Your UDL Journey: A Systems Approach to Transforming Instruction

Authors Patti Kelly Ralabate and Elizabeth Berquist draw on years of working with schools, districts, universities, and states to put the inclusive principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) into practice. They offer a guide for adopting UDL as the conceptual framework for an entire system, not just individual classrooms. The authors clarify the difference between mere change and true transformation in a system, offering a welcome solution to the common "flavor-of-the-month" dilemma that school leaders at all levels so often face.

Your UDL Journey addresses challenges in learning design, instructional planning, professional development, resource allocation, and reflection. Written in a warm, collegial style, this book is filled with helpful signposts along the road to transformation.

Patti Kelly Ralabate, EdD, is the author of the bestseller Your UDL Lesson Planner: The Step-by-Step Guide for Teaching All Learners (Paul H. Brookes, 2016) and co-author of Culturally Responsive Design for English Learners: The UDL Approach (with Loui Lord Nelson, CAST, 2017). Dr. Ralabate is founder and executive director of PKR Professional Learning, which works with educators who are interested in transforming their instruction and learning environments to better meet the needs of all learners. As director of implementation at CAST, Dr. Ralabate guided a multidistrict Universal Design for Learning (UDL) implementation initiative funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation that applied a systems-change lens to professional learning. During her tenure as director of the National Center on Universal Design for Learning, she was instrumental in building access to a storehouse of resources for lesson design and UDL implementation. She was the special education policy analyst for the National Education Association and an early partner in the National UDL Task Force that successfully brought UDL into federal policy. She has nearly three decades of teaching experience as a speech-language pathologist and holds a master's degree from the University of Massachusetts and a doctorate in special education from the George Washington University in Washington, DC.

Elizabeth Berquist, EdD, brings 20 years of experience in PK-12 and higher education to her current role as director of professional learning for the Baltimore County Public School District (BCPS) where she designs and delivers professional learning for district leaders. BCPS is the 25th largest district in the US and serves more than 115,000 students. Dr. Berquist began her career in BCPS, first as a classroom teacher and then as a central office staff member. She then spent eight years as a faculty member in the Department of Special Education at Towson University in Maryland, where she worked with pre-service and in-service educators. Her research focused on UDL, conceptual change, faculty professional development, and enhancing university-school partnerships in professional development schools. She was also responsible for the design and administration of a multiyear Universal Design for Learning Professional Development Network (UDL PDN). Dr. Berquist won numerous teaching awards at Towson before returning to BCPS in 2015. A frequent presenter at national conferences and a member of CAST's National Faculty, she is the editor of UDL: Moving from Exploration to Integration (CAST, 2017), the first book to consider scaled-up implementation of UDL in schools, districts, and states.