From Compliance to Connection: Elevating Student Voice for Equity, Access, and Engagement

This session reframes compliance-driven practices in special education and classroom instruction into student-centered opportunities for equity, access, and authentic engagement. Moving from paperwork to partnership, participants will explore three complementary strategies that elevate student voice across Individualized Education Programs (IEPs), function-based behavior plans, and academic discourse. Participants will be able to: 1. Redesign IEP processes through a hospitality-infused framework that centers relationships, student dignity, and collaborative decision-making. 2. Apply person-centered planning strategies to function-based behavior supports, ensuring student voice, autonomy, and cultural responsiveness shape interventions. 3. Implement the A.C.D. strategy to promote equitable access to academic content, strengthen student talk, and deepen comprehension in diverse classrooms. 4. Synthesize across contexts by identifying common practices that elevate student voice in IEPs, behavior plans, and classroom learning. 5. Develop actionable next steps to embed student-centered practices into their own school or classroom setting.