How to Conduct a Virtual or In-Person Hill Visit: Building Champions to End Seclusion and Restraint

Interested in learning how to advocate for federal legislation prohibiting the use of restraint and seclusion in schools? Join us for a virtual training by two experts in federal advocacy on how to engage in this advocacy on Capitol Hill. All skill levels are welcome!

As a Partner at Stride Policy Solutions, Laura Kaloi provides strategic policy, advocacy, partnership-building, and communications expertise to nonprofit clients and is a leader in the education, disability, and child advocacy communities. She advises clients on policy and advocacy issues impacting children and families. Laura has a deep passion for improving access to education, career training, and independent living for all individuals. She has written and spoken extensively on federal education, special education, and workforce laws. Prior to becoming a consultant, Laura led the public affairs teams for nonprofit policy and advocacy organizations, including the National Center for Learning Disabilities, the American Health Quality Association, and HealthInsight. She worked in the U.S. Congress early in her career as a legislative assistant to the late U.S. Congressman James V. Hansen. Laura holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Utah and a master’s in public administration from Brigham Young University.

Cyrus Huncharek is the Policy and Advocacy Director for the National Down Syndrome Congress. Before joining NDSC, Cyrus was a Senior Public Policy Analyst at the National Disability Rights Network (NDRN) where he oversaw several policy areas impacting people with disabilities. Prior to his work at NDRN, Cyrus worked as a Government Affairs Coordinator for the National Parent Teacher Association (National PTA), taught high school English in South Dakota through Teach For America, and served as a Learning and Development intern for the White House Office of Administration where he developed e-learning courses for executive office employees. He holds a B.A. in Government from the University of Texas at Austin. Cyrus’ experience as a classroom teacher and prior work on special education policy motivates him to now work toward an improved world for individuals with Down syndrome.

Transcript

Guy Stephens  0:13  
Well, hello and welcome. And it is a Monday and we are almost never here on Monday and you are in for a special treat today we've got a great live training that we're going to be doing today. So if you're on with us live, thanks for being here, I think you're going to enjoy what we're going to be doing today. Just to give you a little background, my name is Guy Stevens, I'm the founder and executive director of the alliance against seclusion restraint, you probably know who we are, we are an organization advocating to end the use of seclusion reduce the use of restraint. But even beyond that, you know, reducing things like suspensions, expulsion, corporal punishment, all the things often done to kids very often in the name of behavior. I am really excited today, we have a special a special event in line today. And it is a live training event with a couple of amazing experts. So many of you that follow us have heard probably about the keeping all students SAFE Act, you're gonna learn a little bit more about what that is, and how you can get involved advocating for a bill like the keeping officer. That's a fact. So we're really lucky to have a couple of experts here today to share our training event. Before I get started in introducing our experts, I do want to ask you, if you would any of you that have been here before you know the drill and tell us in the chat, who you are and where you're from. And we'd love to see where people are joining us from today. So with that, let me get to the really great part here. Let me go ahead and bring up on the stage with me here, a couple of amazing folks, people that I'm lucky enough to have had the opportunity to work with that I would call friends and colleagues that are out there doing amazing work. I want to introduce you to both Lorelai and I have Cyrus, you know, I realized that I sort of say your last name, I'm probably going to get it wrong. You're you're letting me suffer here for a second. On a wreck. In my close hunch, Eric, but I then check okay, well, okay, I just realized that as we were getting here that I've never said it out loud. And then suddenly, it seemed like, Oh, I've gotta gotta figure that out. So let me tell you a little bit about both Cyrus and Laura. I'll begin with Laura. And, you know, I'll say that I had the opportunity to first meet Laura, actually attending Capitol Hill visit. So this is a really interesting connection point here. So as a partner at stride rate policy solutions, Laura provides strategic policy advocacy, partnership, building communication expertise to nonprofit clients, and is a leader in the education, disability and child advocacy communities. She advises clients on policy and advocacy issues impacting children and families. Laura has a deep passion for improving access to education, career training in independent living for all individuals. She has written and spoken extensively on federal education, special education and workforce laws. Prior to becoming a consultant, Laura led a public affairs team for a nonprofit policy and advocacy organizations, including the National Center for Learning Disabilities, the American Health Quality Association, Health Insights, and she's worked in the US Congress early in her career as a legislative assistant, and the late US Congressman James V. Hansen. And Laura holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Utah and a Master's in Public Administration at Brigham Young University. Laura also serves as a co chair of the appraise Coalition, which is part of why we're bringing this to you here today, and we'll talk more about appraisal in a minute. And as the federal policy advisor for the council's apparents attorneys and advocates, COPPA and the Center for learner equity, and Laura is an amazing advocate who has been doing incredible work for, you know, your career, really trying to advocate for positive changes for so many people. I had, I think the first time I met you in person was actually for a visit on Capitol Hill. I had reached out to COPPA in regards to restraint, seclusion, and you were offering me some advice and we got to meet in person and had a great meeting. But I remember kind of walking out and you shared some things with me. And it really had a lot of influence on me and the work that I've been doing with the Alliance. So, Laura, welcome. It's great to have you here. So let me introduce you to Cyrus as well. Cyrus is a policy and advocacy director for the National Down Syndrome Congress before joining NB FC and you're not gonna get these acronyms wrong here. There's a lot of acronyms. Cyrus was a Senior Public Policy Analyst for National Disability Rights Network. There we go and Dr. N so we have a lot of ends there, where he oversaw several policy areas impacting people with disabilities seem to have lost him there for a second but we'll bring him back and oversaw several policy areas, impacting people with disabilities. Prior to his work in DRM, Cyrus worked as a government of fares coordinator for the National Parent Teacher Association National PTA taught high school English and South Dakota, through Teach for America and served as a learning and development intern for the light White House Office of Administration, where he developed elearning courses for executive office employees. He holds a BA in government from the University of Texas in Austin. Cyrus's experience as a classroom teacher and prior work on special education policy, motivate him to now work towards improved world for individuals with Down syndrome. And of course, what I know very well from you is really making a better world for all individuals with intellectual developmental disabilities. And I appreciate both of you and all the work that you're doing. So welcome both of you for this very special training event that we're doing together here today.

Laura Kaloi  5:51  
Really excited to be here. Thank you. Absolutely. I

Cyrus Huncharek  5:54  
really think I was booted out for a second. So I apologize when we

Guy Stephens  5:59  
brought you right back and blipping you disappeared, and suddenly you were there. That's the fun with doing this live is you know, when things happen, we just kind of roll with him, I will let you know that we have people that have already joined with us from a couple of places. And those of you that are joining, you know, please in the chat, tell us who you are and where you're from. But I'll just share with Laura and Cyrus here we have people here from Michigan, somebody Trisha from Idaho, for Idaho ins for safe schools, great ally, and this work that we're doing, Jenny from Massachusetts, we've got Amy here, from Connecticut, also writer, autistic activist, Michelle here, and Braska, you didn't tell me but I'm pretty sure I remember Michelle. But we'll get that wrong. There we go from Nebraska, there you go. You say me, and we actually even have Chantal here who is a volunteer with the Alliance actually in Canada. But you know, we've been actually talking about what we can do to help people in Canada as well. So people from all over the all over the country, and even beyond showing up to join us today. And we're gonna be talking about, you know, we're gonna be talking about constantly keeping students SAFE Act. But really, the focus of today is going to be talking about how individuals can help to advocate for this really important change. So, Laura, you have prepared a presentation for us, which I'm going to bring up on the screen here. And you've asked me to kind of start it off. So I will start it. And then we're going to kind of shift between all of us. So let me go ahead and bring that up on the screen here. And I'm going to get that into our presentation mode here. Give me one second. All right. And if all has gone well, you are seeing the presentation. Now all I see is the presentation. So I'm going to assume that you're all still there. But Laura or Cyrus telling me if anything goes awry here. So again, today, we're going to talk about how to conduct a virtual or in person visit to Capitol Hill on the keeping all students SAFE Act. And of course, we're doing this in conjunction with the Alliance, the alliance against seclusion restraint, and also an organization that we are part of as well called appraise, and appraises the Alliance to prevent restraint, adverse of interventions and seclusion. And we'll tell you a little bit more about a praise here in a few minutes. But it's a great coalition of organizations that were a part of COPPA is a part of all of the organizations we've mentioned so far are a part of. So I'll just go over the learning objectives, kind of what we're here to do today, we're here to talk about the keeping all students SAFE Act. So the keeping all students SAFE Act, many of you know is a bill that would bring federal legislation around the use of restraint, seclusion in schools, something that all of you know, that I feel is very much needed. And my partner's here would very much agree with me that we absolutely need federal legislation around this. We're gonna talk a little bit and you know, Cyrus is actually going to talk about the keeping all students safe. I'm gonna talk a little bit about your story and why your story matters. And why your story is really important in helping to promote change, Laura is going to go into really how to conduct a hill visit. So if you've ever wanted to do this, but it seems maybe a little overwhelming, Laura is gonna break it down. And this is somebody with a tremendous amount of experience, I was fortunate enough to actually have Laura by my side, the very first time I did one of these, but I'll tell you, you're gonna get the benefit of that as well. In doing the training today, you're going to have an opportunity to have somebody with a tremendous amount of experience, offer you some input on how to do these kinds of things. And then finally, we'll talk about how you can get involved moving forward. So with that, I'm going to hand it back to Cyrus to talk about why we need Casa so Cyrus go ahead and take it away. And you can just let me know when I should advance it in the next slide.

Cyrus Huncharek  9:44  
Wonderful. Well, thank you guy, just just check. Can you hear me Can folks hear me? So Okay, wonderful. And I'm sorry about the technical difficulties. So if something happens maybe Lori you can step in and one other housekeeping things I have a dog and she occasionally barks. So I apologize about that,

Guy Stephens  9:59  
but didn't need to apologize. We are a dog friendly kid friendly place, and especially through COVID. And all the screen time that we do. You know, I always tell people because I meet with a lot of people, it's like dogs, kids, you know, it's okay. It's life, right? And sometimes I make people pick their dogs up and let me see them. But I can't see you right now. So maybe the end, you have to show me your dog? Because love dogs for sure. Go ahead and take it away.

Cyrus Huncharek  10:24  
He's 30 pounds off, then we'll use some muscle there. But yes, well, thank you guys, I think I can speak on behalf of, of Laura and I that, you know, we're so honored to be here, we so appreciate your partnership, and your involvement with with a praise. And like I said, I'm Sergeant cherrick. I'm the Director of Policy and Advocacy at the National Down Syndrome Congress. And I'm based in Washington, DC. But I'm really coming to this space as one of the co chairs of the upraise coalition that that guy talked about, and that that coalition is co chaired by the National Down Syndrome Congress, who I represent COPPA, who law represents. And we have a third partner, the arc, that our lead there is actually on maternity leave. So she'll be back with us in December, or January. And you know, the appraised coalition. Again, it's just a coalition of organizations who are working to reduce restraint, eliminate seclusion, and we have one legislative agenda item. And that is the keeping all students safe fact, which we refer to as casa. So if you go to the next slide, I'll talk a little bit about, you know, why we need Casa and sort of what it does, which I'm sure many of you are acutely aware of the need. But, you know, CASA has really come about because of this sort of patchwork of state laws and regulations and guidances, some of which are much stronger in some states, and some are not as strong in some states. And so again, there's this patchwork of laws and regulations. And so, you know, what costs are really attempts to do is really set a minimum federal standards so that, you know, parents know that, you know, their student will be treated with respect to restraint, seclusion, the same in state A, and also in state. B. So like the slide says, I mean, right now states, even states with really strong laws or regulations are really not doing enough. And again, Casa would really just set that minimum, federal standard states could certainly go above and beyond that, you know, I think this group is acutely aware that restraints and seclusion are not therapeutic, or not evidence based, have been shown time and time again, to do far more harm than good, and in some unfortunate cases have actually resulted in the death of students and you know, also trauma, etc, that that is inflicted upon students who are at the receiving end of restraint and seclusion. So obviously, I think there's that saying that, you know, cost attempts to mitigate that, for obvious reasons. And then, and then lastly, the reason, you know, groups such as Loras, and myself are so interested in this issue, is that there's an issue of disproportionality, you know, year after year, or really year after every other year, when the data is collected, we continue to see a disproportionate impact of restraint seclusion on specifically since disabilities. And and and if you were, if you were to drill down even further, students with disabilities who are sick are also students of color, particularly black male students, these are the groups of students that are receiving a almost all restraint and seclusion again, this is this has been documented by the Federal use Depart of education was collecting data on restraint seclusion, every other year, you know, we have reason to believe that the disproportionality also exists at the states for the states that do collect this data and so as you can see, here, this is this is not not a pretty picture, which is probably no surprise to any of you and in a problem that that the states not for lack of trying, have just not been able to get under control. So CASA is I don't want to say the end all be all but is the beginning of an answer to the issue of restraint and seclusion. So what would Casa do and I'll explain that here in the next slide guy, if you could please advance. So casa, again, stands for the keeping all students SAFE Act, and this is a piece of federal legislation. So we're talking, you know, the United States Congress. That's kind of the realm we're in. And again, like I said before, it would really set a minimum federal standard for restraint seclusion in every school that receives federal financial assistance, ie every public school. Now this slide has a lot of great information on what the bill would do. But I like to think of the bill in sort of three buckets. And this is actually the three buckets I use when I go to Hill meetings with Laura and Gaia and others. So bucket number one is, Casa would eliminate a prohibit the use of, of seclusion. And again, when we're talking about seclusion, we're talking about something very specific, right? The bill explains the seclusion is right, the placement of students in sort of a room against their will undefined period of time, little to no adult supervision. So it wouldn't be prohibit that that practice in its entirety. That's bucket number one. bucket number two, is it would, what I like to say sort of severely regulate the use of restraints. So within that bucket, it would outright prohibit the use of prone or supine restraints, which is sort of using your body pressure to paint a student either face down or face up. So it eliminates that practice, it eliminates the use of mechanical restraints, which would be like, you know, tying students chairs, using zip ties, that that sort of stuff. Third, it would prohibit the use of chemical restraints, which you could think of as, you know, kind of these, like aversive sprays or inappropriate use of certain medications. And that it would allow, though the use of physical restraint under very specific circumstance. And that circumstance is if there's threat of serious physical injury, just to kind of plan that out for a minute, what that could be, is, you know, a number of things. But what I like to use with Hill offices is examples like the following, you know, you're at the pickup line, students about to run into the street and get hit by a bus, right? Obviously, a teacher could or school personnel could physically restrain the student to avoid the threat of serious physical injury, which means a student getting hit by a vehicle or bus. That's one example. If you know, another example, students, you know, throwing chairs, right, you could argue that a physical restraint can be appropriate there to, you know, avoid serious physical injury. It's not only the school personnel and other students, but also the risk of serious injury, serious physical injury to the student, themselves. So again, physical restraint could be used, but it is very specific circumstance of threat of serious physical injury. And that's, that's a standard that's sort of acknowledged and recognized by the courts. And then the third bucket, which I think is, in my opinion, probably the most important piece of the bill, is the bill provides a funding mechanism for grants that would go to state education agencies, and then they could sub grant that two school districts to have grants to train school personnel on the new law. So casa, and then also, schools and districts and state education agencies can use the dollars to train on alternatives to restraint, seclusion, seclusion, so think of sort of positive, you know, behavioral supports and things of that nature. And what we've seen in sort of the literature is that there's all this literature and evidence based work that's being done that really shows that there are alternatives to restraint, seclusion, that can help mitigate sort of this crisis situation that we get into when restraint seclusion is being used. And so again, these training dollars are so critical, in my opinion, because it it's sort of filling a gap, right? We have you know, all three of us guy, Laura and myself argue that restraint. Seclusion are these archaic practices, but nonetheless, practices that are being used in schools. So if we're going to extract these archaic practices we need to be replacing them with with some other tool and Casa allows sort of a runway for kind of evidence based therapeutic tools that we know that work. So in closing, or second, last closing, I should say, you know, from our perspective, this bill is really pro student for obvious reasons. We're eliminating these therapeutic practices being deployed against students. We also think it's pro family, pro family, pro parent or guardian, because of the VCR screen kind of require notification that that that's included in the bill so students so parents are being notified that you know if a restraint is used, and then lastly, we think it's pro teacher and pros

Laura Kaloi  20:00  
Hey, is Cyrus frozen guy.

Guy Stephens  20:03  
I just lost his audio there for a second. And it sounds like he might be

Cyrus Huncharek  20:08  
sorry, you're back. Okay, we

Guy Stephens  20:10  
lost your audio. You were kind of going through the list of pros and your audio broke up, and I think your video froze, I don't. Okay, I'm

Cyrus Huncharek  20:17  
so sorry, I'm just put in closing. The bill is pro student, pro pro parent family. And then we also think is pro teacher because of the funding mechanism. Last thing I'll say is the bill is really picking up steam, we've got last I checked about 86 co sponsors in the house, which just means their 86 members of the House are supportive of this bill. And then in the Senate, we have 19. co sponsors last I checked, and again, those are 19 senators are supported the bill. So let me turn it over to you guy who hopefully has better internet than myself to talk about, you know, why your story matters and how impactful your story can be in our advocacy for, for keeping our students safe.

Guy Stephens  21:03  
Sure. And before before I start, I just wanted to ask you a quick question. And I know you're in a was a acting up, but hopefully we'll make it through this bill. This is not the first time this bill has been introduced. He can tell us a little brief history without going into a lot of detail, but of this type of legislation and kind of, you know what, what stood in the way of getting this move forward? And really, my hope is to kind of share with folks how much impact they can have. But could you share a little bit of the history of the bill?

Cyrus Huncharek  21:34  
Yeah, I can. And I hate to kind of dodge the question. But I think I'm also going to turn it over to Laura, who knows the history much better than I do. But let me say this. The bill has been introduced for many congresses now. And I would say each Congress, Congressman is on a tear cycle. So in each Congress, we have built more and more support. Each each time I think, to your question, kind of a nutshell, to answer. The reason the bill has not been enacted into law, I think is because of variables that are really beyond our control at the moment, but every year that we build more and more co-sponsors, it increases the chance of the bill passing in the future. But let me Lord, do you want to jump in here kind of on more of the history because you know better than I do? Well,

Laura Kaloi  22:24  
and I think to I don't know, guy how much you want to talk about the politics. But we can talk about the the groups that oppose the bill, it just outright to make that really clear that there is opposition to making these policies, this federal policy change at the federal level. But before I go into that, I would like to say and I know guy, you've actually helped lead this in Maryland. The federal bill, despite it not being passed by the US Congress has served as a very helpful gold standard, as advocates work at home in states to change state law. And when we have a high standard set, with sufficient support in the US, in a US Congress to say this is the gold standard for the for the lay of the land, this is what we would like for our country at some point. So that at home in states, it helps advocate say, Well, if we can get you know, go as far as the federal policy would or even get as close as possible. It helps keep that high, high watermark. We we've worked really hard to not negotiate. In the times when we have a chance to tweak the bill here. And there. We've worked really hard to not water it down. Because there is pressure from the teachers unions. And each of the of the unions, the NEA and the AFP each have their own distinct issues with the bill, which I won't get into here, but happy to have that conversation offline with others. But just know that from this from the teachers, unions perspectives, they don't want to see this these changes made in federal policy. And even with immunity, Cyrus was mentioning this, I think when his technology kind of broke down, there is immunity for teachers in the bill. However, even with that they will not support this change to federal law. So you need to know that. And then the other on the other side. So that's basically the unions are very much connected to the Democrats in our US Congress. There's a lot of support and connection, a lot of funding that goes from the teachers unions to members of Congress for Democratic campaigns. Everybody just needs to know that money flows from unions to Democrats, and that's how the part of the system works. On the Republican side. There's been resistance. We do have one Republican co sponsor, however this year, which is really exciting. We have had one for a while. Am I doing okay on sound? Oh, you sound great. Okay, great. So Mr. Mulliner off from New York is our Republican co sponsor in this Congress. And that's been wonderful to add a Republican, we haven't had one for about eight years. And so it's nice to have a Republican with us. But historically, Republicans don't want the federal government telling states what to do, especially when it comes to education. And so just know that philosophically, many Republicans resist signing on to the bill, because of their, you know, that position that has nothing to do with seclusion and restraint, in many ways, but it has everything to do with what the federal intrusion is into educational decisions and what happens to kids in schools. To that point, kids, you know, there's another bill that would add corporal punishment, we know that there are over 25 states that still allow corporal punishment schools. And so to that end, that's another example of where they don't want the Feds intruding on decisions being made about kids in school. So does that help? I know, that was kind

Guy Stephens  26:03  
of Yeah, that was great. And I appreciate the point you brought up. And I think an important one, about the the fact that that the keeping students SAFE Act, I mean, there have been iterations as introduced for some time, but it has, it has, in fact influenced changes in state laws. You know, I think about going back to 2016, Hawaii was was heavily saying, hey, there's federal legislation that might be coming. They use that to help them pass, you know, better state law. So certainly these things have happened. But it can work both ways. I mean, I would encourage people, you know, what you have in the keeping listed and Safe Act, if your laws are not as strong as what's in the keeping our students safe act, this is a great time to work with your state lawmakers as well. And the more states we can get moving in a better direction, the better also, so while Casa can be used to help further states, states can be used to help further casa, I had an opportunity a couple months ago, I met with Senator Chris Murphy. And he made that point that you know, the more states that are doing better, the more that's going to help defeat into something like supporting the keeping our students safe. So thanks for that bit of background that was really helpful. And Cyrus, thank you so much. for that overview. I'll talk a little bit about your story. And we'll transition into law, we're actually getting to some of the tactics. And of course, we're gonna answer questions, we'll probably wait until we get a little further to hit some of those questions. Just because while I'm driving, I can actually see the questions at the moment. So we'll, we'll hit some of those as we go. Lord asked me when we talked about this, if I would, as a parent, share a little bit about, you know, my experience, going and providing testimony and talking to lawmakers, and all of these things about kind of why your story matters. And of course, any of you that know me well know, I'm a huge proponent of this idea that our stories really do matter. Our stories really do make a difference. So before we get into that, I just want to give a little bit of background here. When we think about advocacy, you know, and, you know, advocacy is, you know, really organized activism to support an idea or cause, you know, that's what we're doing here. We're, we're advocating for change, you know, we're trying to bring about change. And of course, advocacy consists of individual constituents, you know, contacting their elected officials, and letting them know that things are important to them. I think people sometimes don't realize how much power and influence we can have. Sometimes we feel like we're part of a really big thing, and our single voice doesn't make a difference. But I will tell you, and we'll get into this more in a moment, your voice really can make a difference. And Laura had mentioned, you know, oh, we've got a Republican on board this time for CASA fantastic. I'd love to see through our advocacy efforts, you know, doing doing this training, somebody out there that lives in an area where you have a Republican senator or a congressperson, I'd love to have you meet with them. And let's bring more people on board. This is this is really, I think this legislation makes sense for kids, it makes sense for educators, it makes sense for families. And I think our stories can help bring people on board. So of course, advocacy involves establishing ongoing relationships, and that are then leveraged, educated, influenced people. I'm a huge proponent of relationships, as I think we all are. Relationships are really critical in helping us better work with kids, and helping us better work with each other and helping us better work with lawmakers. And when we can form relationships, really amazing things can happen. So just kind of keep that in mind as we're talking through this about what advocacy is. What I really wanted to focus on today was the importance of sharing your story and building a relationship. So if you had told me, Oh, gosh, it would have probably been about five years ago. If you had told me five years ago before I started the Alliance before I got involved in this work. That, you know, I would begin meeting with federal and state lawmakers and trying to change laws and whatnot. I probably would have looked at you a little bit with a bit of a So look, I don't even know that I would have imagined how that would have worked, it would have seemed a little overwhelming to me. But the truth is that all of us is constituents of various lawmakers that we vote into, you know, vote into office, we have a voice that our lawmakers want to hear and care about. It may seem like an impossible thing to think, Oh, gee, you can go talk to a lawmaker or lawmakers office and share with him concerns or ideas that you might have, but very much, that's how progress gets made at a state level at the federal level, even at a local level to some degree. So I want to set the backdrop to this to begin by saying you can you can set up meetings with lawmakers, you can of course, join the appraise coalition and attend meetings with lawmakers. But this is something that you can do. And it's not as hard or difficult as you might think. So let's talk a little bit about what you might do, Laura is going to run through kind of the process what a meeting might look like. But part of that process is sharing your story. And what I want to tell you is that, oh gosh, I have so much admiration and respect for Laura and Cyrus in the work that they do. And they are true experts in these areas that we're talking about. And they have many years of experience advocating for, you know, advocating for our children advocating for other people's own advocating for for positive change.

But the truth is that, you know, a advocate can go in and they can talk to a mayor, and it makes a difference. But what really makes a difference is when a parent or when a self advocate go in, when you share your own story, when you share how you've been impacted by something, it is extremely powerful. I can't tell you how much of a difference it can make whether it's going to meet with a lawmaker to to ask them to support a bill like the keeping all students SAFE Act or providing testimony, you know, in a hearing to try to get a bill passed, when you share your story, it really can make a difference. So you know, that's what I want to focus on here. So what's that look like? What's it look like to meet with a lawmaker and share your story, Laura is going to walk work through kind of logistics, and you have an opportunity with his training that we're doing, and with the opportunity that you have to join in with meetings. So the appraised coalition is organizing meetings right now with lawmakers from across the country, you have an opportunity, we'll share with you a link at the end. But to sign up and say, Hey, I'd like to attend a meeting. And you'll have an opportunity to attend a meeting with folks like Cyrus and Laura and perhaps myself as well, and see what a meeting looks like. But you also have an opportunity to go there and share your story. And of course, you can set up your own meeting with a lawmaker anytime you'd like by contacting their office, letting them know that you're a constituent and asking for a time to meet. And you might be surprised, but you'll probably get a response. And they will probably be willing to meet with you, it doesn't always mean that you'll meet with the actual lawmakers, sometimes you meet with their staff, staff that is often very well trained and very well versed in the particular subject matter that you're you're interested in. And that's very effective as well. So one you can do it you can meet either as part of the appraise coalition, you can ask for a meeting on your own, but what's it look like once you get there. And I guess that's where it really is about telling your story. And I just want to give a little bit of a high level overview here. If you were to attend a meeting as part of the coalition, or even on your own, you'll want to share your story. And you're going to want to share how the issue in this case restraint. seclusion, affected you and affected your family. You'll want to talk about, you know it through your experience. So you know, in my case, I would go and I would share what happened to my son what was done to my son, what that led to for our family. I would tell the story. And that's really what it is. It's it's telling your story, how you've been impacted, and why it's important to change. So if I'm joining a meeting, and as part of the price coalition, you know, these meetings, and Laura will give you the details, but they might be 30 minute meetings, and you'll have a brief opportunity to share your story, it might be three or five minutes. And in that three to five minutes, you'll you'll introduce yourself and you'll talk about you know what happened, what its impact was, and why again, it's so important to change in doing that. You know, first of all, you really do want to tell them tell the narrative, tell the story, tell, you know, tell how it impacted not just your child but your family, tell how it impacted your relationships, you know, let people know the impact that this might have had on you. I always encourage you when when meeting with a lawmaker to speak from your heart, you know, really share with them what you're feeling. People sometimes say well gee, if I do that, I'm going to cry. And you know, I always say if you get upset, that's okay. It's okay to express real human emotion and if you get upset, that's okay, that happens. And you know, quite frankly, it can really have an impact as well. So I would not worry that you might get upset Yeah. You might, and you've got to make sure you're ready to speak because that's important as well. We know that if you have a child that's been restrained and secluded, it's traumatizing not to shear to your child, but to you and your family. So you've got to make sure that you're at a point that you can talk comfortably about things. Certainly, we can offer you more help around that as well. But once you are ready to share your story, being able to tell that story in kind of a concise, but meaningful manner is really important. I almost always bring pictures to the meeting, I often start by talking about who my child is, and why this special. I remember, in fact that I lower the meeting that you join me for, I can actually probably still remember some of the photographs that I had, I would very often kind of talk about my child, as I put those photographs down, it's a great way that people are able to kind of relate to the humanity of your story and understand, you know, really the true impact. So, you know, again, you know, it's often three to five minutes that you might have to kind of work through the narrative work through this is what happened, this is how it affected us. This is why, you know, we're asking for your help. You know, of course, you want to be polite, and you want to be professional, and you want to go to those meetings lawyer will tell you all the things you want to do in terms of setting those meetings up and going. But it really is about sharing your story. And the other thing I would say is that, as I mentioned, as a parent, the the weight of your story, Laura and Cyrus, I'm sure you've both been in rooms where the error has been removed from the room, as people listen to the stories of how families have been impacted, they really make a difference I would also say to you is that if you have a child or young adult, even an adult that went through restraint, seclusion, having self advocates that are able to share their stories, you think a parent's story has a lot of weight, when you hear an individual that has had an experience, it has a tremendous amount of impact. So know that your story is important. Know that you can kind of share that. And it can really do a lot to change people's perceptions and humanize things. You can look at a policy from a 50,000 foot view and think, Well, you know, this is what I believe. But when we share our stories, it can really challenge people's beliefs. And I think that's the thing that I would encourage you to do is think about how you can share your story. And we can provide you more tips on that as well. But hopefully this will give you kind of a good start. So with that, I want to pass it over to Laura, who's going to talk about what one of these visits looks like and how to conduct a hill visit. And again, we'll come back at the end. And we'll take questions and comments and have some more discussion. So Laura, you want to take over? Sure.

Laura Kaloi  37:39  
Thanks, guy, you can go to that first slide, I'm going to build on some of the things that guy has shared. And I do want to just reinforce how much more effective these meetings are that we conduct on this issue when we have constituents. So you know, Cyrus, and I live and work in Washington, DC, we're constituents in the offices, you know, like I live in Virginia, I can go to Virginia office as a constituent. But when we can bring any of you who are from the home state or the district of the member of Congress, it makes the meeting that much more meaningful. In fact, some offices won't meet unless there is a constituent in the meeting. So that's just something for you to know. We've geared this training more toward those that don't have as much experience. But I can see on the chat. Some of you, I actually know some of you personally that have done heel meetings with me and for organizations that I work with including COPPA and the Center for learner equity in the past. So I hope what I share today, we'll both help those of you that feel a little bit intimidated or just unsure of what it would be like to get your feet underneath you around this and know that anybody can do this one thing you need to know about our Congress, we elected them, they take meetings. And if you're a constituent, it might be a little bit challenging kind of getting it lined up, because they have a million emails flying in and out of their inbox. But they are meant to do meetings. And so we'll talk about who you typically meet within a minute, but just know, you need to ask because they will say yes and take the meeting most of the meetings, well, they can be in person or virtual, let me put it that way. They're used to doing both. Now we're in very much in a hybrid situation with Congress due to COVID. And in this case, and what we're talking about today, and where you can sign up, we will actually schedule and set up the meetings and have you go with us if you live in the state or the district of the member of Congress. Or if you just want to go and like watch us do it. Why don't you can always just calm and we'll say we have some guests joining us today. They're not from your district. You know you're a parent, you can always just listen in and listen and learn and come watch for once for one time. The meetings usually don't last more than 30 minutes. We stick they stick to a very hard stop and that's something you do at the beginning of the meeting is establish how much time do we have with you too. Today, we always wear professional clothing. I know, it's really tempting to kind of be casual, but they're in their, you know, in their work life as professionals, and we want to be respectful of that. And then as Guy mentioned, you would share your story for about three to five minutes. One thing I would say about this, and I've had so many powerful meetings where parents and older children who were comfortable talking about it, remember, this can be trauma inducing for kids to have to relive this. And as the parent, you need to help make the decision about whether your child is ready, depending on, you know, what their experience has been, and what their their emotional, you know, the their mental health status at the time and where they are in their journey. as kids get older, sometimes they're more comfortable sharing, it just really depends. But you as the parent also have to feel ready to talk about it in a way where, for example, when we're going into a federal office, we're not talking about your school and the principal and how they did or didn't do this and all of that we're talking about your child's experience, and why we need to change the law. And that can be that can feel a little bit awkward, and maybe even weird that you're you're not, you know, telling the problem, which could be very, it's very much linked to the leadership in your building the teacher, the lack of whatever you did or didn't get for your child. But this person that you're going to meet with can't fix that problem. That's the most important thing to know. They work on federal laws, they work on federal policy, they work on federal legislation. And so as much as it matters where your child wants to went to school, the actual experience with the personnel isn't really the focus of your story. So you need to think about it in the context of, you know, the experience that your child had, you're having as a family, and why we need a better law to protect your child in the future and children coming after your child in that building and in the school district. And, you know, will help facilitate the meeting too, and keep it moving along. So I think, I hope that would give some comfort to folks who have never done this before, to know that we're there to help, you know, kind of move things along and, and make sure everybody gets the time that they need in the meeting. Let's go to the next slide and talk about who's in a meeting. Sometimes when you do a meeting in DC, everybody thinks you're gonna get to meet with a member of Congress. Now, sometimes you can and request can go in, but it's pretty rare that we actually meet with the actual elected official, especially on an issue like this. The meetings typically in Remember, these are little small businesses, a congressional office is run by the member of Congress, and they hire staff who split up all the issues and become experts in those areas. And so you'll meet with a legislative assistant or an aide or a legislative correspondent, these these are some of the titles that the staff have on Capitol Hill professional staff is another title. And they are assigned education issues. Sometimes you meet with the health staff, but they are meant to be paying attention to all of the issues that flow through K to 12, sometimes K to 16 education. And they tend to know what's going on at home what some of the top line issues are. And then also mainly what's related to legislation here in DC, but they are relied upon on the member of Congress to make recommendations. I actually used to have this job many moons ago when I was in my 20s. It's what I did. And you go in and meet with your boss and you get to tell them the bills that people are coming in and meeting with you about and you get to help decide whether that member of Congress signs onto a bill or not, you actually make the recommendation to your boss about whether they should support learn more, or who else they could talk to to make a decision. They always expect in a meeting for us to make an ask and that means we actually ask them to do something we recommend to build a support in this case that keeping all students safe back. That's an expectation it's a waste of their time if you just go in and you don't actually ask them to do something that's why they're elected they need to get something done. And they want reliable local contacts for the data and information that they need and back to guys reinforcing the importance of this relationship. You're being available as someone at home for them to turn to is really important. Staff keep a list of people that they can rely upon to check in with when other things come across their desk. And anything related to ide a the special education lock could be something that they might turn to you about even though you come in on this issue. They might, you know, really connect with you and want to learn more about how things are shaping up or really due to special ed, for you, and what you would, what advice you would give them, because you are an expert around how kids with disabilities are treated in your school, that is, that makes you an expert right there. And you can offer to be a local resource to them. And then we always ask how can we be helpful. And sometimes they'll say, I want to learn more about this, I want my state data, I want my school district data, something like that. And then that's a good follow up and a praise staff, we will help you if an asset like that came to you, we would help support you. But just know that sometimes they really want to learn more about what this really looks like. Or they might say, Can you help me connect with the principal or someone there to learn more? It just depends on the meeting. And it also depends on the level of, you know, sometimes the staff are just, they're really moving through different meetings, and it takes a minute to establish this relationship. And so that's why we go, you know, every year we go back and do all these meetings again. Okay, let's go to the next thing. And then we're going to stop and answer some questions. But I just want to kind of walk through what a typical meeting looks like. And so I'm just gonna assume we're all on Zoom for now. But this would be similar. Cyrus has been doing a lot of meetings in person, because offices are open, if you're, if you're here in the area, but you know, typically, we would all get on and we would just do quick introductions and say, I'm leaving the meeting, I would remind them why we're all together, what the issue is that we're going to discuss. And I would establish how much time do we have with the staffer, sometimes they'll say I have 20 minutes or 30 minutes, I have a hard stop at x. And we will respect that time because they need to go to the next thing.

We will explain just as Cyrus has done, what the bill is why we care about it, just you know, who's the sponsor, kind of the status of the bill and what the key areas are. And then we would turn to you to talk about what the why this issue really matters in at home, and what's happening in a school or a district related to this and how you can this is where you get to layer in at a local level. And from a local perspective, what's happening to children in your school and talk that through with them, they may have questions. As guy has said, sometimes there's just absolute silence. I know I did some meetings earlier this year with COPPA members. And one mom came by and talked about how, you know, the her son's challenges led to him being involved in the juvenile justice system. He became suicidal, his sibling became suicidal because of the trauma in their family. I mean, it just went as you, as we all know, and I'm sure you have some of your own stories. And the staffer was speechless, and probably didn't really even know what to say. And I know I had to find a way to kind of move us on because it was, it was very emotional and very powerful, what she shared and what that did lead to, amidst all of the trauma that this family has experienced, that hill staffer has wanted to stay connected to that parent, and learn more, even though their boss hasn't signed on to the bill. This is the other kind of silver lining, is sometimes you never know who you're going to help just inform and educate and bring further along and their knowledge and understanding of what some of the challenges are for kids in schools. And you never know someday where that person may end up in their career and in their life. And so I always try and be optimistic about how the, what the influence is of making that personal connection. And we might share a little data just depends on who the meeting is for and what you know, what we how we've kind of structured things, but we'll share all of that. And then we're going to make the ask for them to co sponsor and ask why they you know, what some of their questions are Cyrus is really good in meetings about asking them what's kept them off the bill, which is really good to kind of, you know, circle in on, tell us why you would sign on to this so that we can help, you know, answer their questions. And we always keep things on a professional level, you know, we may know even going into some meetings that we're going to have to agree to disagree. But that's one of the benefits of being able to continue to advocate for issues that we know are best for kids is you know, we just we are respectful, and but we meet with everybody we don't we want them to know. And I always think about it this way and I tell in the trainings that I do I think it's really important to remember because some people will say why bother, you know, some office that you know, just may never sign on. And here's my response to that. You never want anybody to go on the House floor or into a meeting. And something is happening. And they say, I never heard from X, Y, and Z. So why would I think this is a big deal. We never want to be able to give any member of Congress and excuse to be able to say that they did not hear from us about how important this issue is to kids and families in their home state or in their home district. And that's really important. And if you can help us do that, that would be my last bit of, you know, I hope inspiration to get on board and help where you can, if you can take 30 minutes in a week and help us in the month of November with one heel visit that would just be tremendous to our effort. So I'm going to stop there. But there are some questions, guys, I don't know if you can see them, or I can help you see them. But Cyrus and I can help with that.

Guy Stephens  50:58  
Sure. I'm going to stop sharing for a second just so I can see those as well. And then we can bring this back up and share some things here at the end that we want to share. So give me one second here. And Laura, that was fantastic. And Cyrus both. Really appreciate that. Yeah, so just so why don't we kind of take a look, and those of you that are watching live, if you have questions, now's a great time to put them in. I'm gonna go and take a look through and see what kind of questions that we have here. But a couple things I wanted to hit on something you were saying or a minute ago. One is, you know, kind of the why bother, right? You never know where the connection point might be. And what I found is that sometimes there are things that might, you know, might cross might cross party lines, somebody might have a typical view on something. But because you share another connection, sometimes people are brought along. So you know, I found that for instance, with disability, more and more people have a, you know, a grandchild a child, you know, someone in their life that might be autistic, or, you know, some other connection between them. And very often those connections can really make a difference. So never underestimate the potential of connecting with people, even that might not at face value, you know, kind of share what some of your views might be. So I'm going to take a look through these questions here. And services generally, we're gonna No,

Cyrus Huncharek  52:21  
I'm sorry, I, there's a couple of questions in the chat that I think were directed towards me. But but before I do that, there is just one thing I wanted to mention about the kind of impact that Laura talked about. And you talked about guy of, of constituents and them telling their story. And just to give you a recent example, we had a meeting with rep. Rep. Maxine Waters, the statue represents kind of the LA we're like, in LA LA area, and we brought some constituents. And she their staff emailed us a couple days ago saying that Representative Waters is going to co sponsor the bill. And I wholeheartedly believe it was because of those constituents that came on with us because she has never co sponsored this bill. We looked at the history. And she's a very prominent Democrat. I mean, she's chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee. I think she's one of the founding members of the Congressional Black Caucus. She's a pretty high ranking member of the Congressional Progressive Progressive Caucus, all that to say it's a pretty big deal to get her and I don't think it would have been possible had it not been for the constituents that that that joined. I know that I think there's two questions. I just wanted to to address one I think, Kristin, Jersey, apologies if I'm, if I didn't get that last name correct. Asked or said hope this is defined in my new detail. And I think she was referencing when I was discussing kind of seclusion, and things like that and to answer to respond to you, Kristen. Yes. If you look at the bill, if you look at the pros, Bill, it is it is full of definitions. And Laura, I'm sure can agree that each and each word was painstakingly chosen. And I'm sure Laura remembers even last last Congress, and we were making some minor tweaks. I mean, you wouldn't believe the number of people that we had, I mean, debating over I mean single words, I mean, lawyers, advocates, self I mean, etc. So rest assured that every single word in that bill was meticulously and thoroughly chosen and no word was, is extra or not needed. So to answer your question, seclusions is defined very specifically, all the restraints, all school personnel, all that stuff is defined. And not to say that we got it perfect. And I think it's the strongest Bill iteration of the bill we've we've had so far. And then one other question from Chantelle. She asked about, Is there somewhere that we can find a list of acceptable training the funds can go towards this is in reference to the grant funding was talking about? Just a quick response to that is the bill is not very prescriptive on the training specifically, and that's I think intentional, right? Sometimes if you're too prescriptive, you know, it can kind of stifle innovation. But the bill is very specific that the training has to at its core, reduce the use of restraints, and and also training school personnel on the new on the new law. And then there's some additional activities that schools can participate in, or can use the training dollars for. And that can be things like Positive Behavioral Supports, which is also defined. So again, there's no list of like, you know, training from x company can be used, it's more of like, okay, the training needs to work towards this end, which again, is reducing physical, reducing restraint, and seclusion. Back to you guy. Yeah.

Guy Stephens  55:49  
And I got one more question for it. And just this question came between the other two. So I think it happened when you were speaking. And Rachel said that I'm in Connecticut, and my two senators, Murphy and Blumenthal have already supported casa. Is there any more I can do? So what are your thoughts on that?

Cyrus Huncharek  56:06  
Well, that's a great, probably more question. But my my thoughts just off the top, and I'm sorry, I It's like I live in a shoe box apartment. So my fiance's is here. So apologize with that. No, no, it's okay. What so what I would do is I would, I would I would ask for a meeting or send an email or something and ask them to use their political capital to try to move the bill, particularly Senator Murphy, who was a lead on this bill. I mean, this is his bill. I mean, putting the pressure on him to say can you know, do everything you can to get this bill to move as is my recommendation? But Laura, I'm sure you have other other thoughts?

Laura Kaloi  56:47  
No, I think that's excellent. And I I'm guessing your house rep is also on? If not, I know there's just a handful from Connecticut twos, but chances are they're on. But you can also just reinforce that your local your your house, you have a house, co sponsor as well. Okay, great. But I, you know, the, the likelihood, I'm just going to be honest, the likelihood of this bill moving in this Congress is very slim. What we're trying to do, just so everybody's clear about our goal, we want to just continue to gain as many co sponsors on this bill as we can, because the political climate is right right now, but it could be in the next Congress. And so we want to be able to have a very strong showing. Because when you have a weak showing, sometimes they don't want to reintroduce the bill. I mean, I don't know we haven't had that problem with casa, we've always they've always wanted to reintroduce it. But we know they get even more excited, we went up over to what 107 Cyrus 100. And we were up there in the last Congress, we need to get back up there again, and then some and so that's our goal, because that helps us have more political clout, in a better political environment where the bill could possibly be attached to something else. It isn't the kind of bill that will ever move on its own. It's tiny in the scheme of things when it comes to legislation, it will need to be tucked into something else. But tucking it in is a big decision. Because given the change the monumental change, that would mean and we need to have sufficient support in Congress to make that happen.

Guy Stephens  58:27  
Great. So another related question, somebody tuning in saying how can I help in North Carolina? And I think it's going to be a lot of the same advice. You know, one consider going on a hill visit with the appraisers coalition. We'll talk more about how you can sign up to do that. But, you know, in relation to Rachel's question as well, you know, is there anything more I can do? You know, my first answer is yes, yes, yes, there's more you can do, you know, let other people you know, you know, inform them about casa, you know, if you're part of a, you know, like a special education, PTA or a PTA, bring awareness, do what you can share things on your social media support organizations that are doing work, to, you know, in seclusion, reduce restraint, you know, do anything you can, I think when it comes to supporting something like casa, is really helpful. So again, you know, in North Carolina, think about signing up for a meeting and think about setting up a meeting on your own. Think about ways you can share information with other parents and other families. I think there's lots that we can do for sure. Somebody did ask if we can share the slides. And I know that we're, you'd provided a set of slides that we can share, I can put my email here in the chat as well. And people are always welcome to reach out to me. And I will be happy to send you a copy of our slides that we have actually ready to go. So if you want to send me an email, I can send those out to you. Let me keep going through here. All right, and I'm not really reading through these as I go. Jenny, okay. Can we be reps for or CO reps with a praise and Asr for COPPA in our hill day meetings? Is more powerful or diluted? Okay, so I guess the question is really about talking about this during Hill day. Is that what you're getting out of that lore?

Laura Kaloi  1:00:09  
Yeah, I'm not sure, Jenny, I know, Jenny, I can email and follow up with her too. I'm not sure I understand that distinction. I mean, I think joining with us whenever we do Hill visits is really powerful. We've separated these out from the couple Hill days in the spring, and we're meeting we're targeting the members of Congress that have not signed on. So it's just a different strategy. So we'd love to have you do both.

Guy Stephens  1:00:34  
Great. And Rachel just mentioned here brought my son to meet with to Senator senators office as he told them his story when he was eight. It was as though the credits association we had asked for funding for that and but also I thank them for supporting Casa I cried for sure. Yeah, it's gonna be really meaningful.

Cyrus Huncharek  1:00:56  
Guy, cuz I know we're over time, but I think Rachel jacobellis Really put in a good a good comment that I think I think we should probably address is that about, so she does read it for the benefit of the of the audience, that probably isn't constant stop restraints. As long as the school said, yeah, here we go says it's an emergency, they can use trains, there's no committee have to go in front of the previous emergency, no accountability. I'll go back to kind of one of my earlier statements, which is that, you know, I don't think anyone's sort of the impression that CASA is the end all be all solution. I do think it is the most comprehensive bill to address this issue on the books. Thus far. I will say that but but but you're right, it doesn't by by definition, that bill does not stop all restraints, it does allow physical restraints. But what I would say those that CASA has a very intentional notification process that must occur after a physical restraint. Is is used. Currently, as I'm sure you're all you are all acutely aware of some states have notification processes. Some don't. It's a patchwork, right. So at least if a physical restraint is being used, there's a notification process. And then I think there is a structure by which families, students and schools can really decide whether the physical restraint was appropriate or not in accordance with the law. So what I would again, just to kind of underscore, this is a much better scheme than what we currently have, which is, in some states, there's a scheme that's working, or may not be working. I don't know if Laura, you have anything you want to add to that? Well,

Laura Kaloi  1:02:41  
I was just gonna give guy credit, because I remember one of the visits we did early on when we met as how one of the powerful things in his story is that he was never notified as a parent that this was happening to his son, and the fact that you can go to any school in the US and this can happen, and you're not required to be notified to me is just, I still can't believe it. That, you know, as a parent, we don't have that. Right. And so I would just reaffirm that that right, there is something that brings more accountability to the current system. But you're right, we we've done our best and have tried to have a bill that would would, would take us so much further than we are now. But of course, having a prohibition on everything would be my ideal to as a parent, but we know that, you know, some restraints are viewed as being necessary for safety. And in this case, serious physical injury, which that's another discussion. There's a whole legal like that's a whole bunch of lawyers made the decision around that language. But I did want to add that there was a question here about can we get a list of states that haven't signed on, you can go on congress.gov. So it's just congress.gov. You can put in each either hr 3470, or s 1750. S for Senate 1750. Put either one of the bill numbers in, and it will show you the list of co sponsors for the Senate and the House bill. And I'm sorry, guy, I can't do the chat function. So if we want to put that in the chat.

Guy Stephens  1:04:09  
We're going to grab that right now. So yeah, so if you go to

Laura Kaloi  1:04:13  
congress.gov, and then you type in the bill number up there in the search line that's on that it looks up the bills for this Congress. And these are the numbers for this Congress. You can see who has signed on and who hasn't. And that can help in the Senate. Of course, we have 100 separate 100 senators, and in the house, there's 435 reps that we need. So we have a lot of work to do in the house.

Guy Stephens  1:04:40  
Right? Yeah, yep. And I'm throwing that in the chat right now. There's a link there. I'm putting up a Senate bill, but you'll see that there's a section there where you can look at related bills and that will let you pull up the House version as well. So you should be able to see that from there. As we wrap up. I did want to bring up our slides again here for kind of one last the second so One of the things that we've talked about throughout this today is, you know, this training, the hope is that it will inspire you, it will make you realize that this may not be as complicated as you thought it might be. And I would love to see people that are watching this, setting up appointments ago meet with their congressional or Senate representatives. But beyond that, you have this amazing opportunity to take part in meetings with the uprise coalition. So you can go to a meeting with probably what one of the three of us may likely be there. And you can go to a meeting. And as Laura said, you could just go the first time just to kind of listen. But you could actually go and share your story. And it's a really fantastic way to do this, because it does seem a little scary at first. But when you're there with, you know, three or four, you know, like minded people, it can really be helpful. And if you're interested in doing that, if you're interested in attending a meeting with a member of their price coalition, Cyrus has been working really hard to get a lot of meetings scheduled. as Laura mentioned, we'd love to have you join us for a meeting at some point in November. If you go to this site, ASR dot news slash Hill visit, you can actually sign up there, that'll send us a message that you're interested in doing this. And we can reach out to you if there's an opportunity for you to join us. So we'd love to have you do that. The final thing I want to share here are the contact information for Cyrus and Laura and of course, myself. Great and great to see there's already some interest here. And I do want to mention a Jennifer, I saw you said you miscalculated the time difference. And guess what, it's okay, because it's been recorded. And part of being recorded means you can go back and watch it. But the other part means if you got something out of this, and you think it's really helpful, share this, share it with your PTA with your SEPTA with any organization or group that you're a part of, the more people that we can get that are that are going and asking for meetings and attending meetings, the more we're able to influence people, the more we're able to influence, the more we're able to change things. So you have all of our contact information here as well. And I know that any of us would be happy to hear from you. So feel free to reach out. If you have any questions, again, you're welcome to send me an email. And I can send you a copy of the slides if you're interested in that. But this will be available on YouTube, LinkedIn, and on Facebook, there's also an audio only version will be up in a few days. So you can go and listen to that as well. So with that, I want to give both Laura and Cyrus first of all a huge, a huge, thank you. And I'm very, very excited to be doing this with you here today. And very grateful for all the work that you've been doing, really, for years on these issues. And it's not just casa. But it's so much more that both of you have been doing throughout your careers. And I want to thank you for that. I also want to give you an opportunity to share any last or final thoughts that you might have. So Laura, I'm going to start with you any final thoughts or any last message you want to share? Before we wrap up? Just

Laura Kaloi  1:07:58  
that I would love to have any of you join us. So sign up if you want and, and like I said, the offer is real, if you just want to sit in on a meeting, just put that note in the form that you just like to monitor one and see what see what you think that's okay to give it a test drive. And we look forward to seeing any of you. Thanks, guy.

Guy Stephens  1:08:16  
Absolutely. Thank you, Cyrus.

Cyrus Huncharek  1:08:19  
Yeah, we'll see. Thank you, guy. And thank you, Laura. And for folks probably don't know, Laura has really been my mentor in this in this space. So she's been doing this a lot longer than I have has taught me a lot. But what I would say is, I know some folks that chat, we're sort of saying, you know, this isn't working in my school, you know, please reach out via email, I'm always happy to talk, I think it informs our work when we can hear what is or is not working on the ground. And I would just underscore Laura said about you know, please join us, we need your voice to make this happen. So thank you for spending some time with us. And thank you guy for organizing this. Absolutely.

Guy Stephens  1:08:53  
So thank you both, you can stick around for a second. We're gonna let everybody else go. But we'll have one final wrap up here. So I want to thank everybody that joined us today. Again, encourage you share this, sign up if you're interested. And stay tuned, we'll try to do more things like this as well. Your support your story, it really makes a difference. I mean, I can't tell you enough, how much impact your story can have in changing hearts and minds. And that's part of this work. It's hard work. It's long work. But the more we can do to get people to listen and understand why there's a need for this. I think we I strongly feel I know Laura, you know, you you're very realistic, like well, it might not happen right now. It's gonna happen, it's got to happen. You know, none of us are done until it happens. So if you've got any retirement plans, just know that they cannot happen until we get Casa pass. But I do believe it's gonna happen. I do believe at some point that we're gonna get this passed. But any progress we can make on the state level in the meantime, you know, keep it up. Feel free to reach out to us about that as well. Anything we can do to kind of continue to push this up is making progress. So thank you all for coming today. And as I have some more you can stick around and we will We'll see you again next time Thanks Bye bye bye

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