Okay, it's Wisconsin today, I'm Rob Ferret.
And I'm Kate Archer-Kent, Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan pleaded not guilty yesterday
to charges of obstructing a federal agency and concealing a person from immigration officers.
A group of protesters gathered outside the courthouse calling for a dismissal of charges.
Here's Vosa Stela Fronterra, Executive Director Christine Newman Ortiz at that gathering.
We know this is not just about one judge, it's an intimidation tactic.
It's a disgusting spectacle of authoritarianism that's directed to all judges in this country.
Dugan's lawyers have also filed a motion to dismiss the charges, arguing that the case
is unconstitutional.
John Deidrick has been covering the Dugan case.
He's an investigative reporter for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
John, welcome back to Wisconsin today.
Thanks for having me.
You were at the Dugan's appearance in federal court this week.
Talk us through very short, I understand, but a lot went on there.
Yeah, so she did appreciate the clip.
She did enter a plea.
That's very standard at this point.
They also set out the dates for the trial.
These will probably change most likely, but right now the trial dates set for the 21st of July.
She's due back in court on July 9th.
As you mentioned, there's this motion, though, that's out there.
And that's really going to probably be the beginning of the whole process.
Her team is pushing for consideration, arguing that this is an illegal prosecution
and pushing for that motion to be ruled on right away.
Let's talk about that motion.
If this motion carried and went through, and I imagine it could probably be appealed,
but if it's ultimately successful, that means no trial, right?
The not guilty plea doesn't matter.
The trial never happens if this motion to dismiss is ultimately successful.
Do I have that right?
Yeah, so if it does, but like you say, an appeal is likely.
So we've got several levels.
We're at the magistrate level right now.
Then we have a district court level that's also in Milwaukee.
Ultimately, it seems likely talking to observers and legal experts.
This will end up at the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago,
no matter how it goes, because the side that loses, it seems at this point is likely to appeal.
Now, a not guilty plea on top of that motion to dismiss.
Are we at a stage where, in either of those, the motion to dismiss or the not guilty plea,
Dugan's lawyers are saying why?
They're making their legal argument for either or both of those things.
Yeah, so what they're saying is that in the immunity plea, or in the immunity motion,
they're saying the motion to dismiss.
There's immunity as a judge.
So what happened just briefly is on April 18th, Judge Dugan escorted a defendant who was in court
in his attorney out a door, which is not normally used by the public.
The allegation by the government is this was an effort to a mood justice.
Their argument from the defense is that this is normal judges control their courtroom
and what doors people go in and out of and so forth.
And so they're saying that she says she has immunity for what she did in court that day
and also that the federal prosecutors are overreaching, that they're getting into areas of
what is delegated to states rights and the 10th amendment to the Constitution.
And so the next story here really is that this is a major legal fight brewing.
I mean, Judge Dugan has four law firms representing her at some level.
There's seven attorneys of record.
That's Steve Biscupic, the former U.S.
attorney who incidentally was appointed by a Republican and also Paul Clement,
the former U.S. solicitor general.
So she has a very high power team that certainly does not appear as though anything other than
a long fight looms ahead.
You wrote some about the tone in the courtroom during, again, this brief appearance.
We might imagine a super confrontational, but that's not what you saw there.
No, you know, sometimes I think from the outset, you see the, you know, the public statements
and certainly there's a lot out there.
There was a lot happening in front of the court courthouse yesterday with demonstrators
as you alluded to.
But inside, it was very collegial.
I mean, acting U.S. attorney Rick Fralling, Richard Fralling, he actually worked for Biscupic
under George W. Bush.
So they know each other very well.
And Mr. Fralling, you know, greeted all the members of the team.
They were, it was polite and even pleasant.
You know, in the backdrop is, yes, it is super serious on the number of levels.
But the demeanor in court certainly was, you know, there were pleasant streets exchanged for sure.
Talk of John D.
Rick from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
He's covering the case of Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan facing federal charges.
This is unusual, John.
This is not something we see all the time.
The feds prosecuting a state judge, you were, you've been looking into some,
looking for some comparable cases around the country.
What did you see?
How rare is this?
Well, it is, and that's very well put rare, like maybe the second of its time in modern history.
There was the case in the first Trump administration against the Massachusetts judge.
The circumstances are similar.
There are some differences, but they actually are pretty remarkably similar.
A state judge there in Massachusetts who was charged with helping a undocumented immigrant
elude federal immigration officers.
Ultimately, that's a judge, Shelley Joseph.
Ultimately, her case played out a little bit differently.
She was not arrested as Judge Dugan was in the courthouse, but was ordered in.
But ultimately, that case was dismissed after Joe Biden was elected president,
and the new US attorney was in place.
But some of the same issues that came up are coming up there.
There was an immunity claim at that point.
There were constitutional claims that were made so similar.
But ultimately, those were not ruled upon because the case was dismissed before they could have.
But really, it's only those, now, just to be clear, judges do get charged with things.
I mean, taking bribes and, you know, salts and all sorts of manner of things.
But what this is alleging is that the judge in the normal course of their duty
broke federal law, you know, like in their courtroom on the record doing what they do as judges.
That is highly unusual to a modern US history.
We heard from that protest outside there, the connection being made between this case and
arguments that the Trump administration and other Republicans are intimidating judges.
Now, again, in the limited time in the courtroom,
is there, do you get a sense that people are looking over their shoulder at that wider
conversation or is this really narrow this case, the particulars, the laws involved?
Well, you know, it's a really interesting question.
I think the lens really matters who you are, the politics in this.
I have talked, I spoke to a number of judges.
You know, some would say, hey, like, this was a particular fact that isn't likely to happen again.
And, you know, really focusing on the actions.
But I think there is, depending on who the judge is and sort of where they sit,
there is some second guessing, you know, what's going on in the courtroom.
And because in Milwaukee County, as well as other courtrooms,
federal officials, federal immigration officers are coming into court.
What they're doing is they are matching cases of people who are in the US,
they say illegally, and they're in court in the courthouse for some reason.
And so that sort of sense is creating some sense of, I would say,
disease amongst some judges, you know, in that way.
I would also say that there is, you know, the way this case is read really depends.
I mean, I'm getting emails from people.
It's almost like they're not talking about the same case.
It just really is highlighting a lot of polarization.
And I should also say that there's a number of readers that I'm hearing from
who see some of both.
They actually do see, you know, some of the nuance and some of the in-between,
you know, in this case, which is fascinating and has grabbed such national attention here.
With the charges involved, if the case goes to trial, if Judge Dugan is found guilty,
potentially what are the punishments possible in charges like this?
Yeah. So there's two counts as you alluded.
One's a felony, one's a misdemeanor.
Together, six years of exposure, unlikely, just at the outset,
then that's only if she were convicted on both counts.
But it is highly unlikely for somebody like Judge Dugan,
who's the first time non-violent offender in federal court to receive that sort of time.
But, you know, it does happen.
And there are a color of indices that that's sort of what this case is called,
sort of in shorthand.
These kinds of cases sometimes result in time behind bars.
You know, the trial judge is Judge Edelman.
He used to be a Democratic state senator, some listeners will recall.
So, you know, we're just getting way down the road.
But yeah, that is the exposure that she would have in this case.
And, of course, we can't predict there are so many possible twists and turns along the way.
Is there any thought that there might be a plea deal reached?
Does either side appear to be floating the idea of,
hey, let's resolve this before we go through all this rigamarole?
And that does not appear to be the case of all the uncertainty in now,
just again, from the outside.
And both teams are not really talking much.
They're talking more through their, you know, filings and so forth.
But all indications at this point seem to be a, you know,
a big fight without a discussion of, you know, a plea deal.
You know, the state, you know, main justice in Washington is involved with this.
The FBI director tweeted on this case.
So, it has very high visibility back to Washington.
And then just looking at Judge Dugan's team, I mean, she has a remarkable legal team.
I mean, I was talking to some folks yesterday.
I cannot recall a local case that had so many, you know,
high-powered lawyers attached to it.
So at this point, things could change quickly, but at this point,
it certainly does not seem that a resolution such as a plea agreement are in the works.
All right. A big legal team there.
Now, John, you're in Milwaukee General Sentinel.
This is your beat.
Of course, you're at this trial.
Are you seeing some of our colleagues in the national media showing up
at key moments in this trial?
Is it getting that level of national attention?
Oh, yeah, for sure.
I mean, yesterday in the courtroom, there were 30, well,
I don't know, everybody who's a reporter.
I'd pretty good sense in time.
You have a reporter, Dar.
The read-ar for reporters, yeah.
That's right.
Most people in the gallery of about 30 people were reporters.
We had a couple sketch artists in court because there's no cameras of course
outside, lots of media, you know, for the indictment when we were there.
You know, New York Times, Washington, Post Wall Street.
Everybody is looking at this because of the unusual nature of it.
And also, it feels like an important moment.
Now, you know, the conflict that the Trump administration has with the judges
works on a couple of different levels.
Some are like what's before the Supreme Court.
That's over the rulings.
And then this feels a little bit different,
but it's been sort of like brought together as an overall template.
So, yeah, the night to your question.
Yes, lots of national media attention.
And the court staff has not seen the sort of attention
in the federal courthouse in downtown Milwaukee in a long time.
So, there's some sort of extraordinary things that they're trying to plan for for a trial
that could take a week.
That's what the U.S. attorney said yesterday.
And it would be highly covered if that trial does come to pass.
John, leave it there.
Thanks again for joining us today.
My pleasure.
Thank you.
That's John Deidrick, investigative reporter for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
He talked us about the Milwaukee County Judge,
Hannah Dugan's ongoing court case and watching for the next milestones in that case.
Coming up on Wisconsin Today, transgender health care is in flux.
A Wisconsin speech language pathologist describes their work in gender affirming voice therapy.
When people are able to make changes in their voice and communication that
better aligns with their identity, they often have improved quality of life
and improved overall happiness.
That's ahead on WPR news.
It's Wisconsin Today, I'm Kate Archer Kent.
And I'm Rob Perret.
Twelve bills that target transgender rights are moving through the state legislature
that's according to the trans legislation tracker.
These bills have the potential to impact how transgender people in Wisconsin
participate in sports use their preferred name and pronouns
and access gender affirming medical care.
And they're particularly focused on trans youth.
At the federal level, President Trump has signed executive orders
affecting the lives of transgender people.
One seeks to ban access to gender affirming care for youth under the age of 19.
For a look at how these efforts are affecting people's lives,
we're joined by Elise Kaylee, president of the Washburn-Shawamagan Bay chapter, a P flag.
That's an organization supporting LGBTQ people and their families.
Elise, welcome back to Wisconsin Today.
Thanks for having me, Kate.
Can you talk broadly about how you and people in your community
are reacting to bills, to executive orders,
to things that are targeting transgender people right now?
What does it feel like?
It's a lot of doom scrolling and seeing what's happening next.
It's looking at what might be happening.
And just any time you have to plan something,
figuring out what's the safest way for me to go to the family reunion
where my grandmother's ashes are going to be scattered.
Well, that reunion and memorial is in Florida.
So what do I do?
Do I answer the call of nature outside for the whole week I'm down there?
Do I go into the women's room where I might pass
and where, after all, all my paperwork says I should be going?
Or do I go into the men's room and which is what the law in Florida demands
and get jumped?
And above all, how many of my friends and especially my husband
are waiting to get gender confirmation health care?
And that could be stripped away any day now.
You know, so we're all very, very frightened about that.
Let's talk more about gender affirming health care,
which is one of the areas that is being targeted
not only at the state level, but the federal level.
What are the ripple effects?
What are the consequences if people can't get access to this care?
You know, the more restrictions there are,
the worse health care outcomes are going to be.
And the more trans people are going to be at physical risk,
not merely because the personal health consequences
of being stuck in the wrong body are serious and dangerous in and of themselves,
but because the possibility of random violence from transphobic people,
you know, noticing us.
So obviously everyone should feel comfortable in their own body
and should be able to feel good about themselves.
That's most important.
And doctor after doctor has confirmed that gender dysphoria is real
and trans people who seek the ability to medically transition should be supported.
But now we're seeing so many restrictions,
especially on those forms of transition care that give us the best protection
from random acts of violence, specifically the attempts to ban care
for people below a certain age, which keeps going up.
First it's 16, then it's 18, then it's 19, then it's 30.
You see where they're going.
They're trying to make people wait longer and longer before being able to transition,
which especially for trans women like me means that later in life,
it'll be a lot harder for us to be seen as anything other than trans,
which can be very dangerous.
It's not something we should have to be ashamed of,
but the ability to pass can mean the difference between life and death and often does.
We've talked before about how your community around you in the area,
in Washburn-Shawamagan Bay Area has been supportive of you that you feel,
you know, you have connections in the community.
But it's also a rural area and I'm wondering,
does that add an additional barrier to finding services that support transition?
I think ordinarily it would, but we've got a really good set of clinics in this region,
the North Lakes Clinic, and they really have excellent support for trans patients.
So I've actually had much better experiences with them than I've had with the doctors
who first helped me out, I guess, 10 years ago.
So I will say the medical experiences I've had here have been the best of my life,
but that is definitely not true for everyone in rural areas.
Then you have to consider how many people in rural areas rely on Medicaid,
not just for gender affirming care, but for everything.
And that has the knock-on effect of much of the health care in this region depends on Medicaid
dollars, otherwise they wouldn't have enough paying patients to be able to stay open.
So as Medicaid is threatened for one reason or another, that's a threat to us,
not just those of us who use or have used Medicaid or Badger Care directly,
but those of us who just use any health care, because funding health care funds us all.
How is PFLAG in this moment in helping people navigate these times and connect to resources
and support systems?
Well, our biggest project right now is scholarships for LGBT and
allies students going on to higher education.
We know that a lot of particular programs are being cut.
We know that a lot of schools are under attack and we want to make it easier for people who have
taken risks for the queer community to go on to school.
We've also recently received a very generous donation specifically to fund applicants for
tech colleges, which is terrifically important.
And I think every town needs more LGBT mechanics.
Every town needs more LGBT plumbers.
So we're over the moon about that and trying to get more people out there.
Other than that, we're about to start the season for our LGBT fishing club, Queers on Peers,
because we really...
I love it.
That's amazing.
You talk about traveling to Florida, crossing state lines when things could get really difficult
for you and scary.
Are you hopeful that there will be change in a positive way in the future in a positive direction
so that crossing state lines isn't potentially harmful?
So I'm afraid I must say no.
I don't think it will get better.
Why is that?
Because so many systems of control and oppression depend on people fearing and hating us.
Whether that's enforcing the social rules that undergird sexism and male chauvinism,
or just general homophobia, or any kind of a devotion to a particular way of living that
someone thinks a deity has ordained, it's a lot harder to enforce any of those systems without
having someone who you can spread all of these fears around, someone that you can feel good
about hurting.
And I can't see things getting any better for us or for many of the other people who are in danger now.
Elise, thank you for this conversation.
Thank you for joining us.
Oh, thank you for the time, Kate.
It's always a pleasure and I just hope everyone can find a place where they can be safe and loved.
That is Elise Kaylee, president of the Washburn-Shawamagan Bay chapter of PFLAG, an LGBTQ advocacy
organization. Now we'll focus on one component of gender affirming care, which is voice therapy.
The American Speech Language Hearing Association has come out in opposition to
government efforts that restrict access to gender affirming care and clinician's ability to provide
that care. We're joined now by one such clinician, Maya Braden, is a clinical associate professor
and speech language pathologist at UW-Madison. Maya, welcome to Wisconsin today.
Thank you so much for having me. I'm really happy to be here.
Start by explaining what is gender affirming vocal care? What does your work involve?
Gender affirming vocal care is anything that helps people to achieve a voice that is
congruent with their gender identity and that might involve changing the pitch of their voice.
It might involve changing the timbre or resonance or qualities of the voice.
It can also involve articulation and the way that we pronounce words, the way that we
change our vocal intonation up and down. Even things such as gestures, word choice,
the way we use language, our body language, all of those things could be incorporated
into gender affirming voice and it really is individualized to each client that we work with.
So everyone might have a different path to getting to the voice that is there in the end.
I'm curious about this path. Is achieving an authentic voice? Is that a journey? Does this
work take weeks years? Yeah, it's different for everyone, but it's usually not instant.
There are strategies that people can adapt pretty quickly, but when you're changing anything
that is almost an automatic, if you think about when you talk, when you speak, when you sing,
we don't think a lot about exactly how we're doing it. And so when you make changes in that,
you might be able to make the changes quickly, but most people find that it takes more time
for those to become more natural, more habitual. And think about how our voice has changed when
we heard that little recording on the tape recorder of singing a song when we are like three,
four years old. And you think, who is that person? Is that really me? How does a voice change?
And what is the impact of like hormones? Yeah. So I don't know how scientific you want me to
get on this, but our voices do change over time. Babies have very, very tiny short vocal folds,
which means that they vibrate very fast at very high pitches. And as we grow, those vocal folds
get longer and thicker. And our necks get longer. And so the vocal folds, as they get bigger and
longer, are our voice deepens. And when people go through testosterone-influenced puberty,
as a sign mallet birth usually do, they will have more rapid changes in their pitch right
around that 12 to 18 years. It can drop about an octave. Those who are assigned female at birth
don't have as much of a change, but we still do have a slight change. And our voice
gets a little bit lower and also our range expands a little bit as we get older. And then there are
other age-related changes that have to do with hormones as we get to midlife and as we age
that can change pitch and quality. Considering the range of services you offer your clients,
how is gender affirming voice therapy similar or different from other types of voice therapy you do?
So we use some of the same techniques and that's how I came into doing this. So when we're doing
voice therapy, for example, for people with vocal injuries, we might do things to modify their
resonance, to modify how hard their vocal folds contact, when they make sound, how they're using
their voices and those kinds of things. And some of those same strategies might be used for gender
affirming voice as well. Do all speech-language pathologists offer these types of services?
There's some specialized training and experience that goes into it. So when we graduate with our
master's degree, we are officially trained in everything, but at the same time we are sort of
generalists. And then as we go farther into our careers, we all do continuing education every
year and some of us might choose to do more focus in gender affirming voice or general voice or
child language or fluency, all kinds of different areas. And to do gender affirming voice,
you should have additional training beyond just the master's degree in speech-language pathology,
but it is part of everyone's scope of practice. When a person's voice doesn't align with their
gender identity or how they want to be perceived to the world, what effect does that have on a person's
self-worth and on their quality of life? Yeah, I mean, it really does. If you think about how much
our voice is sort of that external representation of us, anytime our voice doesn't match who we feel
we are, it can be extremely distressing. There's research, not a ton looking at quality of life,
but there's a paper that just came out recently specifically looking at people's goals in voice
and how having that voice that matches their gender identity, that matches their internal
voice is really important. And when people don't have that, they can feel internally distressed,
there can also be external factors when they are misgendered on the phone or in person,
or even feelings of safety. Their actual safety concerns of having a voice that maybe doesn't
match you. And we also know that when people are able to make changes in their voice and
communication that better aligns with their identity, they often have improved quality of life and
improved overall happiness. So what are the benefits of doing this in a clinical setting
versus trying to do this on one's own? I think there are advantages either way. So, you know,
doing it on your own, it's more economical, it can do it on your own time, but a lot of people do
find that they feel a little bit lost in that. There are a lot of resources out there. There are
a lot of internet videos, but being able to work with somebody one-on-one to really tailor it to
your goals, your voice, make sure that you're doing it in a way that is not just sounding the way
you want it to, but feeling good and being healthy and sustainable and not too tiring. I think are
some advantages of working one-on-one with somebody. Can you talk a bit about pitch? One factor that
you work with, you know, someone might want their voice to sound higher or lower depending on how
they want to express themselves, but what can you do there to help them find that pitch? Yeah.
Well, first, I want to say that there is a wide range of pitch that can be identified as male,
female masculine, feminine. You can have two people who have almost exactly the same average pitch,
who are very clearly identifiable as masculine or feminine. So there's quite a bit of overlap.
At the same time, usually one of the first things we do is measure someone's current speaking pitch,
measure their range, and when we start working on pitch, which is usually not the first thing we
work on, when we start working on pitch, we find a pitch that is achievable, that fits within that
range that is identified as their gender. And so there are some studies that show about 145
Hertz is about the lowest average that can be reliably identified as feminine. And I'm probably
speaking at about 190 Hertz. Oh, okay. Yeah. Is there technology that measures that? Do you have
some devices that you use? Yes. We have fairly fancy devices in the clinic, but there are also
free apps. So people often will just download an app onto their phone that will measure their
pitch and tell them what their speaking pitch is. And then they can also look at a target and kind
of match it to within that range as well. What is demand like for gender affirming voice therapy?
You've been in this line of work a long time. It's variable. I think I think there's always
demand. I think people, as they find out more about the opportunities for it, there might be
increased demand. Most voice clinics within the country do some gender affirming voice,
but I know also we've the clinic at UW has done it since at least the 1990s, and there's been
demand since then. Gender affirming care nationwide is under the microscope. Yeah. Does that affect
how you do your work and how you care for your clients? I'm going to optimistically say it's not
directly affecting my work right now, except in how people are feeling. I think I definitely
seeing a lot more worry, fear, and if anything, it makes me want to go out and do more of it.
But I think people are feeling like they're in some ways, in a lot of ways, under attack and
worried about whether those services are still going to be there. You can hear those emotions
in people's voices. Yes, definitely. Maya, thank you so much for joining us. You're welcome. Thanks
for having me. Maya Braden is a clinical associate professor and speech language pathologist at UW
Madison. We talked about gender affirming voice therapy and the work of aligning a person's voice
with their gender identity to achieve their authentic voice. And earlier, we talked with Elise Kaylee,
president of the Washburn-Shawamagan Bay P-Fleg chapter about efforts to limit access to gender
affirming health care.
Still ahead on Wisconsin today, a Rhinelander Elementary School installs a speech board on the
playground. It has some different symbols on it with vocabulary specific to words that our
children would use on the playground to help them better communicate. A new communication
tool for recess that's next on WPR News.
You're listening to Wisconsin today. I'm Rob Ferret.
And I'm Kate Archer-Kent. Now it's time for Wisconsin Life. Here's producer,
Marine McCollum, with a story about appreciating a particular plant in springtime.
Spring has a way of energizing the five senses. And when it comes to the sense of smell,
there are a few scents that we only have a brief time to enjoy, like the lilacs.
Author Chris Hardy brings us this essay on the sweet smell of spring.
When lilacs last in the dooryard bloomed and the great star early drooped in the western sky
in the night, I mourned and yet shall mourn with ever returning spring, Walt Whitman.
There are a few magical weeks every May where mother nature's perfume fills the air.
She wears essence of lilac and intoxicating and alluring fragrance.
It permeates our souls, lifts old hearts, and washes away her winter cruelty.
It is the smell of spring. Some springs our lilac season is cut short when mother nature decides
to give us a late frost depriving us of her sweet fragrance. Such was the case last year when a
hard freeze in mid-May killed most of the blossoms on our lilacs and on our apple trees.
Although we're still flirting with frost, she's made up for it this year.
Our lilacs and those around the countryside seem to be in spectacular bloom,
or perhaps I'm just noticing it more this year. We can thank the European Balkan countries for
bringing us the lilac, which comes from the Persian word meaning bluish. The common lilac
is called syringa vulgaris and has florets with four petals that grow in clusters called
panicles. Lilacs are a member of the olive family, similar to other ornamentals like forcythia and
privet. Anyone who has transplanted lilacs knows how incredibly hardy the plants are.
They were carried along the trading routes from the Ottoman Empire into Europe
by the late 1500s and then brought to North America by settlers. George Washington and
Thomas Jefferson grew lilacs. New Hampshire designated the purple lilac as its official state flower
in 1919 because it symbolizes the hardy character of the citizens of the granite state. Lilac
bushes can live for hundreds of years. Lilac essential oil has medicinal value and it is used
in aromatherapy to fight depression and increase relaxation.
I always remember having lilacs on the farm. 20 years ago my wife Sherry and I dug up some
sucker plants from a stand on a nearby homestead farm. Those have now spread into an impressive
lilac hedge in front of our house. We enjoy the flowering crab trees and the blooms on the wild
plum and other fruit trees as well. The pinks, purples, reds and whites brighten the greeny
landscape. But I prefer the lilac. Perhaps it's because I admire its tough nature. Ours have
survived drought, 45 below zero temperatures and everything else and yet have endured and flourished.
We need that kind of fortitude in Wisconsin. Since lilacs are not native to North America,
when you see stands of lilacs in the country, someone planted them. Since they live so long,
they are great clue to locating where there was once a farmhouse or some kind of human activity
nearby. Sometimes when I see a lilac hedge in the middle of nowhere, I wonder about who planted
them, what lives they led and why they left. Perhaps the long departed return on warm spring
nights to savor the sweet bouquet if only for a moment. It only seems like a moment when the
lilacs bloom. Life moves fast and soon it will be summer. Be sure to stop and smell the lilacs.
Chris Hardy is an author who lives in Taylor and that story on lilacs came from his book
Back Home, Country Tales Through the Seasons. Wisconsin Life is a co-production of Wisconsin
Public Radio and PBS Wisconsin. Additional support comes from Lola Mary Peterson of Appleton.
Find more Wisconsin Life at WisconsinLife.org and on Facebook and Instagram. I'm Maureen McCollum.
This is Wisconsin Today.
Students with disabilities can sometimes have trouble connecting with their peers and reaching
their full potential in the classroom. Some Wisconsin educators are getting creative with
tools that make school more inclusive and accessible for every student's needs. In Rhinelander,
Central Elementary School has installed a speech board on its playground to help nonverbal students
communicate and make friends. Maddy Sawinsky is a speech therapist at Central Elementary School
who helped get the communication tool installed. Maddy, welcome to Wisconsin Today.
Hi. Thank you for having me. Can you first explain what this nonverbal speech board is?
Yeah. So it is a vinyl poster like board that we have on our playground here at my elementary
school and it has some different symbols on it with vocabulary specific to
words that our children would use on the playground to help them better communicate
because we do have some students who are non-speaking or don't use verbal speech yet to communicate.
They have an electronic communication device usually to help them communicate their message
and sometimes it's a little bit bulky or not very easy for them to carry that around on the
playground. So this communication board is another option for them to use to communicate to their
peers and their teachers. Can you give an example of a symbol that gets used on this board?
Yeah. So there's a few different pronouns. So a student could make a message saying,
I want a drink because it's really hot out. So I've seen that used recently so they could
communicate to the teacher, you know, I'm hot. I want a drink or I want, I need to go to the bathroom.
Stuff like that they communicate or about specific equipment. So like we have
real pictures of our slide, our swings, our tunnel that we have. So if they got hurt on something
they could maybe say like hurt on the swings or something like that. A lot of different messages
they can use with our vocabulary that we have. Right because playgrounds seem like a place
where communication is so key, you know, who gets to use the swings or who's next in line for
another piece of equipment and kids need to negotiate and also talk with the teacher on the
playground. Is this board helping to serve those playground interactions? Yeah, for sure. Because
we do have some messages or some symbols on there for turn taking. So they could say my turn or your
turn or, you know, to communicate to one of their friends. You know, I don't want to play tag anymore.
I want swings or different messages like that. So it's really helping with some of those
peer interactions that we try and target at the younger age, the 4k age, especially turn taking
and social interactions is something that we've seen really kind of take off and benefit from
our board on the playground. Yeah, what has the playground been like since the board was established
and has its place on the playground? Yeah, it's been really cool to see all of the students
use it and interact with it. You know, this board is it really benefits those students who are
non-speaking and who use a communication device. But really, it's just good for all kids to have
and to be exposed to. You know, there's the alphabet, there's the numbers, there's American
sign language, symbols on it. So just exposing all of our students to those things. And it's just
been really cool to see them be interested in that. You know, they've seen some words, like
sight words that they learn in the classroom too. They're like, hey, Miss Matty, I see, you know,
I, that's a sight word. It's been really cool to see all students use it and interact with it.
They're just, they love looking at it and they're really excited to use it.
I wonder why give these tools for nonverbal communication instead of just trying to
make students speak out loud? How does giving them these tools help in their growth and development?
Yeah, so some students just, you know, some students are non-speaking and they just aren't able to
use verbal speech yet. And that's okay because, you know, all forms of communication are valid
and accepted, you know, whether that's verbal speech or whether that's using an AAC device,
a communication board or, you know, a tablet or something like that. That's all, you know,
it's a way to communicate and we shouldn't be, you know, like forcing students to talk verbally.
So it's just another option for them to use. You know, so it's just been really great that
they get so many different options on the playground with their device or the board or
some of them, no ASL to use all those different modalities.
Matty, thank you so much for joining us. You're welcome. Thank you for having me again.
That is Matty Sawinsky, a speech therapist at Central Elementary School in Rhinelander.
She was with us to talk about a new speech board her school put up on the playground to help
nonverbal students communicate with their peers. Now we're taking a step back and looking more
broadly at the kinds of tools and interventions that help make Wisconsin classrooms more accessible
for students with disabilities. Denise Clark is a special and early childhood education professor
at UW Oshkosh and a former special education teacher at the middle and elementary school level.
Denise, welcome to Wisconsin today. Thank you. How are new tools like this playground
tool? We heard Matty talk about a nonverbal communication board. How do you see these tools
improving support for students needs? Yes, this administrative communication device is really a
fantastic option and we want to encourage as many ways for students to communicate as possible.
This kind of visual communication really assists in developing verbal communication
as well as is a wonderful tool for students who are nonverbal.
How much do accessibility tools tend to focus on the learning materials, the classroom stuff,
versus the social development and the peer communication that might happen on a playground
or do those efforts kind of cross over with one another? Yes, special education teachers as well
as related service providers including speech language teachers and pathologists work really
hard in all of those areas and communication is critical absolutely for their participation
in academics but also for facilitating relationships certainly for safety and the playground is an
excellent example of a place that that would be the case and so they have to work collaboratively
to develop augmented communication and skills that students need in all of those areas both
academic, social, self-advocacy. How can teachers make these accessibility tools really inclusive
as part of the school, as part of the classroom environment and preventing them from becoming
something that perhaps stigmatizes a student for their needs? Yeah, making differences in
the ways that we communicate and the ways that we learn normal and part of everyday life from
early on and throughout education is exactly the best practice that we want to do. Special education
is a support as are the related services and they don't have to be in a different place.
We can have all of the students learn together and research shows us that there are greater
gains both for students with and without disabilities when students all learn together.
Denise, you mentioned earlier that schools are under stress, that they are strains. What do you
mean by that? Well, I think that there are a lot of ways that the pressures that families face
and that children face are reflected in our classrooms and so our students come to school
with a variety of differences and challenges and teachers have a lot of students, large caseloads
and limited time and resources and so we have to have teachers have the collaborative time to
develop these relationships. Speech therapists, special education teachers and general education
teachers, for them to be able to deliver these services in the classrooms, they have to be able
to plan and collaborate and continue to learn about new strategies and so having ways that
teachers can do those things and have the support in the classroom to have all students learn together
takes a lot. Denise, thank you for joining us. Thank you so much. Denise Clark is a special
and early childhood education professor at UW Oshkosh. She was with us to discuss ways to make
Wisconsin classrooms more accessible to students with disabilities and earlier we heard from speech
therapists Maddie Sawinsky at Central Elementary School in Rhinelander about her school's new
nonverbal communication board on the playground.
Our colleagues in the newsroom are rolling out some new reporting next month on road trips in Wisconsin
and we got the scoop because Sarah Lear is putting together an ice cream themed road trip that
includes the story about the origins of the flavor Blue Moon. That's so awesome and hope
Kerwin visited driftless books and music and is curating an independent bookstore's road trip
and there's other trips in the works that could involve baseball, birding and haunted Wisconsin.
So how about your curious road trip themes? What theme did you do and what did you see along the
way? Send us your itinerary and it just may pop up in the series. Email Wisconsin today at wpr.org
or you can call our text us at 888-642-0232. Hey is there a dad joke themed Wisconsin road trip?
Rob that doesn't even make sense. Hey don't make me stop this car.
Wisconsin today producers include Colleen Leahy, Beatrice Lawrence and Lauren Cox.
Our technical directors are Lee Rayburn and Sarah Hopeful.
Tim Peterson is our managing producer. Dean Kaneter is executive producer.
I'm Kate Archer Kent and I'm Rob Farret. You're listening to WPR News.