Part C Lead Agencies and Early Intervention Service Providers
Part C Lead Agencies ensure that infants and toddlers with disabilities (birth through age two) and their families receive the supports and services they are entitled to under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), Part C. These early, family-centered services foster healthy development and help prepare young children for the transition into early childhood education.
Preparing for that transition includes making sure children can access and learn from the educational materials they will encounter. For example, early intervention can lay the groundwork for toddlers who are blind or have low vision, deaf or hard of hearing, or who have physical disabilities to participate actively and learn independently in preschool and beyond.
NCADEMI provides technical assistance to Part C Lead Agency staff and early intervention providers. We support efforts to prepare children with disabilities—and their families—for using and learning from the materials and technologies they will encounter in early education settings.
Technical Assistance for Part C Lead Agencies and Early Intervention Service Providers
During the first half of 2025, NCADEMI collected input from Part C Lead Agency representatives and early intervention service providers about their technical assistance needs. The report, Technical Assistance Needs of Part C Lead Agencies and Early Intervention Service Providers: Summary of 2025 Data Collection, summarizes key findings and insights.
Based on the data collection findings, NCADEMI is partnering with Project ECHO to lead an “Early Accessible Educational Material (AEM) ECHO” community. Project ECHO is an “all teach, all learn” learning model. ECHO participants engage in a virtual community with their peers where they share support, guidance, and feedback.
NCADEMI’s Early AEM ECHO will build the capacity of Part C Lead Agencies and early intervention service providers to better support infants and toddlers with disabilities who will require assistive technology (AT) and AEM once they reach early childhood education. An area of focus for this ECHO community will be best practices for supporting parents/caregivers and AT and AEM considerations in the Individualized Family Service Plan (IFSP) to the Individualized Education Program (IEP) transition process.
Early AEM ECHO sessions are open to all individuals who serve young children with disabilities in early development and their families. Certificates of attendance are available to participants who attend individual sessions and complete the post-session survey.
Join Early AEM ECHO sessions on the fourth Tuesday of every month, 3:00 – 4:30 p.m. ET.