673: Tanya Sheckley: Building Accessible Education to Honor Her Daughter’s Legacy

Tanya Sheckley is Founder and President of UP Academy, an elementary lab school that values innovation, empathy, and strength and incorporates a unique neuro-development program for children with physical disabilities. Tanya’s vision and mission show it’s possible to celebrate differences, change what’s broken in the American education system and that all children can receive a rigorous, well-rounded education. She is the host of the Rebel Educator podcast, an Edpreneur, an International Speaker, and the author of her new book, Rebel Educator: Create Classrooms of Imagination and Impact.

As soon as I learned about what inspired Tanya to build her own school, I knew I wanted to have her as a guest on the show. She has a powerful and important story about education and how she will forever honor her daughter, Eliza.  

Listen in to hear Tanya share:

• How and why she intentionally build a school around her daughter Eliza’s legacy
• Eliza’s story of living with Cerebral Palsy
• Her journey of building international medical support around Eliza
• How she navigated advocating for Eliza’s needs when Eliza was able to meet grade level expectations but was not expected to 
• What it looks like and feels like and smells like inside UP Academy
• The benefits of mixed age and mixed ability classrooms
• Examples of what accessible learning looks like
• The importance of having children with disabilities and children without disabilities learning alongside one another
• What she wants parents to know about parenting a child with disabilities

Links mentioned:

• Learn more about UP Academy: upacademysf.com
• Resources for Rebel Educators: rebeleducator.com
• Connect with Tanya: Tanyasheckley.com
• Book: Rebel Educator
• Tanya on LinkedIn
• UP Academy on FB
• UP Academy on IG
• Eliza’s story: https://www.upacademysf.com/elizas-story

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