner, you watch other people dance and you’re like, that was a good move. How can I adapt that? How can I do that?

I would watch NSYNC, Backstreet Boys, Michael Jackson with my brother in the loft in our old house on the big screen TV and just put on these dances. It was so fun. You learn to dance.

But the assumption is that we can’t hear. When I shut one hearing aid off, it allows me to feel the bass better, and then the other hearing aid allows me to hear the volume better.

Tim Villegas:
Oh, interesting. Okay.

Dustin Giannelli:
So it kind of balances it for me. I don’t know if that works for everybody with hearing loss, but I suggest trying it just to see if it works well.

And that’s what I do in a lot of loud settings, even conferences, because otherwise it’s just too much noise. It’s overstimulating.

Tim Villegas:
Right.

I am imagining those with cochlear implants would do the same sort of thing, because I wouldn’t be able to describe what they hear with implants. But I imagine sometimes you can’t control how loud an environment is. By adjusting the equipment and the hardware, you might be able to control some of that.

Dustin Giannelli:
Nailed it. Yep.

Tim Villegas:
Yeah. Are there other things that people assume about you being a deaf person? I’m wondering if there are things that come to mind.

Dustin Giannelli:
When you think of the term ableism, and how others perceive individuals, this world wasn’t designed for all of us in mind. It makes it really challenging for some to navigate everyday things like going to the grocery store, getting on a train, or public transportation.

So the assumption is always challenging. Can somebody that is blind or low vision or deaf or hard of hearing or has ADHD or dyslexia or is a wheelchair user navigate this journey?

And if the answer is no, it’s not a big investment to make an experience more accessible. Oftentimes in the corporate world, it’s only an average of $500 to make an experience accessible for all.

Tim Villegas:
Right. And that’s not too big of an expense, especially for large corporations.

Dustin Giannelli:
Yes, exactly. One of the other things I wanted to add is self-disclosure, especially in the corporate world. Not every employee is disclosing their disability.

What we found is roughly 12% of employees are disclosing their disabilities, yet there’s one in four people in the world that have some form of disability.

Tim Villegas:
Wow. That’s a surprising statistic. Only about 12%.

Dustin Giannelli:
Yeah. And why is that? They don’t want to be discriminated against. They don’t want their manager to think less of them. They’ve had an issue in the past where they were bullied, whatever it may be.

It’s been a challenge. But I always encourage people to be their most authentic self and bring your true self to work. That way we can all help each other. And just like captions, we all benefit from that.

Tim Villegas:
Absolutely. Now you’ve also been involved with adaptive fashion. Tell me more about that.

Dustin Giannelli:
Runway of Dreams. That was a New York Fashion Week event. This was September 2023. An amazing experience.

There were 70 models with diverse disabilities and abilities. I say the word ability is in disability for a reason. We have the ability to do amazing things no matter what your challenge or setback is.

I saw 70-plus models walk the runway, roll their wheelchairs on the runway, whatever it took. They represented a dozen clothing brands like Gap, Tommy Hilfiger, Zappos, Adidas, Target.

I wore adaptive sneakers with zippers on the sides for people with limb differences or motor skill challenges. I wore a sweatshirt that had slits on the side for wheelchair users to make it easier to put on.

Others had adaptive backpacks and one sleeve on their shirt if they only have one arm. There’s so much to think about with many layers of accessibility. Adaptive clothing is growing more and more.

Tim Villegas:
That is great. And I know that you’ve expressed the importance of video accessibility. Do you have a particular project or initiative you’re working on with that?

Dustin Giannelli:
I’ll talk about my career a little bit. When the pandemic hit, I completely shifted my industry as a sales professional and marketing roles.

I ended up joining a video accessibility technology company in Boston to learn all about closed captions and video accessibility and really jump into the world of diversity, inclusion, and accessibility.

They are a big-time champion in the space. I spent 18 months there and realized a lot of my presenting to clients started with me saying I’m profoundly deaf, I’m a lip reader, I value captions.

This was the pandemic. Captions weren’t what they are today in terms of accuracy or even availability. I struggled.

This company can caption all your videos within three days at 99.6% accuracy. That’s amazing.

This isn’t just for the deaf and hard of hearing community. This is for all of us, especially those who may have autism or neurodiverse needs to read the words. It’s so helpful to break down transcripts.

That’s when I realized I could do something big here and launch Hears Dustin. I bring all these resources that I know about and utilize myself to my keynotes.

I speak at a lot of different companies, and none of these engagements don’t have captions. I make sure they all have captions for the in-person audience and the virtual audience.

Tim Villegas:
Yeah. Yeah. As we wrap up, is there anything that you want to make sure educators walk away from this conversation with?

Dustin Giannelli:
Absolutely. Going back to the be on offense mentality, and just in general, there’s no such thing as limitations. You put that on yourself. If you say you can’t do something, that’s on you. But I’m gonna be the first one to remind you that you can do that.

And as soon as you adopt the be on offense mentality, what that actually means is to own your story. I have an acronym for the word offense.

Tim Villegas:
Hmm.

Dustin Giannelli:
Own your story. Be who you are. Share your story. They’re all valuable. In education especially, we have to educate one another. Share your story.

Facilitate inclusion. You talked about how to make the classroom more accessible, more inclusive. You have to facilitate inclusion, further your accessibility journey. There’s no finish line to this work. It’s just a constant, ongoing learning process.

If you’re an organization or a school, you have new people coming in every year. So you learn about new and different abilities. Further the accessibility journey.

Empathize. Empathize through communication. Be empathetic. Normalize self-disclosure. Normalize it. Like I said, there’s 25% of people that have some form of disability, but only 12% disclose in the workplace. It’s challenging.

Show up authentically. Show up authentically. And empower change. That’s what offense means to me. There’s a real meaning to it, and I hope all the listeners share this.

This is very important, how we communicate. If you’re in a circle of people, four people, and a fifth person comes over and they want to be part of that circle, and it’s a little awkward for them, everybody in that circle can open up their shoulders, which is an invitation for them to join.

Then bring them up to speed. Oh, we’re talking about this movie. Have you seen it yet? Oh my God, yeah, I saw it. And now we’re part of this conversation.

I say circle because now we’re able to read each other’s lips and facial expressions. That’s just one of many ways to communicate more effectively. It’s so important.

Tim Villegas:
Yeah. I love that example. The example you gave about being in a circle. Sometimes you don’t know. You talked about your disability being invisible or not as obvious.

If you’re meeting somebody, you really don’t know whether or not they have a disability. Not that it’s important for you to know the specifics, but as long as you are open, inviting, and you try to be and think inclusive, then you’re gonna make space for everyone, wherever you are.

Exactly.

After everything we’ve talked about, access, communication, self-advocacy, and what it really means to show up for one another, we’re going to zoom out just a bit. It’s time for the mystery question, which gets into language, connection, and a fun what-if that ties back to how we all communicate and belong.

Dustin, are you up for a mystery question?

Dustin Giannelli:
Always. Okay, hit me.

Tim Villegas:
Mystery question. These questions are written by my 12-year-old daughter, who is an avid listener to this podcast.

If you could instantly learn one language, what language would that be and why? Sound language, sign language, up to you.

Dustin Giannelli:
Sign language. And if this works, I would like to learn all 300-plus sign languages in the world instantly.

Tim Villegas:
Wow.

Dustin Giannelli:
There are over 300 sign languages. There’s American Sign Language, British, French, Australian. People don’t realize that.

Tim Villegas:
I had no idea.

Dustin Giannelli:
Yeah.

Tim Villegas:
My daughter actually has a sign language book, an ASL book. She looks at the diagrams and practices. She’s always been interested in that. I wonder if she knows there are over 300 sign languages.

And I keep thinking maybe one day we’ll be able to download things into our brain. Maybe that’s a bad idea, but imagine being able to learn something instantly.

What’s interesting about your story and language is you grew up knowing ASL wasn’t something you wanted.

My parents are Mexican, so they speak Spanish, but I do not speak Spanish. I know very little. I could hold a very simple conversation, but I feel bad not knowing Spanish.

If I could know Spanish instantly and become fluent, that’s what I would do.

Dustin Giannelli:
Love it. And I’m Italian. Giannelli is a little bit Italian. My wife and I want to go to Italy in the summer, so if I could learn Italian again, I was very book-smart in middle school and high school when we had Italian class, but I forgot most of it after my grandparents passed away and we didn’t practice at home.

There are some really good translation apps now, and that’s been really helpful too.

Tim Villegas:
My kids love Duolingo. They keep telling me I need to get on that app so I can start learning more Spanish. I think my kids know more Spanish than I do at this point.

Dustin Giannelli:
That’s funny. I also wanted to do a shout-out and thank Jill Wagoner for inviting me onto this podcast. She’s who teed us up. Jill, if you’re listening, thank you. It was great to meet you, Tim, and I appreciate your time.

Tim Villegas:
Absolutely. Dustin, let’s pull up your website. It’s hearsdustin.com. You’re on all the socials. Is there anywhere else you want people to find you?

Dustin Giannelli:
LinkedIn is where I’m most active, especially my whereabouts and keynote engagements. As a keynote speaker, I love sharing my story as a vessel to the bigger message and helping organizations make their environments more accessible and inclusive.

If you’re an organization that wants to bring me in to speak, please reach out. Message me on LinkedIn or email me at dustin@hearsdustin.com. That’s H-E-A-R-S-D-U-S-T-I-N.

Tim Villegas:
Amazing. Thank you, Dustin. And thank you, Jill. We really appreciate her.

Dustin Giannelli, thank you so much for being on the Think Inclusive podcast.

Dustin Giannelli:
My pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Tim Villegas:
That was Dustin Giannelli. One thing I keep coming back to from this conversation is how much inclusion lives in the small, everyday choices we make. Dustin reminds us that access isn’t extra, it’s foundational, whether it’s captions, how we communicate, or how we invite people into a space.

Inclusive design is really about noticing who might be working harder than everyone else just to belong. That feels deeply connected to our mission at MCIE, shifting systems so students with disabilities don’t have to adapt themselves to fit school, but instead schools are designed with learner variability in mind from the start.

One practical step for educators: take a look at one routine part of your day, morning meetings, class discussions, staff meetings, and ask, who might this be hard for, and what’s one small change I can make to remove a barrier?

Sometimes that’s visuals. Sometimes it’s captions. Sometimes it’s just slowing down and checking for understanding.

If this episode resonated with you, share it with a colleague who’s building inclusive schools. Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, and follow Think Inclusive wherever you get your podcasts.

Shout-out to Team Italy for advancing through the quarterfinals of the World Baseball Classic. If you haven’t seen what they do when they celebrate hitting a home run, you have to check it out. They drink espresso. I think we need to see more espresso machines in MLB dugouts. Orioles, I’m looking at you.

Have you been watching the World Baseball Classic? I’d love to know. You can always email me at tvillegas@mcie.org.

Okay, time to roll the credits. Think Inclusive is brought to you by me, Tim Villegas. I write, edit, mix, master. I basically wear all the podcast hats and the baseball caps.

This show is a proud production of the Maryland Coalition for Inclusive Education, scheduling and extra production help from Jill Wagoner. Our original music is by Miles Kredich with extra vibes from Melod.ie.

Big thanks to our sponsors, IXL and Adaptiverse. Visit ixl.com/inclusive and AdaptiverseApp.com.

Fun fact for International Women’s Day: while the world was celebrating women, 51-year-old Cecily Hernandez was out there winning gold. The French para snowboarder who lives with multiple sclerosis just took first place at the Milano Cortina Paralympics, beating competitors nearly half her age.

Now she’s medaled at every Winter Paralympics since 2014. Aging, disabled, still shredding. This fun fact was adapted from the Facebook page A Mighty Girl.

Are you watching the Winter Paralympics? I’d love to know about it. Email me at tvillegas@mcie.org. I read every single message.

And if you’ve made it this far, you’re officially part of the Think Inclusive Inclusion Crew.

Want to help us keep moving the needle forward for inclusion? Head to mcie.org and click the donate button. Give $5, $10, $20. It helps us keep partnering with schools and districts to move inclusive practices forward and support educators doing the work.

Find us on the socials almost everywhere at Think Inclusive. Thanks for hanging out, and remember, inclusion always works.