Teaching special education can be a tough gig, but it also gets a pretty bad rap. Yes, there are incredible challenges - widespread lack of resources, from staffing to curriculum; varied but typically overpowering levels of segregation; and a pervasive presumed incompetence of our students with disabilities - to name a few.

But, like our students themselves, teaching students with disabilities is highly underrated. In fact, my SPED colleagues and I often brag that our students are the coolest kids on campus, a sort of ‘best kept secret’ of the trade (except we’ve been shouting it from the rooftops for a while).

After years of facing these all too common barriers, I want to talk about the other best kept secret I’ve discovered in education: Project-Based Learning. Six years ago I stumbled into an opportunity to create a special education program at a small, PBL high school, and I gotta tell you: I don’t think I can ever go back. In part, because it has allowed me to ensure students are fully included in regular classes regardless of their disability, from day one.