Support for Families: Many families of children with disabilities face barriers to communication, transportation, and inclusion. What steps will you take to strengthen collaboration between schools and families, ensuring their voices are central in decision-making?

October 8, 2025 locke.spencer@gmail.com

My experience on parent councils has shown me that there are many parents willing to help identify solutions for specific cases and help to bridge many of these barriers. I want to support the schools and local school communities to identify local needs and have means to address them. There are likely many simple solutions that just need a bit more attention to realize. For example, we have experienced difficulty in our family with just getting a parent teacher interview slot. Not having that timely access to the teacher meant that my daughter was unable to get the supports that she needed at a critical time in her development. Fortunately we were able to get things sorted out eventually and the teachers at the school were very happy to help once the scope of the needs were understood.