1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:04,240 All right. Okay, welcome to the AdaptX podcast where we have conversations with individuals 2 00:00:04,240 --> 00:00:08,800 building accessible businesses, advocating for inclusion or excelling in adaptive sports. 3 00:00:08,800 --> 00:00:12,640 Our intention is never to speak on behalf of those with disabilities, but to provide a platform to 4 00:00:12,640 --> 00:00:17,120 amplify their voices and share their ideas to a more accessible world. Today I'm joined by Justin 5 00:00:17,120 --> 00:00:21,200 Hagel, the Colgate Darden Endowed Professor and the Director of the Center for Movement, Health, 6 00:00:21,200 --> 00:00:25,360 and Disability in the Department of Health, Human Movement Studies and Special Education at Old 7 00:00:25,360 --> 00:00:30,960 Dominion University. Contextualized within the interdisciplinary field of adapted PE, his primary 8 00:00:30,960 --> 00:00:35,360 research interests center on exploring how disabled individuals experience physical activity 9 00:00:35,360 --> 00:00:39,840 participation, including within school-based physical education context. Since joining Old 10 00:00:39,840 --> 00:00:45,200 Dominion University in 2015, Dr. Hagel has amassed over 270 peer-reviewed research publications, 11 00:00:45,200 --> 00:00:49,280 as well as several edited or authored texts. He currently serves as the Director of Project 12 00:00:49,280 --> 00:00:55,200 CAPER and the Co-Director of the MAMC, two adaptive physical activity training collaboratives that are 13 00:00:55,200 --> 00:00:59,360 funded through the U.S. Department of Education, focusing on training doctoral students in the 14 00:00:59,360 --> 00:01:03,520 field. He is also currently the past President of the North American Federation of Adapted 15 00:01:03,520 --> 00:01:07,680 Physical Activity and the Editor-in-Chief for the peer-reviewed Publications Quest and Adapted 16 00:01:07,680 --> 00:01:12,480 Physical Activity Quarterly. Might have to redo that bio and not mispronounce afterwards, but 17 00:01:12,480 --> 00:01:15,680 you gave me a good challenge there. So, Justin, thanks for joining me. 18 00:01:15,680 --> 00:01:21,040 Yes, my pleasure. Thank you for the invitation. No worries on mispronouncing. I don't want to 19 00:01:21,040 --> 00:01:25,920 be sad this whole time we're talking. Why did you dedicate your career to 20 00:01:26,800 --> 00:01:32,480 exploring and understanding inclusion? That's a great question. I think I got into 21 00:01:32,480 --> 00:01:36,720 the field of adapted physical activity after having some hands-on experiences 22 00:01:37,440 --> 00:01:41,600 with various programs for people who are blind or visually impaired. That's kind of where I 23 00:01:41,600 --> 00:01:47,200 started off at least learning about the field. I was also a teacher at a school for autistic kids 24 00:01:47,200 --> 00:01:52,720 in Queens and New York for three years, also kind of helped build that passion. I didn't start 25 00:01:52,720 --> 00:01:59,120 talking about or thinking about inclusion much until a few years into my tenure here at ODU. 26 00:02:00,640 --> 00:02:08,400 There was this moment where I started thinking about the incongruence between what disabled 27 00:02:08,400 --> 00:02:14,160 people were telling me about their experiences within general PE classes and the concepts of 28 00:02:14,160 --> 00:02:19,120 inclusion, how I understood them. So, we were pushing kids into general PE in the name of 29 00:02:19,120 --> 00:02:23,120 inclusion, but they weren't having positive or meaningful experiences in those classes. 30 00:02:23,120 --> 00:02:29,040 To me, that just didn't make any sense. So, then I started spending a lot of time talking 31 00:02:29,040 --> 00:02:33,360 to other researchers and scholars around the world about inclusion and trying to learn as 32 00:02:33,360 --> 00:02:36,720 much as I could and then writing a bit about it afterwards. 33 00:02:36,720 --> 00:02:42,000 Yeah, absolutely. I feel like most people that get into the space had some sort of formative 34 00:02:42,000 --> 00:02:47,440 experience, whether it's a program like you mentioned or for me it was first volunteering 35 00:02:47,440 --> 00:02:53,600 with Special Olympics in high school. Is there anything that you initially believed, I'm sure 36 00:02:53,600 --> 00:02:58,640 there is, that you now think differently or that you no longer believe? Or kind of like, 37 00:02:59,680 --> 00:03:03,760 yeah, I guess how has your understanding evolved over the years? And I'm sure we'll dive into 38 00:03:03,760 --> 00:03:06,800 some of the finer details throughout this conversation. 39 00:03:08,160 --> 00:03:15,200 Yeah, I think if my beliefs hadn't changed over the years, I think that would be more concerning. 40 00:03:15,200 --> 00:03:21,040 As a faculty member, my job is to learn and it's to then share what I've learned with people. 41 00:03:21,040 --> 00:03:26,160 As I've learned various things through research, through talking with disabled people about their 42 00:03:26,160 --> 00:03:31,440 experiences, through understanding our field on a national and international level, and then 43 00:03:31,440 --> 00:03:37,280 our field on a national and international level, I've learned a lot and it's changed the way I think, 44 00:03:37,280 --> 00:03:41,680 changed the way I think about and talk about our field and changed the way I think about and talk 45 00:03:41,680 --> 00:03:47,360 about disabled people within movement spaces. Initially, I probably thought, you know, it's just 46 00:03:47,360 --> 00:03:52,240 great that people are active. So great, let's get people active without thinking about the why. 47 00:03:52,240 --> 00:03:56,800 And now most of my life and most of my time I dedicate toward thinking about 48 00:03:56,800 --> 00:04:02,960 that and asking other people the question why. Yeah, and that's hopefully what I hope I'll be 49 00:04:02,960 --> 00:04:08,640 able to ask you today. But I started with special education. I was initially pursuing a degree to 50 00:04:08,640 --> 00:04:14,320 be a teacher before I decided I wanted to open a gym. But I distinctly remember, and I've been a 51 00:04:14,320 --> 00:04:20,080 caregiver for a boy with Down syndrome and autism since I was 19. And I distinctly remember in those 52 00:04:20,080 --> 00:04:27,680 classes, professors, well one advocating exclusively for person first language, and I've noticed that 53 00:04:27,680 --> 00:04:32,720 you use identity first language and I know there's nuances with that conversation. But I also remember 54 00:04:32,720 --> 00:04:38,240 them advocating for the full integration of people with disabilities in general education 55 00:04:38,240 --> 00:04:44,800 classrooms with no exceptions. And I just had Jacob, the boy I watch in mind, moderate to severe 56 00:04:44,800 --> 00:04:49,200 disabilities if you classify him in that way. I'm like, there's no way he would be able to 57 00:04:49,200 --> 00:04:53,200 participate in a meaningful way. There's no way he would enjoy it and there's no way it wouldn't 58 00:04:53,200 --> 00:04:58,880 be disruptive for the other classmates. So like, why is that the standard? So I guess how do you 59 00:05:00,000 --> 00:05:07,760 explore the intersection of inclusion, exclusion, sub-separate classes for exclusively for people 60 00:05:07,760 --> 00:05:13,040 with disabilities? Like where does that exist in the education landscape? Yeah, I think that, 61 00:05:13,040 --> 00:05:16,960 I think you bring up a lot of good points, right? I think the language piece is great. I think 62 00:05:16,960 --> 00:05:22,240 one of the best examples of how my thinking has changed over time is the tension I now have 63 00:05:22,240 --> 00:05:28,000 between the person first language that I was trained to use during my undergraduate, masters, 64 00:05:28,000 --> 00:05:34,400 and doctoral work, and then the identity first language that I now believe in because of the way 65 00:05:34,400 --> 00:05:39,760 in which disabled people are disabled through society and how that's reflective of respecting 66 00:05:39,760 --> 00:05:45,360 that disabled people are disabled by society, not by the impairments that they have or exclusively 67 00:05:45,360 --> 00:05:51,040 by the impairments that they have. In terms of inclusion within schools and spaces, I think 68 00:05:51,040 --> 00:05:57,680 historically our field, adaptive physical activity generally, has had preferred treatment of 69 00:05:57,680 --> 00:06:07,120 integrated spaces and so years ago, just for clarity, years ago I did the best I could to help 70 00:06:07,120 --> 00:06:14,480 distinguish what integrated or general PE is versus inclusive PE. So for me, I try to use the term 71 00:06:14,480 --> 00:06:19,040 integrated to describe the physical space or place where disabled and non-disabled people are 72 00:06:19,040 --> 00:06:24,320 together and I use the term inclusive very differently as you know from some of the stuff 73 00:06:24,320 --> 00:06:30,080 that you had read to represent an intersubjective experience of acceptance, belonging, and value. 74 00:06:30,960 --> 00:06:36,720 And so with that, we have been prioritizing integrated spaces for a long time and I think 75 00:06:37,760 --> 00:06:43,280 unfortunately when we've done that, we've done it at the risk of further marginalizing disabled 76 00:06:43,280 --> 00:06:47,840 people by dumping them into spaces and people have been bringing this up for years. There are 77 00:06:47,840 --> 00:06:53,680 scholars in the 80s and 90s and early 2000s in adaptive PE who have brought this up and have 78 00:06:53,680 --> 00:07:00,000 written about this. So most of the stuff I write today that's about this is not really different. 79 00:07:00,000 --> 00:07:04,320 We're not really pushing things forward. We're actually kind of circling back to ideas that have 80 00:07:04,320 --> 00:07:09,680 existed already and just providing more of a platform for them I think and hearing disabled 81 00:07:09,680 --> 00:07:14,720 people say it themselves I think is a bit more powerful. Yeah, well that while that research 82 00:07:14,720 --> 00:07:22,560 might have been around for decades, I don't think I really was exposed to it outside of your material. 83 00:07:23,360 --> 00:07:30,800 So whether that's a testament to how the dissemination of content and material has evolved 84 00:07:30,800 --> 00:07:36,800 over the years with advances in internet and just how we consume information or not, those concepts 85 00:07:36,800 --> 00:07:44,720 might be around but I'm curious as to why they were not initially adopted. What do you think is 86 00:07:44,720 --> 00:07:52,240 the resistance to those ideas? It's a good question. I mean I think it's hard to really look at 87 00:07:52,240 --> 00:08:01,200 the etiology for why some ideas take and why some don't. For me at least, when I first started 88 00:08:01,200 --> 00:08:08,320 writing about integrated spaces not necessarily being inclusive, I had a handful of people who've 89 00:08:08,320 --> 00:08:13,120 been around for a long time, some recently retired who reached out and said I'm glad you're writing 90 00:08:13,120 --> 00:08:19,840 this but you know we did this 20-25 years ago and that actually got me thinking like that means 91 00:08:19,840 --> 00:08:27,200 we need to keep going and some of it is to respect those voices as you had said when we opened 92 00:08:27,200 --> 00:08:32,880 you know the podcast is about amplifying disabled people's voices. Part of what we need to do at 93 00:08:32,880 --> 00:08:37,280 least in our field is respect and listen to what disabled people are telling us and that doesn't 94 00:08:37,280 --> 00:08:42,720 mean a wholesale movement away from integrated spaces. What it means is listening to disabled 95 00:08:42,720 --> 00:08:47,840 people about what's best for them and allowing them perhaps choice into which spaces they're 96 00:08:49,120 --> 00:08:54,560 existing and participating within and respecting that like acceptance and belonging and value can 97 00:08:54,560 --> 00:09:01,120 happen across space and place. It doesn't depend on non-disabled people being there. That's a 98 00:09:01,120 --> 00:09:07,920 pretty ableist concept isn't it? Yeah yeah absolutely. I had a conversation last week with 99 00:09:07,920 --> 00:09:13,120 someone with cerebral palsy and she was like you wouldn't be able to pay me to come work out at 100 00:09:13,120 --> 00:09:20,080 your gym and she referenced back to gym class in elementary and middle school and how she was 101 00:09:20,080 --> 00:09:26,480 integrated into gym class but in that sense she had to do the warm-up laps with everyone which 102 00:09:26,480 --> 00:09:30,560 required everyone waiting for her to finish and staring at her as she finished and all these 103 00:09:30,560 --> 00:09:38,080 negative experiences to the point where now she won't be active into adulthood and it made me 104 00:09:38,080 --> 00:09:43,840 like as I was reading your papers and as I was thinking back to my experiences in middle school, 105 00:09:43,840 --> 00:09:47,280 high school, PE, it's tricky because like if you look at 106 00:09:47,280 --> 00:09:52,080 people don't always want to participate in PE whether they have a disability or not. 107 00:09:52,800 --> 00:09:58,560 So how do you value and in the same lens and they might not want to participate in mathematics or 108 00:09:58,560 --> 00:10:05,760 science but these are things that they should do. So how do you balance student feedback, 109 00:10:05,760 --> 00:10:13,680 student preferences with also expectations and standards? Yeah I think that there's a 110 00:10:13,680 --> 00:10:20,560 difference to me between engaging in the class and engaging in a class in a setting that is 111 00:10:20,560 --> 00:10:26,400 most educational or appropriate for you and so you know within special education including within 112 00:10:26,400 --> 00:10:34,160 adapted PE there's supposed to be a variety of spaces or places or placements offered for 113 00:10:34,160 --> 00:10:40,480 disabled kids to engage in any material whether it's math or physical education and so I think 114 00:10:40,480 --> 00:10:47,280 it's a matter of listening to feedback to say you don't need to participate in PE. I think it's 115 00:10:47,280 --> 00:10:51,520 listening to feedback to ensure that the environment in which PE is provided is the one that's most 116 00:10:51,520 --> 00:10:56,960 appropriate and meaningful for the child and I think the same is for math, same as for whatever 117 00:10:56,960 --> 00:11:03,280 topic it might be and so you know if we're shoving or dumping whatever word we want to use, 118 00:11:04,000 --> 00:11:06,960 disabled kids into integrated spaces without like providing a specific 119 00:11:06,960 --> 00:11:12,480 or with providing modifications and trying our best and we have very kind-hearted adapted PE 120 00:11:12,480 --> 00:11:18,160 people or PE people trying to do so but it doesn't provide meaningful experiences for the child. 121 00:11:18,160 --> 00:11:23,280 It still means we need to rethink what we're doing in the schools regardless of you know how great 122 00:11:23,280 --> 00:11:28,880 the teachers are you know how wonderful the peers are if the kids not participating or having a 123 00:11:28,880 --> 00:11:34,880 meaningful experience why are we doing them? Because we're not doing them because we're not 124 00:11:34,880 --> 00:11:37,920 doing them because we're not doing them because we're not doing them because we're not doing them 125 00:11:37,920 --> 00:11:45,360 and so it means why are we doing them? Yeah I think I've read that PE teachers on average only have 126 00:11:45,920 --> 00:11:53,040 one to two classes in pre-service education that's related to adapted PE or disability 127 00:11:53,040 --> 00:12:01,120 inclusion as a whole. Do you think that's one of the primary underlying factors or I mean even if 128 00:12:01,120 --> 00:12:05,680 they could be misled to assume that as long as they check the box of there's people with 129 00:12:05,680 --> 00:12:11,920 disabilities in my class I'm being inclusive like where do you think the disconnect is and how can 130 00:12:11,920 --> 00:12:18,400 it be addressed? I don't think it's one disconnect. I think there's many many many disconnects. I think 131 00:12:18,400 --> 00:12:23,600 one is what you said that there's this conceptualization that as long as disabled kids 132 00:12:23,600 --> 00:12:30,560 are in the room it's an inclusive class and for for administrators and perhaps for teachers but 133 00:12:30,560 --> 00:12:35,600 probably more so administrators and parents for them oh we're an inclusive school we're good to go 134 00:12:35,600 --> 00:12:39,120 kids exist in the same space regardless of what they're doing within that space. 135 00:12:40,400 --> 00:12:47,760 The piece about training is is interesting but it's also and it might have some impact but that's 136 00:12:47,760 --> 00:12:55,280 probably the most villainized piece among APE folk. It seems to me that over time APE people 137 00:12:55,280 --> 00:13:00,400 specifically faculty have said over and over that all they need is more training all they need is 138 00:13:00,400 --> 00:13:04,720 more training we only have one class in higher ed programs if they had more training everybody 139 00:13:04,720 --> 00:13:10,000 be better at this. You know that might be true but you know our field's been around for about 140 00:13:10,000 --> 00:13:15,360 40 years now and more training isn't on the horizon and so we have to rethink what we're doing. 141 00:13:15,360 --> 00:13:19,920 You know if you need more training to teach in an integrated placement but you don't need more 142 00:13:19,920 --> 00:13:25,440 training to provide a high quality experience for children in a different placement why are we so 143 00:13:25,440 --> 00:13:31,360 focused on the placement why aren't we focused on the high quality experience. How can you gauge 144 00:13:32,000 --> 00:13:38,880 acceptance belonging or the experience as a whole with someone like my Jacob who doesn't have any 145 00:13:38,880 --> 00:13:45,600 verbal language and might not be able to comprehend what you're asking him? Yeah that's that's a 146 00:13:45,600 --> 00:13:50,720 question that we've talked about often in like research circles about how do you talk to kids 147 00:13:50,720 --> 00:13:57,040 with like limited expressive or receptive language skills about acceptance belonging and value or 148 00:13:57,040 --> 00:14:03,520 you know disabilism or exclusion within any setting and so you know there's a variety of 149 00:14:03,520 --> 00:14:09,840 different types of data collection or assessment that people might use. We've used with a faculty 150 00:14:09,840 --> 00:14:15,360 member out in Illinois named Wes Wilson we use drawing based inquiry where we've asked kids to 151 00:14:15,360 --> 00:14:20,880 draw what PE looks like for them and then we've asked them questions about those drawings and 152 00:14:20,880 --> 00:14:27,120 we've used a variety of different techniques to elicit what that meaning is for them with a couple 153 00:14:27,120 --> 00:14:32,640 of master students in the past we've had photo based inquiry where we've asked kids to take 154 00:14:32,640 --> 00:14:39,200 photos of what is meaningful for them within a PE environment. There's a lot of different ways to 155 00:14:39,200 --> 00:14:46,000 talk with disabled people who don't necessarily speak the same way that typical data collection 156 00:14:46,000 --> 00:14:50,400 would collect like not every kid's going to want to be interviewed regardless of disability. 157 00:14:51,360 --> 00:14:56,960 So there's ways to do it to me the first step isn't figuring out how to talk to them it's opening our 158 00:14:56,960 --> 00:15:02,640 minds that we can communicate if we can communicate with a child with a disability or disabled child 159 00:15:02,640 --> 00:15:08,320 then we can ask them questions about acceptance belonging and value. Yeah absolutely that brings 160 00:15:08,320 --> 00:15:13,920 up a good point because as I was reading through this I'm reflecting on my own gym and my own 161 00:15:13,920 --> 00:15:19,600 space and my own business and just my understanding of inclusion and how it exists in those spaces and 162 00:15:19,600 --> 00:15:24,560 I'm thinking of specific clients of mine who like you said don't have the receptive or the expressive 163 00:15:24,560 --> 00:15:32,560 language and thinking about smiley face scales and how I could find a way to help them understand 164 00:15:32,560 --> 00:15:40,720 to like gather their experience within my gym as a whole but I also wonder they don't have other 165 00:15:40,720 --> 00:15:47,360 opportunities to be physically active so they don't have a frame of reference to compare 166 00:15:48,240 --> 00:15:54,160 inclusive fitness too so you had mentioned in one of the previous responses that like assuming that 167 00:15:54,160 --> 00:16:02,720 programs that only train people with disabilities as exclusive is an ableist comment but I wonder if 168 00:16:02,720 --> 00:16:08,160 too often people with disabilities don't have the opportunities to experience different environments 169 00:16:08,160 --> 00:16:13,200 to forge like a complete picture or at least to have something to compare to I'm not sure I'm 170 00:16:13,200 --> 00:16:17,840 articulating that well but if the only experience and the only opportunity that people with 171 00:16:17,840 --> 00:16:23,760 disabilities have is to participate alongside other people with disabilities then they don't 172 00:16:23,760 --> 00:16:28,480 know what the other environments are like yeah no I think that's a good point and you know if you 173 00:16:28,480 --> 00:16:33,280 think about how schools are generally structured there's not a lot of choice for any child with 174 00:16:33,280 --> 00:16:38,320 what kind of placements or spaces that they're experiencing sport physical activity in right 175 00:16:38,320 --> 00:16:44,480 there's generally just one thing offered and that setting or that concept I guess of funneling 176 00:16:44,480 --> 00:16:49,360 people into settings kind of goes into adult life as well where you know if you came through a school 177 00:16:49,360 --> 00:16:53,360 for the blind a lot of the connections you have likely are within like the blindness community 178 00:16:53,360 --> 00:17:00,000 and so therefore you like are more likely to engage in like blind sports in environments that 179 00:17:00,000 --> 00:17:05,760 are you know blindness specific and likely dominated by blind people whereas I suppose if you went 180 00:17:05,760 --> 00:17:12,160 through an integrated school and the only physical activity or p.e. experiences you might be offered 181 00:17:12,160 --> 00:17:18,160 are integrated you likely will have those experiences more readily available to you after 182 00:17:18,160 --> 00:17:23,520 graduation or at least hypothetically that's how it should be it's probably not actually that way 183 00:17:23,520 --> 00:17:30,320 but I guess going back to an earlier point if that's the case and you're within the integrated 184 00:17:30,320 --> 00:17:38,960 space and the experience is not pleasant or you don't feel valued within it you're more than likely 185 00:17:38,960 --> 00:17:44,720 learning that you don't belong in that space which likely then perpetuates inactivity after graduation 186 00:17:44,720 --> 00:17:51,680 so it's a really difficult double-edged sword where you'd probably want people to have both 187 00:17:51,680 --> 00:17:57,600 opportunities at some point during their forming experience but it's very uncommon I think 188 00:17:57,600 --> 00:18:04,400 especially in like low low income areas or rural areas where access to like adapted sport outside 189 00:18:04,400 --> 00:18:10,000 of school is limited yeah well that's why we've it's probably the biggest thing that I think I've 190 00:18:10,000 --> 00:18:17,360 shifted on over the years is my first model for my gym was heavily influenced by Special Olympics 191 00:18:17,360 --> 00:18:22,640 like Unified Sports Models so I had high school volunteers helping with our quote unquote adaptive 192 00:18:22,640 --> 00:18:28,960 programs that met a few times a week and we worked pretty hard to transition to a model where the 193 00:18:28,960 --> 00:18:34,960 presence of a disability is just another factor to contribute to your program design process and 194 00:18:34,960 --> 00:18:42,160 you can train at whatever time of day or with whoever you choose you would like to so our 195 00:18:42,160 --> 00:18:47,200 wheelchair users with CP like maybe they're most comfortable with other people with disabilities 196 00:18:47,200 --> 00:18:51,440 and there's a few sessions throughout the week where the gym is almost exclusively people with 197 00:18:51,440 --> 00:18:55,920 disabilities and they can choose that but they can also choose other times so I think when 198 00:18:56,720 --> 00:19:02,240 adaptive fitness is just viewed as a program or an initiative and it meets once or twice a week 199 00:19:02,240 --> 00:19:10,080 that's not enough so I guess that's that's I'm kind of advocating I guess when I speak to fitness 200 00:19:10,080 --> 00:19:17,280 professionals to find ways to not allow the disability to be a defining characteristic of 201 00:19:17,280 --> 00:19:22,880 when and how someone trains yeah I mean I like the idea of a comprehensive offering where 202 00:19:23,600 --> 00:19:29,840 people can look at the calendar of the gym and say at this time only disabled people are here 203 00:19:29,840 --> 00:19:36,080 or at this time only autistic people are here and the setting of the gym is designed for 204 00:19:36,080 --> 00:19:41,520 you know the strengths of autistic people or disabled people or whatever group it might be 205 00:19:41,520 --> 00:19:47,440 and if you know if the value of the gym is also to include those integrated programs to make sure 206 00:19:47,440 --> 00:19:53,040 that this is clear and obvious in the schedule you know so that when people show up at the gym 207 00:19:53,040 --> 00:19:57,440 they understand that like here's what's happening at these times you're welcome to join the gym 208 00:19:57,440 --> 00:20:03,360 but you're making that decision yourself like we're not funneling you into our values you're 209 00:20:03,360 --> 00:20:10,560 allowed to pursue your own values within your gym experience is it fine to not be inclusive to 210 00:20:10,560 --> 00:20:19,200 everyone like is there like I I'm probably not competent or uh skilled enough to support 211 00:20:19,760 --> 00:20:25,600 certain levels of spinal cord injury or like I don't have a skill set to be able to do that 212 00:20:25,600 --> 00:20:31,680 I don't have a skill set to help everyone and there's environments in my gym that might not be 213 00:20:31,680 --> 00:20:39,360 ideal for someone who doesn't prefer a lot of sensory stimulation like is it fine to exclude 214 00:20:39,360 --> 00:20:45,840 people on the grounds of this isn't going to be the best place for you or do you think it's fine 215 00:20:45,840 --> 00:20:52,880 I mean that's a personal decision no yeah yeah I think I I would trend towards being transparent 216 00:20:52,880 --> 00:20:58,400 with what the environment is what we can offer and give them the opportunity to decide if if 217 00:20:58,400 --> 00:21:03,600 that's something they want to try yeah I think it would be more dangerous to say we're fully 218 00:21:04,160 --> 00:21:08,320 inclusive depending on what you how you use the word inclusive but we're fully 219 00:21:08,880 --> 00:21:13,600 capable of supporting everybody's needs and then people show up and you can't support those needs 220 00:21:13,600 --> 00:21:18,960 then tell them up here are the people who we know we can support these groups of people 221 00:21:18,960 --> 00:21:25,760 and so that's what we're going to do yeah so for all the years my gym has been around I've referred 222 00:21:25,760 --> 00:21:31,600 to it as an inclusive strengthening conditioning facility um with just inclusion being the primary 223 00:21:31,600 --> 00:21:38,080 word I was familiar with um and it's necessary from a marketing standpoint right like gyms aren't 224 00:21:38,080 --> 00:21:45,120 typically designed with disability in mind so uh until it's the expectation and not the exception 225 00:21:45,120 --> 00:21:50,480 I do think you need to articulate that people with disabilities are welcomed in your space and 226 00:21:50,480 --> 00:21:55,520 inclusion is just kind of the term I know in one of your papers you talk about how it's hard to uh 227 00:21:55,520 --> 00:22:00,000 like hang your hat on a word that's so vague and can mean so many different things but do you think 228 00:22:00,000 --> 00:22:04,480 I should not call it an inclusive strengthening conditioning facility should I call it an integrated 229 00:22:04,480 --> 00:22:09,920 strengthening conditioning facility or I mean I think you should call it whatever you want this 230 00:22:09,920 --> 00:22:14,160 is uh I think if you think from a branding perspective and a marketing perspective calling 231 00:22:14,160 --> 00:22:20,480 something inclusive is typically attractive to people um but you know as you know from the 232 00:22:20,480 --> 00:22:26,640 writing that that I sent you um for me to say something is inclusive is is a promise that 233 00:22:26,640 --> 00:22:32,240 you're making that you might not be able to fulfill so if you're saying everybody who shows 234 00:22:32,240 --> 00:22:37,520 up at your gym is going to feel accepted a sense of belonging and a sense of value every day that 235 00:22:37,520 --> 00:22:42,720 they show up I think you're making a promise that's impossible to keep it doesn't matter disabled 236 00:22:42,720 --> 00:22:50,240 non-disabled um I don't think you can keep that for anybody and so if you're striving toward 237 00:22:50,240 --> 00:22:55,200 inclusion and striving toward those you know meaningful subjective or inter-subjective 238 00:22:55,200 --> 00:23:01,440 experiences I think that's really the only thing you can promise or anybody can promise PE teachers 239 00:23:01,440 --> 00:23:08,080 gym owners you know higher ed faculty you strive toward providing an environment that people can 240 00:23:08,080 --> 00:23:14,720 feel supported accepted have meaningful experiences but to say that it's happening 241 00:23:15,440 --> 00:23:21,920 before anybody even shows up is uh it's difficult yeah yeah and as I was kind of thinking through 242 00:23:21,920 --> 00:23:28,400 what we could do better with goal reviews and client conversations putting more of an emphasis 243 00:23:29,040 --> 00:23:34,720 on that experience and not just the quantifiable performance goals of are you improving your 5k 244 00:23:34,720 --> 00:23:40,480 time are you improving your lifts but looking at the community aspects and the sense of belonging 245 00:23:40,480 --> 00:23:47,520 and value are there scales and assessment protocols that ask these questions and do so effectively 246 00:23:48,080 --> 00:23:53,280 yeah I don't think so um I don't think they exist I've worked with uh well briefly worked 247 00:23:53,280 --> 00:23:58,640 with an AP teacher up in Fairfax County who I think is probably the best one in the country 248 00:23:58,640 --> 00:24:04,000 that I know his name is Brad Wiener and he's put together a website that has resources for PE 249 00:24:04,000 --> 00:24:10,160 teachers to talk to kids about feeling accepted a sense of belonging sense of value I think he does 250 00:24:10,160 --> 00:24:16,640 remarkable work I say we briefly worked together because it didn't take him very long to figure 251 00:24:16,640 --> 00:24:21,360 that stuff out whereas for me it's very difficult to figure out like the practical side of things 252 00:24:22,000 --> 00:24:27,680 but I don't think scales or questionnaires are going to do it I think it's like constant and 253 00:24:27,680 --> 00:24:33,040 consistent engagement with people and so if you know your people as a gym owner and you can talk 254 00:24:33,040 --> 00:24:38,560 to those people not only is that going to enhance the likelihood that they feel accepted and valued 255 00:24:38,560 --> 00:24:45,600 but you also can gather a sense of what is helping them feel accepted but like the sense of belonging 256 00:24:45,600 --> 00:24:51,680 and sense of value it's about meeting and talking with people not about you know just checking some 257 00:24:51,680 --> 00:24:59,600 boxes to say you're inclusive yeah is he at UVA no he's an he's an AP supervisor Fairfax at 258 00:24:59,600 --> 00:25:05,920 county school district okay all right so he's an actual like physically in schools and teaching 259 00:25:05,920 --> 00:25:13,520 AP not not a researcher he's actually working on my committee no because there's a there's a student 260 00:25:13,520 --> 00:25:20,160 from UVA completing his PhD dissertation and he reached out to me last week he's with Dr. Block 261 00:25:20,160 --> 00:25:27,680 and he asked if he could it could develop yeah Matt so his PhD thesis project I guess is going 262 00:25:27,680 --> 00:25:34,160 to be on developing assessment protocols for the course that I teach and so we kind of talked about 263 00:25:34,160 --> 00:25:40,400 what those outcomes would be and it's it's something that I've struggled with so just I guess for 264 00:25:40,400 --> 00:25:45,520 context we teach a course to personal trainers and strength conditioning coaches on how to create 265 00:25:45,520 --> 00:25:49,200 more accessible spaces and more effective programming for people with disabilities and 266 00:25:49,200 --> 00:25:55,360 you can improve confidence I guess but that doesn't mean that they're competent and there's 267 00:25:55,360 --> 00:25:59,680 probably some degree of selection bias if you're looking at like attitudinal beliefs towards 268 00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:03,280 disability that people that seek out my course probably already feel pretty strongly about the 269 00:26:03,280 --> 00:26:08,560 value of disability inclusion so we're trying to figure out I guess what we want to measure 270 00:26:08,560 --> 00:26:14,160 and the primary objective is to create more environments for people with disabilities to 271 00:26:14,160 --> 00:26:18,960 train that's a second order effect to help them get to the level of success that they want to 272 00:26:18,960 --> 00:26:25,920 to us training the trainers who then go and deliver those services so with Michelle actually she had 273 00:26:25,920 --> 00:26:30,720 mentioned like well why don't we interview some of the clients that coaches who've taken your course 274 00:26:31,840 --> 00:26:35,840 and like why don't you why don't you talk to the clients themselves instead of the coaches 275 00:26:36,720 --> 00:26:40,720 to see how they're benefiting from the services that those trainers provide and that would be 276 00:26:40,720 --> 00:26:46,960 good insight into I guess the sense of belonging and value and acceptance that they feel but I'm 277 00:26:46,960 --> 00:26:50,640 interested in how to quantify that I guess maybe it doesn't even need to be quantified but 278 00:26:51,520 --> 00:26:57,040 and I guess that's the that's really the question is why are we quantifying stuff you know why are 279 00:26:57,040 --> 00:27:03,200 you why quantify somebody's personal and lived experience where you know there are stories about 280 00:27:03,200 --> 00:27:09,200 the experience is going to be far more meaningful than just a number saying it was good you know 281 00:27:09,200 --> 00:27:15,200 right like the the color and the gray that you can develop from learning from the person and 282 00:27:15,200 --> 00:27:20,880 listening to what they're saying and not reducing what people think and feel to a number is you know 283 00:27:20,880 --> 00:27:26,560 going to be of much higher quality I think so yeah I would encourage you to talk to the clients and 284 00:27:26,560 --> 00:27:31,280 or engage with a research team and have that research team do the work because you probably 285 00:27:31,280 --> 00:27:36,960 can't and shouldn't do that work being invested in having obviously a conflict of interest with 286 00:27:36,960 --> 00:27:42,320 talking to clients and hoping to get positive results out of it but you know having a research 287 00:27:42,320 --> 00:27:49,040 team come in and speak with you know 20 of your clients to see what those experiences are like 288 00:27:49,040 --> 00:27:55,760 would probably provide to you really valuable information that you wouldn't get from you know 289 00:27:55,760 --> 00:28:02,400 a survey or you know a scale or something of that nature yeah one of the bigger projects I guess 290 00:28:02,400 --> 00:28:10,960 that I hope to tackle is is coming up with some sort of standards or systems to I guess define 291 00:28:10,960 --> 00:28:17,840 it's not the word but to characterize whether a gym is making the appropriate efforts to being 292 00:28:17,840 --> 00:28:22,800 more inclusive and accessible I framed that a different way than I might have framed it before 293 00:28:22,800 --> 00:28:29,120 speaking to you like the standards of how can a gym become inclusive so standards for inclusive 294 00:28:29,120 --> 00:28:37,440 fitness facilities so I guess that's where the the quantifiable stuff seems like it's relevant 295 00:28:37,440 --> 00:28:44,480 but maybe it's it's not well I think I think the way you word it is is it's fun to to pick apart 296 00:28:44,480 --> 00:28:52,480 right so is it about effort to be inclusive or or is it about people feeling included because if 297 00:28:52,480 --> 00:28:56,960 it's about effort I mean you know I could put a lot of effort into pushing a wall over but that 298 00:28:56,960 --> 00:29:02,320 wall is probably never going to move I'm not strong enough to move it but you know if you 299 00:29:02,320 --> 00:29:08,960 if you want to measure whether people feel included or what they can what can be done to have kids or 300 00:29:08,960 --> 00:29:14,800 have people feel included I actually again think listening to the people is the way to go and 301 00:29:14,800 --> 00:29:21,120 perhaps you know engaging in some sort of project where you're working with the clientele to develop 302 00:29:21,120 --> 00:29:25,680 that framework and they can essentially tell you exactly what you need to do in order to 303 00:29:25,680 --> 00:29:32,240 support feelings of inclusion within your settings you know of course gains and like gyms are about 304 00:29:32,240 --> 00:29:39,040 games right drinking protein shake you know bench pressing all that stuff and that's important stuff 305 00:29:39,040 --> 00:29:44,000 as well but to me if you want to make a gym environment inclusive then it's about talking 306 00:29:44,000 --> 00:29:49,760 to the clients and asking them what can be done or what is being done that makes you feel welcomed 307 00:29:49,760 --> 00:29:55,440 here and then you can develop your whole framework on what an inclusive fitness facility is and 308 00:29:55,440 --> 00:30:01,600 what an inclusive gym feels like based on the voices of and opinions and experiences of your clients 309 00:30:02,720 --> 00:30:10,400 yeah that's a good idea I think like so addressing obviously ADA standards as the base level and then 310 00:30:11,280 --> 00:30:18,000 going beyond that and having consistent conversations and a feedback loop and a 311 00:30:18,000 --> 00:30:23,200 performance improvement plan type of thing where you're addressing the barriers and the issues 312 00:30:23,200 --> 00:30:28,800 of creating a lack of a sense of belonging or acceptance yeah I think there's a there are 313 00:30:28,800 --> 00:30:33,600 qualitative methodologies that people talk about like either participatory research or 314 00:30:33,600 --> 00:30:39,520 co-production research depending on you know who you're talking to and like what specific 315 00:30:39,520 --> 00:30:45,840 particularities of the research that you'd want to do in order to construct like these recommendations 316 00:30:45,840 --> 00:30:52,000 or criteria or what have you but there's ways to do it it takes a lot of work but the outcome if 317 00:30:52,000 --> 00:30:57,440 well and you're working with those clients that you're talking about I mean you could have 318 00:30:57,440 --> 00:31:03,520 something that's very unique that doesn't exist elsewhere because honestly I don't think people 319 00:31:03,520 --> 00:31:09,680 take the time to listen to and develop ideas with clients I think instead it's easier to 320 00:31:09,680 --> 00:31:14,240 think about and develop those ideas without them and then apply it and hope that it works 321 00:31:14,240 --> 00:31:20,880 yeah yeah that's where we've been revising and rewriting courses alongside people with disabilities 322 00:31:20,880 --> 00:31:26,080 who are either sharing their lift experiences in gyms or they're sharing their expertise or 323 00:31:26,080 --> 00:31:31,920 subject matter expertise on various topics but what is your vision I guess for an ideal 324 00:31:32,800 --> 00:31:39,760 physical education class or environment oh I don't have a vision for an ideal class I don't 325 00:31:39,760 --> 00:31:47,840 think that's reasonable I think for me people entering PE and exiting feeling like they can 326 00:31:47,840 --> 00:31:54,480 be active as adults is the objective and I don't really care what it looks like I think that's what 327 00:31:54,480 --> 00:32:00,160 it has what we need so when we look at national shape standards or national shape objective 328 00:32:00,160 --> 00:32:06,080 shape is our our national organization shape America the objective is to help people develop 329 00:32:06,080 --> 00:32:14,000 into physically literate adults and I think oftentimes that's the goal of PE for non-disabled 330 00:32:14,000 --> 00:32:20,320 kids and I think oftentimes among adapted PE people the goal ends up being how do we get our 331 00:32:20,320 --> 00:32:26,480 kids into the gym instead of how do we have our kids reach that same or aim toward that same 332 00:32:26,480 --> 00:32:31,520 objective becoming physical literate adults and so there were definitely times that I thought 333 00:32:31,520 --> 00:32:37,920 differently about this but today my thinking is that I don't really care what PE looks like 334 00:32:37,920 --> 00:32:43,760 and I think we should think beyond what PE currently looks like but for me the goal has to 335 00:32:43,760 --> 00:32:48,800 be developing physically literate adults and so how do we do that the best possible way for every 336 00:32:48,800 --> 00:32:53,280 kid I don't think there's an answer to that question I think cognitive flexibility is really 337 00:32:53,280 --> 00:32:58,160 important on the teacher end and engagement with the kids is really important to help develop the 338 00:32:58,160 --> 00:33:05,280 best strategies for reaching that goal but should each kid have the same path toward that goal I 339 00:33:05,280 --> 00:33:13,200 don't I don't think that's a thing that I could I could say yeah and and you see in youth and 340 00:33:13,200 --> 00:33:17,840 adolescence that people with disabilities tend to be more active during the school day and then 341 00:33:17,840 --> 00:33:24,240 less active on the weekends and then significantly less active into adulthood because I guess the 342 00:33:24,240 --> 00:33:29,200 opportunities aren't there to continue to be physically active because of transportation 343 00:33:29,200 --> 00:33:34,640 barriers and all the other socioeconomic barriers that people with disabilities might feel like 344 00:33:34,640 --> 00:33:40,560 disabilities might face into adulthood so it is interesting I haven't really thought of it as 345 00:33:40,560 --> 00:33:48,080 physical education the experiences in physical education through school is what might incentivize 346 00:33:48,080 --> 00:33:53,760 or motivate someone once they graduate once they turn 22 plus and they age out of the school system 347 00:33:53,760 --> 00:33:59,680 if if they're on that track or if they go to university but they to be more active into 348 00:33:59,680 --> 00:34:07,040 adulthood I guess so PE is almost a segue into kind of what I do at a gym I mean it should be 349 00:34:07,040 --> 00:34:13,200 that should be the goal of PE I mean no different than learning math in school going back to math 350 00:34:13,200 --> 00:34:20,880 like you don't learn math in school so that when you graduate you don't math don't engage with 351 00:34:20,880 --> 00:34:26,720 mathematics right you never do math again right yeah just ends or you know english like you don't 352 00:34:26,720 --> 00:34:31,120 learn how to write so that you never ever write again like it's all taught so that you could be 353 00:34:31,120 --> 00:34:37,600 functioning members of society the point of PE is not so you play sports and run around as a child 354 00:34:37,600 --> 00:34:43,440 and so that you have the skills and the interest and the passion to be physically active into 355 00:34:43,440 --> 00:34:51,200 adulthood and throughout the lifespan and so what you do with adults should absolutely be the segue 356 00:34:51,200 --> 00:34:57,680 or it should be a segue from PE it should build from what's done in PE and perhaps PE needs to 357 00:34:57,680 --> 00:35:04,320 look at what you're doing and then reverse chain down with kids or help teach them to generalize 358 00:35:04,320 --> 00:35:09,760 what they're doing into settings like that that you work in so that that lifelong physical activity 359 00:35:09,760 --> 00:35:16,640 can can continue yeah I wonder how that would change the curriculum and what's taught like 360 00:35:16,640 --> 00:35:21,760 whether you have to learn all these different sport skills whether you have to have a unit on 361 00:35:21,760 --> 00:35:28,560 uh badminton or whether there's better ways I guess to encourage people to be physically active 362 00:35:28,560 --> 00:35:32,640 well like how many people have played badminton because yeah I guess that's why it was one of the 363 00:35:32,640 --> 00:35:36,240 first things that kind of came to mind like it might be helpful to learn how to kick a ball and 364 00:35:36,240 --> 00:35:43,360 throw a ball etc for a lot of different sports but um let's trash badminton I probably played four 365 00:35:43,360 --> 00:35:48,880 times in my adult life you know for I played zero so you got me yeah but you know I go to the gym 366 00:35:48,880 --> 00:35:54,080 every morning I mean maybe not effectively but I go every morning right and like I learned how to 367 00:35:54,080 --> 00:35:59,840 lift when I was in a high school weight training class and so that likely is the only high school 368 00:35:59,840 --> 00:36:06,320 PE experience that I functionally use on a daily basis now I still like to engage in sports and 369 00:36:06,320 --> 00:36:12,400 you know I was playing basketball up until I had ACL surgery last spring so like some of those like 370 00:36:12,400 --> 00:36:18,880 interests and passion in sports probably got developed in PE but functionally like the weight 371 00:36:18,880 --> 00:36:25,280 training skills that I learned transitioned really well to going to the gym after almost like it to 372 00:36:25,280 --> 00:36:30,720 me it almost seems like new partnering with high schools in the area and helping them learn how to 373 00:36:30,720 --> 00:36:38,320 teach you know fitness to disabled children in high school is like the goal like that would reach 374 00:36:38,320 --> 00:36:44,080 the goal of developing physically literate people afterwards yeah yeah absolutely I mean we've always 375 00:36:44,640 --> 00:36:51,760 kind of viewed one of our roles to be the bridge between like PE I think that's a misconception 376 00:36:51,760 --> 00:36:57,920 sorry PT that's a misconception that I I write about a little bit maybe misconceptions too strong 377 00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:04,480 because it implies that I have some unequivocal truth that's the opposite but like that PT 378 00:37:04,480 --> 00:37:09,280 shouldn't be reserved or activity for people with disabilities shouldn't be reserved for PT 379 00:37:09,920 --> 00:37:14,560 if the only opportunity that people with disabilities have to train is physical therapy 380 00:37:14,560 --> 00:37:19,680 then they're never going to meet the CDC's levels of daily recommended physical activity so just this 381 00:37:19,680 --> 00:37:25,920 idea that disabled is not synonymous with injury and there's obviously things that I can't do the 382 00:37:25,920 --> 00:37:30,240 physical therapist can do but that doesn't mean that I can't try to start supporting people with 383 00:37:30,240 --> 00:37:35,760 disabilities and kind of welcoming into our environment and then learning alongside them but 384 00:37:36,480 --> 00:37:41,360 language is a big piece of what you write about obviously the definition of inclusion 385 00:37:41,360 --> 00:37:47,760 versus integrated and other things special needs is something that pops up more recently in my 386 00:37:47,760 --> 00:37:52,640 world just people not being fond of special education and special needs as terms do you 387 00:37:52,640 --> 00:38:02,640 have any visceral reactions to that I mean not not anything that's profound I don't understand 388 00:38:02,640 --> 00:38:07,360 why special needs I don't know the history of special needs as a term maybe that's something 389 00:38:07,360 --> 00:38:12,560 I need to think about more and read about more before having like a really sound opinion on it 390 00:38:12,560 --> 00:38:20,400 I know it doesn't feel right I'm thinking about disabled people who I talk to on a regular basis 391 00:38:20,400 --> 00:38:25,120 and thinking about how they would react to me saying that they have special needs would be a 392 00:38:25,120 --> 00:38:30,720 pretty interesting conversation I think I probably would curse that or yell that yeah well from what 393 00:38:30,720 --> 00:38:35,360 I've heard it's like I don't want my needs to be viewed as special I want them to be viewed as 394 00:38:35,360 --> 00:38:41,840 basic human rights so and then you see special ed special education I still see a lot of parents 395 00:38:41,840 --> 00:38:47,680 of people with disabilities refer to their kids as special needs or sped students which is interesting 396 00:38:47,680 --> 00:38:52,960 but maybe that's just a generational thing and just what they've become accustomed to over the 397 00:38:52,960 --> 00:38:57,920 years and maybe it will take years to reverse some of that stuff but yeah it was just something that 398 00:38:57,920 --> 00:39:02,960 came to mind when you think of special education and special needs students well I think with 399 00:39:02,960 --> 00:39:06,960 language generally it takes a lot of time to change language it takes a lot of time to change 400 00:39:06,960 --> 00:39:13,040 ideas and so like for us to have an idea perhaps the idea is to discontinue the phrase special 401 00:39:13,040 --> 00:39:18,480 needs I don't think this like that like you know the inclusion stuff it's not overnight stuff like 402 00:39:18,480 --> 00:39:24,400 this is like teaching generations of people to think differently about the way they talk about 403 00:39:24,400 --> 00:39:30,320 disabled people and allowing that to seep down generations so that that becomes you know the new 404 00:39:30,320 --> 00:39:36,400 phraseology when thinking about or talking about or speaking with disabled people but with that 405 00:39:36,400 --> 00:39:42,400 being said by the time that is reproduced across generations it probably changes a lot more 406 00:39:42,400 --> 00:39:48,320 probably changes again that's the other thing it's like we need to be very reflective and 407 00:39:48,320 --> 00:39:55,840 responsive to changes in the way people talk and think about disability and yeah because if we're 408 00:39:55,840 --> 00:40:04,640 not then we will you know get left behind at some point yeah if you're trying to sell inclusion or 409 00:40:04,640 --> 00:40:11,680 these concepts of inclusion to a PE teacher how how would you convince general education 410 00:40:11,680 --> 00:40:17,360 physical education teacher that they need to learn about these ideas no that's not my job man 411 00:40:18,240 --> 00:40:27,120 I don't you know I think there was a time that I was thinking about like how do we get these ideas 412 00:40:27,120 --> 00:40:34,560 in front of people and I think that ideas are ideas and what I write about is ideas and scholarship 413 00:40:34,560 --> 00:40:42,720 I write our ideas and thoughts and perspectives and I don't think it's it's not who I am to push 414 00:40:42,720 --> 00:40:48,800 my own agenda I don't want my agenda to be misconscued as truth these are perspectives and 415 00:40:48,800 --> 00:40:55,520 ideas and there's people who have conflicting ideas and so I won't spend time you know selling 416 00:40:55,520 --> 00:41:00,560 stuff to people I won't go to conferences and try to sell this idea if somebody asks me to talk 417 00:41:00,560 --> 00:41:06,960 about it I'll talk about it with Brad again like he and I worked on some resources for teachers a 418 00:41:06,960 --> 00:41:12,240 few years ago there was a person named Matt up in Fairfax as well not the Matt you're talking 419 00:41:12,240 --> 00:41:18,000 about a different Matt there's loads of Matt's in Virginia who made a video for us just explaining 420 00:41:18,000 --> 00:41:24,720 what we meant by inclusion but I think you know maybe I'm misunderstanding or over emphasizing 421 00:41:24,720 --> 00:41:30,560 the selling piece but I think we as a field oftentimes are trying to sell ideology and trying 422 00:41:30,560 --> 00:41:35,840 to sell our own perspective as truth and that's just not who I am what I believe is what I believe 423 00:41:35,840 --> 00:41:41,600 it's not a universal truth it might not be a universal truth but it's the concept that people 424 00:41:41,600 --> 00:41:46,400 should be exposed to if you've if you never heard about it I had never heard about it when I was 425 00:41:46,400 --> 00:41:56,640 starting my gym if you taught me it when I was 22 I would have expedited the developments that I've 426 00:41:56,640 --> 00:42:02,560 made over the years so while you say it might not be your job to sell it I'm not sure whose job it 427 00:42:02,560 --> 00:42:09,280 would be it's nobody's job so you're on the forefront of this idea that could positively 428 00:42:09,280 --> 00:42:13,680 benefit a lot of people with disabilities so why would you not try to get more people to adopt it 429 00:42:13,680 --> 00:42:18,320 you know I also don't know if I'm on the forefront so like the first time I saw inclusion as 430 00:42:18,320 --> 00:42:26,000 subjective experiences in papers was I believe it was 2010 Nancy Spencer from University of Alberta 431 00:42:26,000 --> 00:42:32,800 wrote about it and I was like this is I love this like this is incredibly like smart and thoughtful 432 00:42:32,800 --> 00:42:39,280 and this this disabled person centric focus you know I also learned about like the differences 433 00:42:39,280 --> 00:42:44,720 between integrated and inclusive PE from different people I saw a presentation in Brazil years ago 434 00:42:44,720 --> 00:42:50,400 about this and so what I've done is just moved things forward I've kicked the can down the road 435 00:42:50,400 --> 00:42:54,960 per se as far as like developing the ideas and probably writing a little more about it 436 00:42:56,160 --> 00:43:00,720 but this is it's also still relatively new I mean the first paper I wrote about inclusion I think 437 00:43:00,720 --> 00:43:08,560 was in 2019 so that's only five years ago and then we've written a bunch of that since whose job is 438 00:43:08,560 --> 00:43:14,800 it to sell it I don't I don't know if it's anybody's job to sell it again you know we we if you start 439 00:43:14,800 --> 00:43:23,120 selling ideas or pushing ideas too far the problem becomes that you're trying to recolonize knowledge 440 00:43:23,120 --> 00:43:28,400 with your own knowledge and your own ideas I very much believe that we should share our ideas we 441 00:43:28,400 --> 00:43:33,760 should publish ideas and thoughts but it's up to the consumers to decide whether or not to implement 442 00:43:33,760 --> 00:43:42,480 ideas based on these thoughts it's not researchers job to push things to sell ideas some people do 443 00:43:42,480 --> 00:43:48,240 it some people spend a lot of time trying to sell that's who I am yeah I can appreciate that and I 444 00:43:48,240 --> 00:43:52,480 definitely respect that but though the woman that you referenced that started writing about in 2010 445 00:43:52,480 --> 00:43:57,360 like if she adopted that same perspective of it's not my responsibility to change this then these 446 00:43:57,360 --> 00:44:05,760 ideas just live in the silo of people that are already doing these things but it doesn't spread 447 00:44:05,760 --> 00:44:11,360 to people that aren't doing them so yeah but who's to say that these the ideas that those people 448 00:44:11,360 --> 00:44:17,280 should adopt I haven't come across a better one than how you articulate inclusion oh well thanks 449 00:44:17,280 --> 00:44:24,640 but I mean again Nancy's the one that started that idea and I think I'm sure Nancy Nancy and a lot of 450 00:44:24,640 --> 00:44:33,040 people have influenced you so I also appreciate that recognition but like I think it's it's an 451 00:44:33,040 --> 00:44:38,080 idea that's worth exploring and worth implementing if there's always a disconnect between those who 452 00:44:38,080 --> 00:44:44,400 do research and those who impact the people on the ground then the idea is never no no and I agree 453 00:44:44,400 --> 00:44:50,640 with you there I think that having having mechanisms to talk with people who are in the field who are 454 00:44:50,640 --> 00:44:55,120 practicing in the field is it's critical and that's why I started working with Brad these are 455 00:44:55,120 --> 00:44:59,520 conversations Brad and I had where I believe he said these are cool ideas but it doesn't mean 456 00:44:59,520 --> 00:45:04,720 anything for us and I thought okay well let's work together to figure out what it means for you and 457 00:45:04,720 --> 00:45:10,560 so those resources have been developed and you know again have worked with people when those 458 00:45:11,360 --> 00:45:16,320 um when those requests have been made so there's never been a time that teachers or school districts 459 00:45:16,320 --> 00:45:21,280 or the state of Virginia for example has acceptance belonging and value in their state learning 460 00:45:21,280 --> 00:45:27,440 objectives for PE now there's never been a time where I've said no to sharing the idea but selling 461 00:45:27,440 --> 00:45:34,800 the idea is different because selling means I'm pursuing profit or I'm pursuing capital yeah I 462 00:45:34,800 --> 00:45:38,960 guess I did I when I said selling I guess I I'm more so from the lens of how are you going to 463 00:45:38,960 --> 00:45:44,240 convince people to adopt these things and implement them for maybe no benefit of your own outside of 464 00:45:44,240 --> 00:45:49,360 you would want to see the fruits of your labor benefit people with disabilities yeah I think 465 00:45:49,360 --> 00:45:56,080 with that it's been a long process of trying to develop resources but it's also not my skill set 466 00:45:56,080 --> 00:46:01,680 um one of you brought up Marty earlier Marty Block from UVA and one of my favorite conversations 467 00:46:01,680 --> 00:46:08,800 with Marty is about like he's he's so much better than I am at figuring out how to share ideas in 468 00:46:08,800 --> 00:46:15,680 consumable ways that teachers will adopt them whereas I am like you know flying around like 469 00:46:15,680 --> 00:46:21,680 a space cadet in an old Looney Tune movie right or a Looney Tune show and so he actually wrote a paper 470 00:46:21,680 --> 00:46:28,240 in palestro which is the journal he edits which is for practitioners explaining inclusion as a 471 00:46:28,240 --> 00:46:34,560 subjective experience and acceptance belonging value and I loved it because like to me being 472 00:46:34,560 --> 00:46:41,280 able to translate that information to that particular market is critical but it's not 473 00:46:41,280 --> 00:46:46,400 something that I work really well at I would need to work with practitioners in order to understand 474 00:46:46,400 --> 00:46:52,080 their context to translate what we're thinking conceptually to what they want to do practically 475 00:46:52,880 --> 00:46:59,840 yeah well we quoted your definition of inclusion in a NIH grant application for the value of our 476 00:46:59,840 --> 00:47:05,040 program so hopefully we can hopefully we can implement it into the into the fitness space in 477 00:47:05,040 --> 00:47:11,680 some ways how do you think the fitness industry at large or as a whole could be more inclusive 478 00:47:11,680 --> 00:47:17,200 and accessible for people with disabilities um I think the fitness industry should be talking to 479 00:47:18,240 --> 00:47:24,880 disabled people more um I think our industry the adaptive physical activity piece is like has 480 00:47:24,880 --> 00:47:29,840 shifted considerably in that direction there's a lot of people now that this is like the core of 481 00:47:29,840 --> 00:47:34,880 their research and the core of their scholarship is centered on disabled people and I think there 482 00:47:34,880 --> 00:47:39,680 are a lot of newer people who are doing a lot better job than I do and that I can do with it 483 00:47:39,680 --> 00:47:46,320 and so we're seeing a lot of really cool pushes toward further um centering disabled people in 484 00:47:46,320 --> 00:47:53,520 decisions and adaptive physical activity in the fitness space I've seen a lot less um and that's 485 00:47:53,520 --> 00:47:58,080 not to say it's not happening because you know I don't see everything I don't know everything 486 00:47:58,080 --> 00:48:05,680 that's going on of course I'm a human but I think that um to learn about fitness facilities that are 487 00:48:05,680 --> 00:48:11,200 co-designed with disabled people would be really interesting and to see scholarship on it because 488 00:48:11,200 --> 00:48:17,840 I think while doing it is important and doing it is going to have an impact locally I think 489 00:48:17,840 --> 00:48:24,400 scholarship on it the research on it but also like the concepts and theories on it and on paper 490 00:48:24,400 --> 00:48:29,760 allows it to then spread faster and a wide to a wider space than just doing it locally 491 00:48:30,960 --> 00:48:36,960 yeah absolutely are there any projects at ODU or that you're working on that you're particularly 492 00:48:36,960 --> 00:48:43,760 excited about in the in the coming years now we are always doing something um right now I think 493 00:48:43,760 --> 00:48:48,160 the most exciting stuff is the stuff our PhD students are working on they each have very 494 00:48:48,160 --> 00:48:55,600 different perspectives there's um four full-time students two part-time students each doing really 495 00:48:55,600 --> 00:48:59,680 interesting stuff I'm not going to go too deep into it because I don't know if they want me 496 00:48:59,680 --> 00:49:06,320 sharing their stuff yeah but that's been really cool we're we have a grant application out for 497 00:49:06,320 --> 00:49:12,240 something I'm quite excited about which is developing a PE curriculum with blind and visually 498 00:49:12,240 --> 00:49:18,640 impaired kids to be disseminated to PE teachers so allowing them to help construct what those 499 00:49:18,640 --> 00:49:24,000 experiences should look like we're hoping to hear back soon of whether or not we got the funds to 500 00:49:24,000 --> 00:49:30,560 execute that project and I think that's the beginning that to us is going to be a model 501 00:49:30,560 --> 00:49:38,320 for how we want to help develop and suggest PE curriculum and adaptations and all that good stuff 502 00:49:38,320 --> 00:49:44,640 for the future instead of non-disabled faculty making statements about what should happen in PE 503 00:49:44,640 --> 00:49:50,720 we're trying to bring together groups of kids and kids with various disabilities to make those 504 00:49:50,720 --> 00:49:56,800 recommendations maybe quickly kind of tangent off of that do you think having people without 505 00:49:56,800 --> 00:50:04,400 disabilities experience adaptive sports like beat baseball by wearing a blindfold or by having that 506 00:50:04,400 --> 00:50:11,680 sense removed is acceptable I've seen I've seen contradictory thoughts on disability simulations 507 00:50:12,240 --> 00:50:15,440 yeah that's a good question so we've done quite a bit of work on 508 00:50:17,760 --> 00:50:24,640 research on disability simulations I work with a guy named Anthony Maher in the UK on a lot of it 509 00:50:24,640 --> 00:50:31,600 he's done more work than I have in that area I think at this stage I would so I've spoken to 510 00:50:31,600 --> 00:50:37,440 we've spoken to blind or visually impaired people about this and because of the research we've done 511 00:50:37,440 --> 00:50:44,240 I would hesitate to think that that's a high quality experience I don't know I think there's 512 00:50:44,240 --> 00:50:49,760 this perception that you learn what it's like to be blind by being blindfolded which I think is a 513 00:50:49,760 --> 00:50:55,040 really difficult thing to state because you can't really learn how to actually embody blindness just 514 00:50:55,040 --> 00:51:02,480 from 30 minutes in a blindfold right yeah so the message is really difficult for the participants 515 00:51:02,480 --> 00:51:11,360 to get um on with that said I mean people still do this constantly so you know yeah I guess I 516 00:51:12,000 --> 00:51:17,600 the idea that disability is kind of a transient state I could see being seen as offensive like 517 00:51:17,600 --> 00:51:22,880 it could be offensive to someone um who's in a wheelchair when someone comes up to him says oh 518 00:51:22,880 --> 00:51:27,760 yeah I feel yeah I broke my leg back in middle school and they're like yeah you don't feel me 519 00:51:27,760 --> 00:51:32,800 um but like I just I wonder if adaptive sports being integrated into general PE 520 00:51:33,520 --> 00:51:38,080 curriculums can be beneficial I know from a motor learning standpoint and like movement variability 521 00:51:38,080 --> 00:51:43,440 it can be uh even if it's like only being able to use one hand when you play basketball and 522 00:51:43,440 --> 00:51:47,760 and that could be beneficial for the students with hemiplegia that that's their everyday life 523 00:51:47,760 --> 00:51:52,560 and then they're participating equally with their peers but like at our 5k this past June we had a 524 00:51:52,560 --> 00:51:58,400 beat baseball clinic where a beat baseball team came and they they had some of my athletes without 525 00:51:58,400 --> 00:52:03,600 disabilities try to sprint to a base a beeping base with a blindfold on and try to hit a ball and 526 00:52:04,640 --> 00:52:07,600 it was an interesting experience and I enjoyed watching my kids kind of 527 00:52:08,320 --> 00:52:14,960 gain a different appreciation for adaptive sports as different not less but I wonder if it is a 528 00:52:14,960 --> 00:52:21,280 blessed or offensive in any ways I think it can be and I think it's about messaging right so if it's 529 00:52:21,280 --> 00:52:24,640 you're going to learn what it's like to be blind or you're going to learn what it's like to be a 530 00:52:24,640 --> 00:52:32,000 wheelchair user that's just that's simply not true but if it's we want to introduce sports to you 531 00:52:32,000 --> 00:52:36,720 and you're introducing a series of sports and some of those sports happen to be disability sports 532 00:52:37,440 --> 00:52:41,520 but you're not saying this is what it's like to be blind you're saying we're going to play 533 00:52:41,520 --> 00:52:45,840 beat baseball here are the rules here's the functions behind it here's why we're doing it 534 00:52:45,840 --> 00:52:51,600 I think that makes a lot more sense yeah I like that yeah but but if yeah if you start saying this 535 00:52:51,600 --> 00:52:56,240 is what it's like to be blind when you put a blindfold on someone for 15 minutes I mean that's 536 00:52:56,240 --> 00:53:01,760 probably I would assume that's going to offend some people yeah yeah I think that's a fair 537 00:53:01,760 --> 00:53:08,480 assumption uh well Justin it was uh it was an honor to talk to you uh these are all concepts that 538 00:53:08,480 --> 00:53:13,120 are really important to me hopefully I was able to articulate them in a way that was somewhat 539 00:53:13,120 --> 00:53:18,960 coherent uh throughout the conversation but I think gyms could benefit from learning from the 540 00:53:18,960 --> 00:53:24,480 ape space um and specifically the ideas that you that you write about whether you want to 541 00:53:25,120 --> 00:53:29,360 sell them to people or not I think they're worth selling so uh thanks for the time this morning 542 00:53:29,360 --> 00:53:33,200 yeah no my pleasure and yeah I'm not going to sell them but you're welcome you're welcome 543 00:53:33,920 --> 00:53:40,320 and you know I think for those people in the the gym space the fitness space there's loads of 544 00:53:40,320 --> 00:53:45,840 research and loads of work to be done in those areas and and centering it on inclusion or 545 00:53:45,840 --> 00:53:51,360 exclusion as these interests objective or interest objective experiences would be quite interesting 546 00:53:51,360 --> 00:53:56,080 it's just something that you know has to happen we are grateful for the support of our first show 547 00:53:56,080 --> 00:54:01,200 sponsor resolution fitness offers leading brand health club equipment and accessories for residential 548 00:54:01,200 --> 00:54:05,680 and commercial use in addition to traditional exercise equipment they specialize in adaptive 549 00:54:05,680 --> 00:54:09,680 fitness products and wheelchair accessible machines if you're interested in outfitting your 550 00:54:09,680 --> 00:54:16,320 fitness facility or home gym to be more accessible visit www.resolutionfitness.ca or the link in the 551 00:54:16,320 --> 00:54:43,200 show notes below you