NOTE: we will update this page with more sessions.
The Friday Keynote Luncheon will focus on the narratives of BIPOC Deaf youths’ identities. We will discuss how BIPOC Deaf youth can advocate for themselves while they explore their Deaf and racial identities through their peers, at school, in their communities, and at home. Attendees will learn how to provide different leadership and educational opportunities for BIPOC Deaf youth. Find out how we can ensure BIPOC Deaf youth thrive with their intersectional identities. Presenter Dominic Harrison will leave attendees with stories, tools, and inspiration to begin and continue the work.
The Saturday Luncheon Keynote will share what has been happening with Deaf Education across the country, including different challenges that deaf schools have experienced in recent years. How can we ensure that Deaf, DeafBlind, DeafDisabled, and hard of hearing infants arrive at school with age-appropriate language acquisition? What can we do to protect deaf schools from legislative attacks? What can we do to ensure these students thrive with language acquisition? This presentation will include resources and tools for you to advocate in your states and support your state’s Education Advocate!
What is Racial Equity? As a very broad topic, it means there are many ways to examine the concepts of racial equity as it applies to individual(s), workplace(s), and organization(s). Presenter Dominic Harrison will guide you through on how to reexamine and unpack the biases and perspectives of yourself as an individual, at work, and in your organization through a mixture of presentation, small group discussions, individual reflections, and hands-on activities. All NLTC registrants are expected to attend this opening plenary session.
Do you know how to run a board or organization meeting? What parliamentarian rules should be followed to keep the meeting flowing smoothly? This two-part training by a Deaf Certified Parliamentarian, Mark Apodaca, will provide a basic introduction on how to run a great meeting. Part A will cover important principles. Part B will go deeper into each principle. Note: attendees must attend Part A to be able to attend Part B. This hands-on training will allow attendees to practice different scenarios that could happen during a meeting. After NLTC, parliamentarian training participants will be able to continue their training virtually with Mark and get experienced enough to test to become a registered parliamentarian. Note, participants are encouraged to bring two books: ‘Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised, 12th edition‘ and ‘Robert’s Rules of Order Newly Revised In Brief, 3rd edition‘ to this training. [ASL video]
The NAD has a training program to ensure that each state and affiliate has an Education Advocate. We urge every state association and affiliate to send a person to this training to become their Education Advocate. Participants will attend intensive training through four workshop sessions and a Keynote Luncheon to become fully familiar with special education and disability rights laws, state and local education systems, early intervention systems, and more. Participants are required to attend all four workshop sessions and will be able to attend other sessions and events. People who are interested in education advocacy should join this important training and become part of a cohort that will preserve and protect deaf education!
TRACK: Organizational
Learn how to strengthen data-driven decision making by using resources offered by the National Deaf Center on Postsecondary Outcomes. This workshop will equip you with tools and knowledge to use data to improve organizational efficiency, address disparities, promote equity, enhance outcomes for marginalized populations, and advocate for increased services. Discover how to make better informed decisions through utilizing an interactive data dashboard, self-assessment tools, and online training modules.
TRACK: Inclusion
Our communities cannot expand and thrive if we ignore racism. We know it is important to dismantle racism but how? Is it even possible? The NAD Dismantling Racism Committee developed a curriculum to help all of us learn how to identify individual and systemic racism, how to address racism, and how to work together towards dismantling it. Come and learn how to use this curriculum in your communities!
TRACK: Leadership
We were young once. Sometimes, all it took was one person to believe in us and encourage us to take a leadership position. However, are we doing the same for our deaf youth today? Our future depends on them taking our place as leaders and advocates. This is only possible when we include deaf youth in real-world opportunities such as organization board activities, meetings, events, conferences, and more! This workshop will share different and creative ways you can give deaf youth the growth and experience they need to eventually take our places and elevate our advocacy to the next level.
TRACK: Leadership
Each of us brings a different set of skills to our organization or the workplace. Sometimes the differences can cause friction or conflict. It is possible to merge all these skills into a strong collaborative, dynamic team! You’ll learn the best ways to build a strong relationship between different people. After this workshop, you’ll understand how to bring people together through team building activities, interpersonal dialogue, and joint projects.
TRACK: Organizational
Nonprofit organizations have to create and follow its bylaws and keep minutes of board meetings. For those who are new to being on the board, it can be overwhelming to understand how bylaws work, how to follow them, and how to create good minutes. If you are trying to understand your bylaws, or about to revamp your organization’s bylaws or you are responsible for creating minutes, this workshop is for you!
TRACK: State Advocacy
Deaf, DeafBlind, DeafDisabled, Hard of Hearing, and Late-Deafened seniors face many barriers and challenges. We must advocate with them to overcome these problems. There are not enough accessible services for them. There are not enough caregivers that know sign language. Too many assisted living centers and nursing homes refuse to admit them or provide access. Many states don’t have accessible services for seniors. This workshop will share resources for seniors and how you can ensure your golden years aren’t met with discrimination.
TRACK: Organizational
Being a great leader means preparing new leaders to take your place. This requires time and investing in people (especially deaf youth) to put their skills to use! Pipelines help people grow into becoming more ready to help organizations thrive. What kind of things contribute to a good pipeline? Is it creating mentorship opportunities? Does it include giving new people a role on the Board? Creating a pipeline depends on having tools and support from your communities. Not all pipelines look the same – this workshop will share ideas on how you can develop pipelines for your organization.
TRACK: Organizational
Organizations depend on bringing in more money than they spend. How do you keep track of this? What are nonprofits required to report? This workshop will give you information and forms that organizations need to track revenue and expenses. Once organizations are set with their reports, they will need creative ways to raise money. Raising money can be fun! You will leave with a list of great ideas on how to create revenue for your organization.
TRACK: Organizational
Are you having trouble getting people to join your organization or attend your conferences and events? To keep your organization thriving, you will need to identify incentives. Find out ways that help convince people to come and join you. Avoid boring meetings and reports, and make your conference the “don’t miss event” of the year!
TRACK: Organizational
With more and more remote video conferencing, this leads to increased remote learning. Some organizations may be familiar with Board members coming from all over which requires them to meet virtually. However, organizations often need to take training or provide training for their members – not everyone can attend in person. The NAD has experience developing different online training modules which has become convenient for remote learning. We will share different platforms and approaches for you to consider.
TRACK: Professional
A brand is not only dependent on a name but also the work and actions behind that name.The best way to advance our work or advocacy is to ensure that everyone knows your services and what you do. This requires different branding strategies in order to communicate effectively . Learn about the different tools, techniques, and technologies you can use to raise awareness which leads to your brand.
TRACK: Professional, Organizational
Even if you are using all the social media tools to share your news, events, and hard work – there’s a different purpose for each platform. When do you TikTok, share a story, or do a livestream? It’s one thing to understand how to maximize the platform but it’s just as important to know how to ensure accessible content. Learn from our social media team about different social media platforms, when to use it, and how to provide accessible content! The more accessible content you post, the more viral it can get!
TRACK: State Advocacy
State laws can help us but they also can hurt us. We have seen an increasing number of oppressive bills being proposed (and passed). We must watch for them and block them. You will learn how to convince legislators to pass better laws. This requires a relationship with your legislators so you can effectively block bad bills and promote good state laws.
TRACK: State Advocacy
Have you experienced being denied an interpreter for an appointment? Or did you request captioning for a meeting only to find out it wasn’t approved? Too many hearing people deny our rights. It happens so often that we can’t always file a lawsuit for every act of discrimination. To address this problem, the NAD developed different “advocacy letters” you can use for different situations. Sometimes those advocacy letters will help educate hearing people to do the right thing. You will leave with different print outs, pamphlets, and VRI cards to bring home to your communities.
TRACK: State Advocacy
Most, if not all, sport teams and/or venues often begin their event with the National Anthem. Whether you prefer football, basketball, baseball, hockey, soccer, or other sports, there are ways that your organization can work with your local sports team and/or venues to bring in ASL performers! We will share ideas and ways to build a relationship which will lead to more ASL access at these home games!
TRACK: State Advocacy
Every state has a child welfare system that is not accessible to deaf parents and deaf children. Too often, they take away children from deaf parents simply because they are deaf. Deaf parents and deaf children are not given appropriate services. It’s also reported that there are not enough deaf foster parents. What are the challenges to changing this? Find out the ways to advocate for a more accessible child welfare system in your state.
TRACK: Inclusion
We have long advocated for accessibility, but we fail to ensure accessibility for Deaf people with other disabilities, such as folks who are DeafBlind, DeafDisabled, or have other disabilities. How do we ensure that our programs and services are fully accessible to all within our communities? This session provides tools and resources for you to consider implementing for your events, communications, and overall advocacy work.
TRACK: Inclusion
Individually, we have experienced incredible difficulties, stress, and challenges in recent years and we must take care of ourselves, both physically and mentally. Many factors add to the stress that we all experience, and this is especially true for our deaf youth. This session will share information on how best to identify challenges and where you can achieve optimal mental health for yourselves, your loved ones, and the people involved in your organizations.
TRACK: Leadership
Join this interactive workshop which will use a combination of a presentation, hands-on activities with real-life scenarios, and self-evaluation with a personality profile assessment! With the personality assessment, you will better understand your leadership style and find the right tools and resources for you to engage with others. There will also be a discussion of different ways and techniques to engage with other board or team members to get the most productive results and best teamwork.
If you’re interested in receiving Continuing Education Credits (CEUs), please read our FAQs here.
Further questions may be directed to [email protected].