Empowering Educators: Navigating Inclusive Education Challenges and Opportunities with Nicole Eredics

Nicole Eredics: So for me, it’s about what you already do in your classroom and what barriers you see for your students at this point. If you have a student that is leaving for part of the instruction, is there a way to have the student stay? We’re talking about starting from the ground up, right? Look at your student’s schedule and see where in your instructional time the student can remain in your classroom.

And of course, communicate with the staff that works with the student. When the student is not in your classroom, how can we, as a team, have the student remain in the general education classroom for longer periods of time? What kinds of resources do you have that can help me support the student in my general education classroom?

What are the possibilities for co-teaching? Can we spend more time working as a team, or do you have resources that can help me teach the student while they’re in my general education classroom?

Tim Villegas: Hi friends, it’s Tim Villegas. This is Think Inclusive, and who you just heard was Nicole Eredics. Nicole is an expert in inclusive education with over 25 years of experience.

She holds degrees in elementary and special education and began her career as an inclusion teacher in British Columbia, Canada. As the founder of the Inclusive Class, she has implemented inclusive systems in over 150 schools across the US since 2008. Her bestselling book, Inclusion in Action, is a key resource for educators.

Currently, she is a national presenter and trainer for the Bureau of Education and Research and an education and ed-tech consultant. Nicole’s international experience and engaging presentations empower educators to create inclusive learning environments. Thanks so much for being here with us today.

We appreciate each and every one of you listening to or watching Think Inclusive, MCIE’s podcast that brings you conversations with people doing the work of inclusion in the real world. While you’re here, make sure to hit the follow or subscribe button wherever you are so you can keep getting Think Inclusive in your feed.

In this episode of Think Inclusive, Nicole and I discuss her journey, the work she’s doing with school districts to foster inclusive practices, and the growing awareness of diversity and personalized instruction. Nicole shared insights on how technology, including AI, is helping educators adapt lessons to meet diverse student needs, and the challenges posed by standardized testing and grading.

She emphasized the critical role of administrators and the benefits of co-teaching models. Nicole reminds us of the significant impact teachers have on their students’ educational journey and encourages educators to be a positive force in their students’ lives.

Before we get into my conversation with Nicole, I want to tell you about our sponsor for this season, IXL. IXL is a fantastic all-in-one platform designed for K-12 education. It helps boost student achievement, empowers teachers, and tracks progress seamlessly. Imagine having a tool that simplifies what usually requires dozens of different resources.

Well, that’s IXL. As students practice, IXL adapts to their individual needs, ensuring they’re both supported and challenged. Plus, each learner receives a personalized learning plan to effectively address any knowledge gaps. Interested in learning more? Visit ixl.com/inclusive. That’s ixl.com/inclusive.

All right, after a short break, we will get into my conversation with Nicole Eredics. Catch you on the other side.

Tim Villegas: Yeah. Oh, you have your book back there.

Nicole Eredics: I do. Do you show the video of the…

Tim Villegas: It’s video, yeah.

Nicole Eredics: Oh, okay. There we go. That wasn’t planned.

Tim Villegas: That’s pretty good. I think we’re gonna start with that. Okay. Nicole Eredics, welcome to the Think Inclusive Podcast.

Nicole Eredics: Thank you. It’s a pleasure to be here.

Tim Villegas: Nicole and I just met in real life last March. Oh, it was this March actually, in 2024 in San Antonio at the CEC conference. This is the first time we were in the same physical space.

Nicole Eredics: Yes.

Tim Villegas: Which is really cool.

Nicole Eredics: It had been like 10 years or something. Over a decade.

Tim Villegas: Yeah, over a decade, for sure. Back in the day, when I first started this podcast, you were my first official guest.

Nicole Eredics: That’s crazy, right?

Tim Villegas: Yes, that is. That was fun. I had been on your podcast, The Inclusive Classroom.

Nicole Eredics: That’s right. We did that podcast for a couple of years. I think you were on a couple of times, actually.

Tim Villegas: I think you’re right. One of our repeats. You were on repeat.

Tim Villegas: We’ve both gone on to do really cool things. You wrote Inclusion in Action, which is in your background. What else is going on? When we talked, you filled me in on what’s happening in your life. I’d love to know if people have not followed you, what’s going on, what’s happening in your world?

Nicole Eredics: Lots of great opportunities really came out of just doing the podcast and connecting with people like yourself and others who are advocating for inclusion. Over the years, my network has really grown, and through that, I’ve had the opportunity to connect with teachers and go to different parts of the country to see what’s happening with them and what inclusion is like in their settings. Most of my time now is spent working directly with school districts and organizations supporting their inclusive practice. Outside of that, I’m enjoying the empty nest lifestyle.

Tim Villegas: Yeah, because both of your kids are off and graduated college, right?

Nicole Eredics: Yes, both of them have graduated and are very successful. They are not living at home anymore or even in the area, so I get to travel and see them. I’m busy going all kinds of different places and connecting with people.

Tim Villegas: So what I’m hearing is that you’re open for being hired as a consultant, is that right?

Nicole Eredics: Yes, that’s typically what happens. People will reach out if they have an issue they’re trying to solve or would like to know more about inclusion. I will definitely and happily support them in that process. It’s nice because I feel like I get to have the boots-on-the-ground experience now. In the earlier days, it was more just connecting online or through blogging and Facebook, but now it’s more direct.

Tim Villegas: Do you do much blogging anymore? I think I’m still subscribed to your Inclusive Classroom blog. Whenever you have an update, I get an email.

Nicole Eredics: That’s funny. Sadly, I don’t. I don’t know what happened. You work at something for a long time, and it’s nice to take a little bit of a break from that and hit the reset button.

So it’s still there though. I still get a lot of visitors coming to the blog, and it’s interesting. I get a lot of comments still, which is nice to see that engagement.

Tim Villegas: Right. Remember when we put comments on blogs?

Nicole Eredics: Right.

Tim Villegas: I guess people can still do it.

Nicole Eredics: Shockingly, they do.

Tim Villegas: It really is. Yeah, it really is. I feel like my whole relationship with social media and blogging has just gone through this complete cycle. When I first started, it was all about being a blogger and connecting with other bloggers, supporting each other, guest blogging, blog swaps, and all that stuff. Now I’m going through the same thing with podcasting: guest podcasting, promo swaps, connecting with other podcasters. It’s like it just goes around again.

Nicole Eredics: Yep. It did a really good job of getting people connected initially. Being able to meet with people in so many different places has evolved to other platforms. I see a lot of the newer generation of inclusion advocates using platforms like TikTok and Instagram. I haven’t waded into those waters yet. I’m still old school.

Tim Villegas: Yeah, me too. The most we do is cut up video clips, which you will probably be on eventually. I cut up the podcast interview and then we post that to Instagram, but I don’t do as much of me talking to a camera type of thing.

Nicole Eredics: Right, right.

Tim Villegas: I’m not as comfortable with that, although I’ve gotten a lot better at it now that this podcast is video. Since you’re working with districts all around the country, I’d love to know your general sense of where you feel the field of education has made growth. We’ve both been doing this for a long time, but you’ve been in classrooms and talking to teachers. Where have you seen the growth happen in the field?

Nicole Eredics: That’s a really good question. Honestly, I’ve seen a lot of positive growth over the last few years. Reflecting on the different schools I’ve been to and the different teachers I’ve talked to, what I’ve seen the most is the awareness of diversity and individual student needs, and the desire to personalize instruction for kids. It’s no longer that one size fits all approach. It never was, but that was how you taught 20 years ago. I’m seeing that slowly come to an end. Curriculum used in the classroom now is designed to support different learners, whether through scaffolding, small group instruction, or intervention. It’s all becoming part of regular everyday instruction, which is wonderful. It’s exactly what we needed to look at our students, see their specific needs, and find ways to support them. As a result, there’s more awareness and willingness to bring students of different ability levels into the classroom and engage them in general education. There’s also a lot more resources overall, with websites like Teachers Pay Teachers and AI creating a large pool of resources for teachers to use to support instruction.

Tim Villegas: Specifically with resources, I feel like just in the last two to three years, there’s been a greater number of books about inclusive education practices, helping schools and districts implement these practices. When we both started blogging, it wasn’t accessible. The information was there, but you really had to know where to look for it.

Nicole Eredics: Totally. Even if some of today’s resources or instructional materials or strategies are not specifically labeled inclusion or inclusive practice, they still facilitate inclusion. Incorporating Universal Design for Learning (UDL) into lesson planning is an inclusive practice. There’s been significant growth in how teachers are working with students and what they’re using to facilitate greater inclusion overall.

Tim Villegas: What about challenges? Are there any things that stick in your mind as challenges?

Nicole Eredics: We’re still working within a very rigid system that believes in standardized testing and promotes certain student strengths while having a hard time recognizing other skills. It’s still a challenge to get technology into classrooms and have access to learning platforms. The grading system often presents a problem, especially at the high school level, adapting grading programs to support students on modified programs or receiving individual education. Supporting overall mental health is still a big issue too. But I’m encouraged. I see a lot of opportunity for growth and awareness of these challenges. It’s inspiring.

Tim Villegas: That’s a good point about grading. We had Thomas Guskey on last season, and he talked about standards-based grading, which I believe Canada uses. I asked him specifically about how that would relate to learners with extensive support needs, especially in high school because of transcripts and stuff like that. He mentioned that in the school they were working with, they provided both sets of transcripts: one with letter grades and one with standards-based grading. The families chose the standards-based grading because it provided better information.

Nicole Eredics: Yeah, because it outlines the student’s performance in relation to specific learning outcomes. It’s much clearer and provides a lot more detail. That’s something that would be nice to move towards.

Tim Villegas: Something else I heard you say is that more and more educators want to have these changes. They want to provide an inclusive environment for their learners and promote inclusive practices. There’s definitely pushback, but when you have a conversation with an educator and explain what we mean by inclusive education, it’s often new information to them. For example, we were just having this conversation internally about some partners we have. When we explain that inclusive education means having a natural proportion of students with IEPs in the classroom, not an inclusion class where 50% of the learners have IEPs, it’s about spreading those learners across the grade level and supporting them where they are using the resources you have. Just because a class has a learner with a disability doesn’t mean a special education teacher has to be in that classroom 100% of the time. They can move around. It seemed like new information to them.

Nicole Eredics: That’s interesting.

Tim Villegas: It was more like, “Oh, wouldn’t that be nice?” I think we’ve had a communication and messaging issue with inclusive education. When we say inclusive education, people often think and hear something we’re not actually talking about.

Nicole Eredics: I totally agree. A lot of that lies in the message and the words we use as inclusion advocates. There’s a conversation about inclusion and what it means, and people are on board with that. Who doesn’t want social equity and academic equity? As educators, people are on board with that. But we still struggle to give them the tools and explicit instruction on what that looks like in practice. We need to be talking about inclusion, raising awareness, promoting, and advocating for it, but we also need to spend as much time and energy giving them the tools to do that and what it looks like specifically. Some people are all about it, but they need to know what it looks like and how to do it. They might have preconceived notions that are not so positive. That’s why what I’m doing now feels like where I’m meant to be because I’m able to get into the classrooms, talk to the teachers, and give them specific strategies. Once they realize it’s not a major overhaul of what they’re already doing, but they have a few extra resources and strategies to rely upon, it’s like, “Yeah, okay, we’re going to do this.”

Tim Villegas: How much of your time, or maybe when you are assessing where a school is on their road to inclusive practices, how much of it is universal tier one, evidence-based instruction? Are you seeing really good tier one universal instruction, or is the lack of that causing more kids to be referred to special education? Does that make sense?

Nicole Eredics: Yeah, I think I understand what you’re saying. In response to that first part, I do see growth and strength in tier one core instruction. Teachers are addressing barriers that are classroom-wide and presenting materials so that the most students can access it during core instructional time. Different types of curriculum and programs are becoming more tailored to supporting students with different needs in the classroom. When you get into more specialized student instructional time, like tier two and tier three, teachers are very well-versed in those strategies. I’m seeing more co-teachers supporting students receiving tier two and tier three instruction directly in a general education classroom with a gen ed teacher. That’s been interesting to watch and I’ve enjoyed that growth.

Tim Villegas: Hopefully, less talk about where the kids are on the tiers. Often, when I’m talking to teachers, it’s about tier one, tier two, tier three kids instead of the instruction or intervention.

Nicole Eredics: Exactly. As educators, we sometimes gravitate towards labels to organize all the different pieces in our heads. It’s about using inclusive language and promoting it in addition to talking about inclusive practice.

Tim Villegas: What about your experience with administrators and school or district leaders moving towards inclusive systems or changing their systems to be more inclusive? What have you observed in that role?

Nicole Eredics: It’s a mix. I still see administrators trying to make inclusion fit into a specific system or district process. As administrators, that’s part of their job to ensure their school follows district protocol. I also see administrators who may not be as informed as classroom teachers on inclusive practice. It’s interesting to talk to some administrators and realize their understanding of inclusion and what it looks like. There are many supportive administrators and district personnel working hard to change the processes in the district. I definitely see a mix, more so than with educators. There’s more of a, you know, they kind of know what they should be doing but aren’t really sure how it’s going to fit into their district protocol.

Tim Villegas: Right.

Nicole Eredics: That is probably the next frontier: working with administrators and district personnel. Teachers generally want to educate and support student needs, but myths, misunderstandings, and lack of resources often get in the way.

Nicole Eredics: Yeah. And depending on their situation, when they’re vocal about a student not being able to or shouldn’t be in their class, it’s really about them not feeling like they can support them.

Tim Villegas: Exactly. There’s a certain level of baked-in ableism in our school system because of the way it’s set up. Teachers are mostly expressing frustration that they’re not able to support the learner. The logic for them is that the student can probably be supported somewhere else. The fallacy is that they won’t be supported there either.

Nicole Eredics: Yes. Have you seen the classrooms? Wow. I was talking to a friend yesterday, and she was relating more to inclusion and the work I’m doing. She was asking about the difference between special education and general education classrooms. As a parent volunteering in the classroom, she observed the wide range of abilities, needs, and the mix of adults versus kids. She commented on how that impacts student learning. I agree. Gen ed teachers don’t necessarily not want to do it; they just don’t know how and what it looks like in practice.

Tim Villegas: Yeah. Going back to what you were saying about what special education classrooms actually look like, if there is a space where another child can go, people will send them there.

Nicole Eredics: Right. So that needs to be eliminated.

Tim Villegas: Right. That’s the problem. We’ve been talking about this for a long time. When you have special education classrooms tied to a program, like a regional or community program, it takes the pressure off general education teachers to provide that support. We need to support general ed teachers to support learners on the autism spectrum. When you have a program, it’s like, “Why wouldn’t they go to the program?”

Nicole Eredics: Right. I can attest to that. When I was teaching in a fully inclusive school district, we didn’t have special education programs. When working with a student in your classroom, you aren’t thinking about getting them out. It was non-negotiable because the program didn’t exist. You bring together your team—resource teacher, administrator, other teachers—and start to problem solve. You figure out how to make it work for the student because you don’t have the option of moving them to a specialized program. When you don’t have those classrooms, you make it work with your team and resources. Having that option doesn’t do inclusion justice.

Tim Villegas: I don’t want to give the impression that we’re bashing schools, teachers, or administrators. This is just the reality of the situation. Especially in larger school districts, they typically have an abundance of programs. When you have a large district, there’s more money, and it feels like they put that into programs. You have all these different kinds of programs: autism, intellectual disability, behavior. It’s a menu of options to serve everyone, but when you have so many options, you tend to over-program. You’re not actually meeting the needs of the learner; you’re trying to group people to serve them efficiently, but it doesn’t work out that way.

Nicole Eredics: On the surface, it appeals like you’re relieving the pressure on general education classrooms and supporting students with specialized needs. But in the end, what’s its purpose? What’s it really doing for kids? There are unique circumstances where kids need specialized support, but it’s not meant to be a place where they spend all their time. It’s a place to be used carefully and selectively. Over-programming doesn’t do inclusion justice.

Tim Villegas: If you’re feeling like this describes where you are, let’s talk about some solutions. What can people do to move inclusive education forward wherever they are? Whether they’re in a district that’s not inclusive or not as inclusive as they’d want, what can they do?

Nicole Eredics: Are we talking about parents? Are we talking about community?

Tim Villegas: That’s a great question. I think for the people that listen to this podcast, I’m really talking about educators in school districts, but there’s a lot of crossover between educators and parents who have children with disabilities. So let’s first talk to educators in school systems.

Nicole Eredics: For me, it’s about what you already do in your classroom. What barriers do you see for your students at this point, and what can you do to create greater access to the instruction you’re teaching? If you have a student that is leaving for part of the instruction, is there a way to have the student stay for some of that instruction? We’re talking grassroots, basic steps. Start from the ground up. Look at your student’s schedule and see where in your instructional time the student can remain in your classroom. Communicate with the staff that works with the student. When the student is not in your classroom, how can we as a team have the student remain in the general education classroom for longer periods of time? What kinds of resources do you have that can help me support the student in my general education classroom? What are the possibilities for co-teaching? Can we spend more time working as a team, or do you have resources that can help me teach the student while they’re in my general education classroom? We’re talking bare bones here.

AI has been a huge game changer for that. My big thing right now is going on to ChatGPT and asking it to make a lesson that will include a student with specific needs.

Tim Villegas: Oh, so you’re saying to give ChatGPT the prompt of, “Here’s a lesson. I have a student with these particular needs. I want you to adapt this lesson so that they are included,” or something like that?

Nicole Eredics: Yes. You can give it prompts like, “I have a student with ADHD, a student with an intellectual disability working at a grade two level, a student with dysgraphia. How can this lesson be adapted to meet those students’ needs and include that student in instruction?” It will reply with a lesson that is broken down in different ways to adapt the lesson for the students. It’s readily available. You can even ask how a co-teacher and I can present this lesson to the class, meeting the needs of these individual students. It will give back a co-teaching model, resources, and ways to instruct the different groups in your class within that co-teaching model.

Tim Villegas: Wow. I’ve heard of teachers using AI to help modify a lesson or assignment, but what you’re suggesting is taking it a step further, which is fascinating.

Nicole Eredics: Yes, it totally is. Of course, there’s room for error with any technology and AI, but if it can give you a framework or a basis to start from, that’s half the battle. It will group your students according to their different needs in the classroom. It’s all about the prompts.

Tim Villegas: It really is. I feel like I need a class to teach me how to use ChatGPT.

Nicole Eredics: Doesn’t it blow your mind what it can do?

Tim Villegas: It does. Charmaine Thaner, an advocate in Idaho, has a great show called The Art of Advocacy on Facebook. She talks about using AI for advocacy, using prompts to help parents pursue inclusive education for their child. It’s an amazing use of this technology.

Nicole Eredics: You could even upload a photo of your lesson plan, and ChatGPT will read that lesson plan off your photo and modify it according to your prompts. It will create templates for you. The options are growing exponentially. Having classroom teachers be aware of that is a big game changer.

That’s part of what I’ve been doing most recently: working with co-teachers and using AI to support their co-teaching. It’s been fun engaging them in that process and having them see how the information is right there.

Tim Villegas: That’s great. Thank you for sharing that. I hope that gives people some ideas and hope for the future as we all try to figure out how to best support learners in inclusive classrooms and schools. Any final thoughts before we go to our last segment? Anything you think teachers need to hear as we head into 2025?

Nicole Eredics: Just remember your impact. Whether it’s providing accessible curriculum or promoting social-emotional wellness in your classroom, students look to you for ways to interact, engage with others, and learn. You play a big role in setting the tone for your students’ educational journey. Remember that you have a significant role in their school experience. Remaining a steady, positive influence is key. Other students see how you engage with various students in your classroom and emulate that naturally.

Tim Villegas: Right. Thank you for that. I appreciate that. Are you up for a mystery question?

Nicole Eredics: Oh my goodness.

Tim Villegas: Do you know what I’m talking about?

Nicole Eredics: No, I don’t.

Tim Villegas: This is something I started doing last season. For the last question of the episode, I have a stack of prompt cards. I pull up a prompt question, and we both answer the question. It’s usually pretty light, sometimes a little deep, but we’ll see what happens. Here we go. Have you ever been kicked out of anything? If so, what? Have you ever been kicked out of anything?

Nicole Eredics: Oh my gosh. I was just talking about this the other day actually. I do have a story. I’ve been kicked out of a campsite in the middle of the night when we were camping years ago. It’s so random, but we decided to go camping for the weekend. We went with some friends and got all set up. You know what it’s like to go camping—all the gear you have to pack up, buying food, and all that kind of stuff. We got to the campsite, set up, and got all of our gear out. We were younger, so we were enjoying our evening.

One of our friends decided to make sure everyone in the campsite was having a good time and safe. They wandered off and got up to no good, I’m assuming, because he was brought back and we were told to take him home, which meant we had to pack up. So we packed up our campsite at midnight, much to our disappointment, and had to take our friend back home. It was not fun, but we look back on it now and laugh. The whole idea of getting set up and then our weekend was ruined.

Tim Villegas: Oh no. That’s a great story.

Nicole Eredics: What have you been kicked out of?

Tim Villegas: Well, that’s the thing. I honestly cannot remember a time that I’ve been kicked out of anything. I feel like there are times where I should have been kicked out of places. I used to go to a lot of rock and roll shows, like punk rock shows, and I feel like I probably could have been kicked out of places for being obnoxious or enjoying myself too much. Mosh pits and all that.

Nicole Eredics: Mosh pits, yeah.

Tim Villegas: We should have been kicked out of movie theaters because I definitely snuck into movie theaters and went to R-rated films when I was underage. But I never got caught.

Nicole Eredics: See, you’re lucky.

Tim Villegas: Apparently, I cannot think of a time where I’ve been kicked out of anything, but maybe it just hasn’t happened yet.

Nicole Eredics: Right? There’s still plenty of time.

Tim Villegas: There’s still time for me to get kicked out of something.

Nicole Eredics: And then you have to let me know what it was.

Tim Villegas: I’ll do an update because that’s exactly it. I feel like I learned my lesson back then. First of all, be careful who you go camping with.

Nicole Eredics: Yes. Number one, who you associate with.

Tim Villegas: Oh my goodness. Yes. Don’t go camping with friends that are going to get you kicked out.

Nicole Eredics: Exactly. Well, thanks for sharing.

Tim Villegas: Thank you for sharing. I appreciate you playing along. Nicole Eredics, thank you so much for being on the Think Inclusive podcast. We appreciate it.

Nicole Eredics: My pleasure. Thanks for having me. It was wonderful. Great talking to you.

Tim Villegas: That’s all the time we have for this episode of Think Inclusive. Now, let’s roll the credits. Think Inclusive is brought to you by me, Tim Villegas. I handle the writing, editing, design, mixing, and mastering. This podcast is a proud production of the Maryland Coalition for Inclusive Education. Our original music is by Miles Kredich, with additional tunes from melod.ie.

A big shout out to our sponsor, IXL. Check them out at ixl.com/inclusive. We truly appreciate each and every one of you who tunes in. We’d love to hear how you are using these episodes. Are they part of your teaching toolkit? Are you sharing them with school administrators? Drop me a line at tvillegas@mcie.org and let me know.

And hey, if you’re still around with us this far into the episode, it probably means that you love Think Inclusive and the work MCIE is doing. Can I ask a small favor? Help us keep the momentum going by donating at our website mcie.org. Just click the button at the top of the site and chip in $5, $10, $15, $20. It would mean the world to us and the children in the schools and districts we partner with. Thanks again for your time and attention. And remember, inclusion always works.

Download the complete and unedited transcript here.