Center for Online Learning and Students with Disabilities

COLSD researchers have released the most comprehensive study of its kind on online education for K-12 students with disabilities. It provides up-to-date research and policy information on the state of such educational offerings in all 50 states and five territories—making this study essential for educators and policymakers. [...] More

Readers who come to this report with questions about the reality of preparing teachers to support students with disabilities in virtual environments will gain understandings about the intricacies of teacher preparation as well as an appreciation for the efforts of teacher educators as they take up this work. [...] More

We are seeking parents with children in grades 2-8 who are currently (or within the past year) educated in fully online learning environments. [...] More

On January 28, 2016, the Center released Invited In: Measuring UDL Design in Online Learning. This report on K-12 online learning explores and evaluates alignment to the Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework among selected online learning product vendors. Invited In assists online developers, administrators, teachers, and parents [...] More

On Tuesday, November 10, 2015, The Center released its 2015 Annual Report, Equity Matters: Digital and Online Learning for Students with Disabilities. From a variety of research inquiries--national scans, forums, surveys, interviews, observations, and data analysis involving various stakeholders in K-12 online learning [...] More

The Center continues to reach out to groups who are directly engaged in or impacted by the involvement of students with disabilities in online learning. The presence of these students in full-time virtual, blended or supplemental coursework challenges us to re-consider special education in new contexts. Do practices effective in brick and mortar settings work [...] More

While digital versions of print instructional materials have significantly expanded both access and usability, the majority of curriculum materials digital from the outset – both commercial and open resources – are, ironically, more rigid and less adaptable to retrofitting than their print counterparts. Progress is being made, often following a civil rights complaint or lawsuit [...] More

During the past three years the Center has been exploring the experience of K-12 students with disabilities in online learning: those involved in full-time virtual schooling, those taking supplemental online coursework, and, predominantly, those involved in Blended Learning environments. Our guiding focus has been to explore the intersection of student, context and system design [...] More

Here’s how you do it – enroll in an online program, stay with it and you will progress nicely and even make some great achievement – right? Well, maybe not! It’s a little like the “Wizard of Oz” in that we’re following this “yellow brick road” – but do we know where we’re going?  Dorothy had [...] More

  The following is a Proceedings Document based on Focus Group held at the NASDSE Annual Conference, October 2012. Two years ago, state directors of special education gave the Center some direction for our research. They indicated their need to have definitions of online learning and to learn more about online learning in regards to [...] More