SST 11 Podcast

Eric Neal:
Welcome to the State Support Team 11 Podcast. I'm your host, Eric Neal. Today we are joined by Aaron Lanou and Colin Ozeki. Welcome, Aaron and Colin. How are you today?

Aaron Lanou:
Doing good. Thanks for having us, Eric.

Colin Ozeki:
Yeah. This whole, how are you today, what a question. It's a question that we hear and have to answer all the time, and I've always had so much trouble answering it. I don't even know. It's just this whole like... I never know what the correct response is because sometimes people genuinely want to know how you are, and other times it's just a little greeting that people say sometimes, like, "Oh, I'm doing good. How about you?"

Eric Neal:
Yeah, sometimes you're right. People don't want to know, really.

Colin Ozeki:
Yeah, exactly. So [inaudible 00:01:04], I'll be on autopilot, and then someone will ask me, "Hey, how are you?" I'll be like, "Oh, well, the commute to work today was kind of, eh. It started raining and whatever." I'll just be telling them how I actually am, and they'll be like, "Yo, bro, just say I'm good, man."

Eric Neal:
I think we've all had those thoughts, Colin. We all have. Well, I really appreciate you guys being here today. It's great to have you on the show. Can you tell me how you guys know each other?

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah, I'm happy to share, and I'd love for Colin to jump in with any memories and perspectives I miss, which I'm sure I will. But Colin and I originally met when I was a fifth grade teacher at a school in Brooklyn, and Colin was a fifth grade student at the same school. His classroom was right next door to mine, and Colin and I were both part, in our own way, of a program called the ASD Nest program, which is an inclusion program for autistic students in the New York City Public Schools. I was a teacher in the program, and Colin was a student in this program.

Colin Ozeki:
Autistic student, mind you.

Aaron Lanou:
He was an autistic student in the program. Colin and I knew of each other. He wasn't in my classroom, but it was a small enough school that we knew each other. And years later, when Colin was in high school at another ASD Nest School, at this point, I was a staff developer working at New York University where the team that supported the ASD Nest program was housed. And a teacher of Colin, as best I understand it, suggested to Colin that he reach out to me as a source for a research project, and we had an interview Zoom call. And I was so taken aback by Colin's sophistication of his questions. He was asking and doing a report on conceptions of disability. And I was like, "This is undergrad, maybe even graduate-level kind of questions this 10th grader, I think, is asking about the implications of how we perceive disability on disabled people and disabled students." That shortly thereafter, Colin and I kept talking.
I talked to his teachers and administrators at his school and ended up inviting Colin to give a speech at our annual fall kickoff conference day in front of, Colin, what was it, 500, 600 teachers?

Colin Ozeki:
It was like 600, yeah.

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah. And so Colin and I... I helped Colin lightly. He had a great speech. I helped shape it a little bit over that summer. We worked on it. It was so well received, it was hilarious and poignant and touching and practical, and people just loved it. And I was just so struck by how reflective Colin was and how much he was really passionate about sharing his perspective with teachers, because he really, really cared about helping other people create supportive educational experiences for autistic students like he'd had. And so we stayed connected over the years. He presented at multiple staff workshops, presented at my undergraduate and graduate classes I've taught at NYU. And then just really recently, we decided to do something together and we co-planned, co-presented at this conference at OCALICON.

Eric Neal:
Yeah, that's how I got in touch with you guys. My colleague Steve Moran saw that presentation. And can you tell us a little bit about that?

Colin Ozeki:
Yeah, absolutely. So me and Aaron, we both got this opportunity to speak at OCALICON, right? Now Aaron and I have worked together a bunch in the past, he's given me tons of opportunities to share my story as an autistic student and person. But this was the first time that we really got the opportunity to actually speak together, co-present something, and given our long history to each other, this was a really big deal and we just had to nail it. So we were brainstorming what we are going to do for this little conference presentation and this recurring theme kept coming up. This whole thing with Aaron being my former neurotypical teacher and me being the former autistic student. This dichotomy between a neurotypical and neurodivergent person presenting together, co-presenting. Something about that just sounded really amusing and interesting. It really tickled our brains in a very nice way, like the whole Mac versus PC commercial, and how that's amusing because you have to both together in the same environment.
We just thought there was so uncommon to have an autistic and neurotypical person presenting together that we just had to come up with something that really took advantage of this interesting dichotomy. And that's when Aaron here brought up this theory, double empathy theory.

Eric Neal:
Yeah, so you guys, I can feel the energy now. And Steve talked a lot about that, and that's what really struck him was almost the same way, Aaron, how you discovered it is just Colin's passion and intelligence and just excitement about everything. So again, I'm so happy to have you guys here. Could you tell me more about that double empathy theory, Aaron?

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I was happy to offer the theoretical lens and framework that could sort of help shape our presentation, but as Colin said, a lot of it just came from us talking and riffing and sharing stories, many of which didn't make it into the presentation, but are hilarious and would've made great additions. But no, yeah, the double empathy problem is actually the full name of the theory, and it was developed by a researcher named Damien Milton, who is autistic himself. And the double empathy problem helps to explain the challenges that sometimes arise when people of different neurotypes interact. So when autistic people and non-autistic people converse or have social interaction, and specifically it helps to challenge that faulty notion that autistic people "lack empathy or have impaired social cognition", and in fact names that this challenge with empathy is shared. So he has this quote, Milton has this quote that I think sums it up really nicely that if it's true that autistic people often lack insight into non-autistic perceptions and culture, it's equally the case that non-autistic people lack insight into the minds and culture of autistic people.
And what we often see, and this was my experience as a teacher, and certainly lessons learned over the years, but what often happens is autistic people are expected to think about neurotypical communication and neurotypical interaction and sort of adjust their behavior and communication to sort of match what we've determined to be the "right way" to interact and to converse. But neurotypical people don't do a lot of soul-searching, a lot of digging, a lot of examining of our own ways of interacting and make that same effort to recognize and honor and match autistic communication and interaction. And what's really interesting is in the research that Milton has done and other people have done to sort of examine the double empathy problem is they often study how a group of non-autistic adults perform some task. And then how a group of just autistic adults performs the same task. And then how a mixed group of autistic and non-autistic people perform a task. And what they tend to find, whether it's problem solving or developing rapport or sharing information, what they often find is the only autistic group performs just as well as the only non-autistic group.
And when there's a breakdown, the place that there's a breakdown is when there's in a mixed group of autistic and non-autistic people. And it really helps us rethink if there is social breakdown, the social impairment. It's when autistic people in neurotypical people interact together. And it has to help us rethink what we think about where that challenge lies, and we have to recognize it lies in between. It lies in neurodiverse communication, and that neurotypical people have more of a responsibility to start to adjust our own conceptions and behavior and communication.

Eric Neal:
Yeah, that's really interesting. It really resonated with me when I first heard about this from you, about that idea of it really is a mindset issue. There isn't a universally right way for any of this stuff, but it really is a lot of times the neurotypical groups are just like, "Well, this is the way that everybody does it." But it's not even really like that. Even within neurotypical groups, there's a huge variance about how people perceive things or how people learn or how people do all of this. So that really resonated with me that thought of it's like, "Oh, we need to fix the mindset, not the people."

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah, absolutely.

Eric Neal:
So Collin, many schools that I support and work in, and I'm sure you've probably experienced this, they're not set up to support the needs of a diverse student population. What are some of the challenges that you faced in high school?

Colin Ozeki:
What are some of the challenges that I faced in high school? What are some of the challenges I faced in college or middle school? Now, this is a question that I get all the time, and I can understand why people would ask this question, but let me turn this on its head, okay. I think this is the wrong question to be asking because asking this question implies that disabled... It perpetuates disabled narrative of how the autistic person is the one struggling to live in a world where a neurotypical communication style is default, and that we're living in a world where we are having to adapt to the world that is inherently designed for neurotypical people, but especially in an educational environment, the goal of any educational environment shouldn't just be to make people conform to a certain type of standard. The goal of education should be to embrace all of our differences and our strengths and bring them up to the forefront. And that goes for how we socialize and how we communicate with each other too. Education environment, schools, aren't just for learning facts. They're also for growing and developing socially and emotionally.
If there are any challenges that I faced in my primary, secondary, or even college school years, these challenges are not the result of my personal shortcomings. They're the result of... These challenges are the result of having to navigate a school environment that might conform to this mentality, that neurotypical communication is default, that may not be totally empathetic to how we all have differences in how we communicate and socialize, and having to navigate myself through depth where neurotypical is still the default mentality.

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah, and if I could add on just a little bit, Colin, I can't say it better than you, but I would go so far as to say that it's because you were educated in a frankly ableist educational system that is not set up in a way to remove barriers that have been placed there as a way the system has developed that does not remove barriers for people who don't learn a very particular way and don't fit a very particular set of strengths and ways that they communicate and learn and interact.

Eric Neal:
Oh, yeah. I've definitely experienced that also in my work. You both talk about the idea of leading with curiosity. Can you give me an example of what that looks like, Aaron?

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah, absolutely. I can actually give you a non-example to start because I think it is a pretty stark way of seeing what leading with curiosity does not look like and sort of highlight some of missteps I've made as a teacher in the hopes that others don't repeat those mistakes. But one of the stories that we shared in the conference was a time when, again, I was fifth grade teacher. I asked students to do a task that I thought was a pretty rudimentary basic task as a part of a larger project to just write about a favorite book. And one of my students who was autistic just wasn't writing, he just wasn't producing anything at the moment. And you go into sort of teacher mode and think, okay, well, I've got to remind him or prompt him or offer some support or scaffolding. And so I checked in with him and I said, "Oh, I see you haven't written anything yet. You haven't written about your favorite book." And he said, "I don't have one."
And I said, "Oh, come on. You have to have a favorite book. Everyone has a favorite book. And I see you're reading all the time. You're reading on the bus and you're reading at recess, you read at lunch, you kind of like to sneak your book even when it's math time, you're reading all the time. You must have a favorite book." And he goes, he said, "I don't have one." And at this point, this is the teacher support mode kind of turned into like, uh oh, is this kid trying to pull one over on me mode? And so I was like, "Okay, how do I navigate this in a way where I don't let him get one over on me," kind of thing. You get a little defensive at times like that, potentially, you hope not to, but that happens. And so I tried to reframe it, think about it differently, and again, offer some kind of creative support so that he could do what I was asking him to do, which is write about a favorite book.
And I said, "Well, listen, if you don't want to do the writing, how about you tell me about your favorite book? I'll write on a post-it, and then you can use that to expand on your writing." And he said, "I don't have a favorite book." And now I got a little like, "Okay, you know, have to start writing. I want to see writing now I know you have a favorite." And he shot back with, "I just don't have favorites." And this interaction goes on, and I'll spare listeners the rest of the details, but I've come to find out later about this student from previous year's teachers that he actually doesn't have favorite anything. He didn't have favorites, and in fact, being asked to name a favorite was really stressful for him to, he felt like to pick the one ultimate superlative ideal book or movie or whatever you were asking to do among all the things that he's experienced in his life, was a stressful ask.
And what I ultimately wanted as a teacher was for him to write about a book that he liked, and if I had led with curiosity, I could have just switched and said, "Oh, you don't have favorites. Interesting. I know a lot of people have favorites. I guess you don't have a favorite. How about you write about any book that you like a lot?" Had I done that, we probably wouldn't have gotten into the battle that we got into, but instead, I had this sort of self-centered certainty instead of leading with curiosity. Leading with curiosity is all about honoring the fact that there are different perspectives and different ways of viewing things, that there's a different culture that autistic people often share that is different from my own, and I have to respect and honor that and pause and ask myself, "What am I missing here?" Rather than assuming I'm the one with all the answers and the student is the one trying to get away with something or get out of something.

Eric Neal:
It seems like that just being really intentional in instead of just assuming or just rushing through, and it happens to... I think every teacher's had that you, there's so much to get done, and it's so easy to get wrapped up and just start, here's a task, let's get it done, let's keep moving. But to think about that and think about how words matter and to make sure that you're approaching it that way. The non example, I think, was the way to go on that one now.

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah.

Eric Neal:
That really paint a good picture of that.

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah. In fact, Colin Colin's even shared that, if you don't mind talking about Colin, that the idea of picking a favorite can be a little stressful or not so easy for you too, right?

Colin Ozeki:
Yeah, Absolutely. I think we even gave a little name for this idea. I think Aaron coined the term the problem of the pinnacle. I just love the alliteration behind that, and the theory goes, there are... As a person that exists in this world, I have consumed lots of medias like movies and books and podcasts and lots of things. Basically hundreds or thousands of them somewhere swimming in my little brain somewhere. And now when someone asks me which one, which book is my favorite, which movie is my favorite, which anything is my favorite, out of the hundreds, thousands of those that I've probably experienced, you are trying to tell me that I got to wade through all that and pick the absolute single best one out of the hundreds, thousands, maybe even millions of options out there. Now, the way I describe this is intentionally exaggerated, because I want to convey just how monumental of a task that it could be for me and some many other people, like Aaron's student, where it just makes more sense to not really think about it that hard. I don't know how people do it.
I don't know how some people are like, "Oh, this is my favorite." It's like, "Well, what about this one? I thought you said this, that, and that," or I don't know how people do it, but I guess that's just how people think differently, especially autistic and neurotypical person.

Eric Neal:
No, I think you're right. I think there's been a point in everyone's life almost where that can stress you out, you know, get those challenges. If you had to eat only one thing for the rest of your life and then all sudden...

Colin Ozeki:
Oh my God, no.

Eric Neal:
You're kind of presented with that feeling of, oh, hold on a minute. I don't know if it's that great. I don't love anything that much.

Colin Ozeki:
Yeah, That's another point too. I just whole having to pick a single, but I like this one too. I like a lot of things.

Eric Neal:
Yeah, it feels really final that...

Colin Ozeki:
It does.

Eric Neal:
Yeah. So one of the strategies that I've heard you talk about is sharing perspectives without judgment. What does that look like, Colin?

Colin Ozeki:
All right, so during our presentation at OCALICON, we actually led off with this story. I just think it's the funniest thing ever, and I just got to tell it to get here. When I was fresh out of middle school and fresh into high school, I was just minding my own business in class. It was the beginning of the year when the loudspeaker comes on and it says for Colin Ozeki to come to the main office. Now, I was a little nervous. I didn't know other people in the main office very well. I think that was the assistant principal or something, but I thought, "Eh, I didn't do anything wrong. It'll be fine, right? Don't worry about it too much." So I mosey on over to the main office trying to put out a confident little smile. Everything's going to be fine. I'm not in trouble or anything. I open a door. The assistant principal is clearly waiting there anticipating me. She turns up her face up with this very warm and inviting and teacherly smile.
She's like, "Hey, Colin, good to see you." And to that very warm and kind greeting, I responded by saying this, "What do you want?" Yo, she was absolutely livid. I never seen someone do a 180 so flipping fast. She was like, "How dare you say nothing so rude to me. What was that?" Okay. No, no, no, she wasn't like livid. It wasn't like that bad, but she was definitely pretty upset. She definitely meant when she said she thought I was being really rude, and I was very confused. I thought I wasn't in trouble. What the heck happened? You were even smiling just a moment ago. What's going on here? Now, if we had just left it at that, if we had made no efforts try to understand each other, then she would've stayed in the office thinking that I was a terrible, rude student that no respect for authority like her. And I would've left the office thinking that my assistant principal was really being a scary and was on the job just to scare students like me, but that's not where the story ends.
What we did was we waited a few hours to cool down, first of all, okay, emotions kind of like... Kind of wavy and wacky. And then later we saw each other again and we decided to talk. We decided to share perspective without judgment. So I shared my perspective. I said, "Well, you called me to come over to the main office, so you clearly wanted me for something, so what am I? Of course I'm going to ask, what do you want? You want something, right?" And that's when we realized what happened. 'Cause my assistant principal, she in her mind, and a lot of people actually, when they hear the phrase, what do you want, they think it sounds really rude and condescending and hearing it from me, she thought I was being rude and condescending to her. The difference here is that I just meant, what do you want as just a statement. Just a statement in a cell. But my assistant principal thought I was saying it with some kind of rude undertones to it that I definitely did not intend.
Because we took the time to share perspective without judgment, we to understand that maybe we're not so horrible people that like to scare children or just want to say rude things to each other just to be a jerk. No, we just have different ways of communicating. So ever since then, I would say, what do you want to her a couple times, and she would realize that I just genuinely met in earnest. I wanted to know what she wanted, and me realizing that maybe a lot of people feel like it's rude the way I say it. I over time sort of changed it up a bit as well. Nowadays, instead of saying what you want, I just say, "Hey, what's up?" I kind of feel like that accomplishes a similar thing. We both took away something from this, and I think this kind of growth and understanding connection was possible because we took the time to share perspective without judgment.

Eric Neal:
I love it. It really just seems like you're giving an opportunity to understand rather than just jumping to whatever your first thought or conclusion is, and just taking that little extra time or step to have there be an opportunity to really figure out what that person is thinking or feeling. I love it. I think that's a great strategy. A lot of this sounds like it's about the idea of balance. Can you say more about the idea of striking a balance in neurodiverse communication, Aaron?

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah, absolutely. And I think Colin's example is a great one to sort of highlight that what it ultimately required was both people on both sides of the sort of neurodiverse communication to recognize that there might have been another perspective at play to honor that and to consider whether in the future they would adjust their own communication accordingly out of respect of the recognition that different people have different styles of communication. And I think that's essentially what that idea of striking a balance in neurodiverse communication is about. I have sort of played with this kind of conceptual visual tool that I've developed that I call the balance challenge that is designed to help people grapple with the nuances in decision making. And if you picture sort of an older car thermostat dial, where... Before every car had an iPad in it to do all the things it does. You had a little crank... Dial you had to crank when you had to crank it all the way to left.
If it was hot out and you want to turn the AC on, you had to crank it all the way to the right on those really cold days, and you wanted the heat to kick in. But really what ended up happening when you're in a car and you crank it all the way down or all the way up, is over time you realize, oh wait, I can't have it all the way at the extreme all the time. It just doesn't work. I've got to nudge it back a little bit, or I've got to crank it up a little less. And that's the sort of idea behind conceptualizing differences in communication through a balance. So if you can imagine instead of cold on the dial, one end of the dial says, stick with my way of communicating. And on the other end of the dial, instead of saying hot, it says, adapt to other people's way of communicating.
And rather than thinking it's a light switch and you do one or the other. Nope, I'm just going to do the way, communicate the way I communicate, or, oh, I have to constantly adapt because everyone else's way of communicating. It's recognizing that there's a lot of variation and options in between those two extremes, and it's more just about calibrating in a given moment, in a given interaction, just how much you feel like it's necessary to and helpful to adjust your dial in the other direction. And I think oftentimes what happens is autistic people have been asked or expected or sometimes social skills trained to adjust their way of communicating to make neurotypical people happy. That unfortunately, it sort of underlies a lot of social skills training approaches. While neurotypical people, as we talked about before, don't do the same... Typically don't do the same work, don't often asked to, and we don't take it upon ourselves to adjust our own dials.
We stay firmly on that side that says, stick with my way of communicating and then I'm going to help all these other people, these autistic people learn how to communicate just like me. And what it ultimately requires is everyone autistic and neurotypical to really consider in this interaction what makes the most sense, what's going to lead to the least conflict, what's safest for me and best for me and my communication partner? Can I adjust that dial a little bit and kind of recognize that someone might communicate a little differently and I can take a beat and I can take a pause. I can try to take their perspective, lead with curiosity, and at other times recognize, you know what, no. In this interaction, it's best safest for me to communicate in a way that is most comfortable for me. And just recognizing that autistic people have been asked to do the work historically and continue to be that it really ultimately, even though we're both striking a balance, more of the onus is on neurotypical folks to start to do that work that we don't naturally do and don't often aren't asked to do.
So that we can start to calibrate our dial so that we're recognizing it takes us changing our communication style to adapt to autistic folks' communication, to really make for harmonious and productive and joyful communication between neurodiverse partners.

Eric Neal:
Yeah, it's really exciting and everything you guys have talked about it, it sounds so great, and what I love about it is, although there's strategies in there, it's not what we do a lot typically in education where it's like, "Oh, I'll fix it. I'll do this strategy and I'll check it off that I did it and then it's done." It's more about weaving all these things together into a different mindset that is really more of a lifestyle than this thing that you do.

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah, absolutely. I think throughout our discussions that Colin and I had in planning the conference presentation and certain throughout the presentation, and certainly when we just continue to talk the two of us, not even in the context of a presentation, a lot of what comes up is exactly that. Part of this is about tactics or a way to apply something or a strategy, but really those are in service of a mindset shift ultimately.

Eric Neal:
Yeah, that's great. Well, I appreciate you guys sharing all of that. I'd like to hear more about the masterminds behind this brilliant presentation that you guys created there. Colin, you're in a program to become a special education teacher. That's amazing. How's it going?

Colin Ozeki:
Hi. So I'm in a recertification program called the New York City Teaching Collaborative. Basically for the first half of the year, you get put in a school with a teaching coach, a school that usually is in need of extra teachers usually. And under this teaching coach, I get in class experience gaining teaching skills, and I also take classes outside of literal school to... I learn skills that I need for teaching as well, and then in September, I get to start working as a teacher by myself. Now, this journey to become a special education teacher really means a lot to me because I've had a lot of special education teachers support me and help me come to this position that I am today. I would not have any of the opportunities that I have today without special education teachers. I would've never gotten connected with Aaron and I would've never gotten through all this long chain of events that eventually led me to becoming a teacher and to showing up on this podcast.
Now, there's this thing though that I realized was missing, and it's that I never had an autistic special education teacher that really personally empathized with my experiences. And I mean, I still think I turned out pretty good, but I just keep thinking to myself, wouldn't it be the coolest, most awesome thing in the world if I was an autistic special education teacher and I could be that person for someone somewhere out there that it was in the same position that I was in once upon a time. I don't know any other autistic special education teachers. So I decided I'm going to be the first one that I personally know. When I came to the school that I'm currently a student teacher at, the very first thing that I did to all the classes that I'm teaching is that I introduced myself and I said very upfront that I am autistic. That felt like such a big deal to me. It was so liberating to just be able to say that upfront and to really be open about this part of my identity and also almost feel like a piece of history even.
I mean, I'm sure there are other autistic teachers out there, but to really be the first one that I could hear say out loud, "Hey, I'm an autistic special education teacher." That just felt like a big step forward for special education and autistic understanding, inclusion. For autistic students out there to have someone like me that could really understand. I've even had autistic students come up to me that said they really appreciated that I was upfront about it. They wanted to know how I was so confident being so open and upfront about my identity. They asked me questions specifically pertained to autism that only an autistic person could really answer even little things like, "Hey, do you ever fidget at home or anything?" I think that came from student that was a little insecure about that.
And I think he was asking me, how do I stop doing that? And I'm like, "Bro, you don't need to stop doing that. If someone is bothered by that, that's on them. This is just how you self regulate yourself. It's just the way that you like... This is just part of who you are, and there's really nothing wrong with that." I just want people to feel more confident and embrace these different things about themselves and their autistic identity, and I hope that by being a mentor figure for autistic people out there that... I'm so excited about this. I'm sure you could tell by now just...

Eric Neal:
No, I'm really excited for you and I'm really excited for these students too, because it's not just in the classroom that it's going to make a difference for them, but it's the fact that they're seeing somebody like them, that it opens up the possibilities in their minds that they're able to do things as well. Because like you said, you came to this path on your own, not ever having seen that before. They're going to see, I had a teacher do this. I could also be a teacher if I wanted to. It's going to be opening up their expectations and their mind about things that they can do, and I think it's just... It's amazing and I'm super happy for you.

Colin Ozeki:
Thank you. It really means a lot to hear that.

Eric Neal:
Yeah, I think you're great. And so what do you doing these days, Aaron?

Aaron Lanou:
Well, I'll just add my quick 2 cents to say that I've worked with a lot of teachers. I'm [inaudible 00:35:17] colleagues, and I've done a lot of professional development and training, and it's hard to think of another person I've interacted with, worked with who has... Is as committed and passionate to this field and this craft and this work and the importance of it then Colin, so I am so excited for him and so excited for his soon-to-be students because he, as you can tell, if anyone's been listening for the last little Bit, is going to be a pretty stellar teacher and figure in a lot of people's lives, as he was saying so.

Eric Neal:
Absolutely.

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah, and little old me, I do inclusive education, presenting and coaching and professional learning. A lot of it is with schools in the New York City area, but I also present and collaborate with folks around the country and around the world, and just recently joined Carol Gray's team, Social Stories, that is the small group that coordinates and updates and develops the social story criteria and presentations, and does the sort of workshops and coaching around that, which I'm really excited about.

Eric Neal:
That's awesome. So if people would like to know more about you and what you're working on, where should they go Aaron?

Aaron Lanou:
You can go to my website, aaronlanou.com. It's not that easy to get to if you don't know how to spell my name, but you can also just search for me on LinkedIn. I am on the other socials, but I don't know what's happening with Twitter these days, so who knows how long that's going to last. But Googling me is a pretty good way to... My name is a pretty good way to find me.

Eric Neal:
Great. Colin, how should people get ahold of you?

Colin Ozeki:
Well, I am very privileged to be the only Colin Ozeki that I know of on this planet. I've really loved that. There's no one else with my name, so you can absolutely Google me as well. I think the best way to reach me for questions pertaining to autism or divergence or what have you, is to find me on LinkedIn. My LinkedIn is under Colin Ozeki. You can see the kind of work I've done, like presentations, interviews, panels, all that good stuff. Or you could even email me at me as well directly at colinozeki@gmail.com. It is a very straightforward and easy to remember email for a person named Colin Ozeki. Feel free to contact me through either medium as well, and thank you for your interest.

Eric Neal:
Awesome. Well, thanks again for joining us, Aaron and Colin. It's been a real pleasure.

Colin Ozeki:
It's been a real pleasure being here as well. Thank you so much.

Aaron Lanou:
Yeah, thank you, Eric.

Eric Neal:
Yeah. Well, that wraps up this episode of the State Support Team 11 podcast. If you'd like to know more about us and the work that we do here at SST 11, go to our website, it's SST11.org. Give us a call at (614) 753-4694, or hit us up on Twitter. We're @SSTRegion11. If you'd like to get ahold of me, I'm at eric.neal@escco.org. Until next time, thanks for listening.