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Chris Ulmer

Last updated
Chris Ulmer
Chris Ulmer 2022.jpg
Ulmer in 2022
Born
Christopher Ulmer

(1989-03-04) 4 March 1989 (age 37)
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Occupations
PartnerAlyssa Porter
YouTube information
Channel
Years activeMarch 19, 2015
Genre
Subscribers3.7 million
Views966 million
Last updated: 27 March 2026
Website https://sbsk.org/

Christopher Ulmer is an American disability-rights advocate, former special education teacher, YouTuber, and founder of the non-profit Special Books by Special Kids.

Contents

Early life and education

Christopher Ulmer was born on March 4, 1989,[ citation needed ] a native of Northeast Philadelphia, grew up in the Rhawnhurst neighborhood before moving to Willow Grove, where most of his family still resides. [1] On weekends, he often visited his grandmother, Cecilia "Cissy" Paul, a pediatric nurse who fostered over 130 children, giving Ulmer early exposure to diverse childhood experiences. Ulmer played soccer throughout his youth and later became a walk-on team captain at Penn State Abington, [1] where he earned a degree in media studies in 2010. [2] After graduating from college, Ulmer moved to Kentucky to coach college soccer at the University of the Cumberlands, where he received a master's degree in special education. [3] [4]

Career

After completing his degree, he moved to Jacksonville, Florida, where he became a special education teacher, working with students aged 7 to 10. [3] In 2015, he was teaching a class of eight students with conditions including autism, agenesis of the corpus callosum and traumatic brain injury. He began each school day with a period of compliments directed at his students. [5] [6] [7]

With parental permission, Ulmer began filming interviews with his students and posting them on social media. [8] [9] The project was initially created to introduce his special education students to the community. [3] Ulmer launched the Facebook page Special Books by Special Kids (SBSK) around 2015, and it had over 1.2 million followers as of 2017. [3] He later expanded the project to YouTube under the same name. As of June 2023, SBSK had published approximately 500 videos, with nearly 3 billion total views across social platforms, about 3.9 million Facebook followers and 3.4 million YouTube subscribers. [1] By March 2026, the YouTube channel had around 3.7 million subscribers and over 966 million views. [10]

He travelled back and forth through the country interviewing disabled children to give them, as ABC News put it, "an opportunity to be seen and accepted." As a result, Ulmer has created more than 500 videos of those interviews. [11] A partial transcript, as an example of an interview of a child by Ulmer, is included in the book Flying Starts for Unique Children by author and special-needs teacher Adele Devine. [12]

In March 2019, the YouTube channel of SBSK had its comment sections disabled as part of a wider platform policy affecting videos featuring minors. According to YouTube, the measure was introduced to reduce the risk of predatory behavior in comment sections. [13] According to The Washington Post , channels featuring children with disabilities were bystanders in this near-blanket ban, and the enforcement of the policy was not applied consistently across all channels. [14] Ulmer said removing comments restricted interaction with video subjects, a core part of SBSK’s mission, and eliminated a key source of community support; he also called the decision discriminatory and harmful to the organization’s engagement with the disability community. [14] [15]

Personal life

Ulmer has been in a relationship with Alyssa Porter. [14] [16]

Awards and nominations

OrganizationsYearCategoryResultRef.
National Organization for Rare Disorders 2018Rare Impact AwardWon [17]
Streamy Awards 2018 Nonprofit or NGO AwardWon [18] [19]

References

  1. 1 2 3 McCutcheon, Lauren (June 26, 2023). "Citizen Of The Week: Chris Ulmer of Special Books by Special Kids". The Philadelphia Citizen. Archived from the original on November 11, 2025. Retrieved November 11, 2025.
  2. ↑ Miller, Trey (May 20, 2015). "Alumnus drives project to produce 'Special Books by Special Kids'". Penn State Abington . Pennsylvania State University. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Puterman, Shari (August 1, 2017). "Former special education teacher empowers kids to talk in their own words". USA Today . USA Today Co. ISSN   0734-7456. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  4. ↑ "9 Noteworthy Alumni". University of the Cumberlands . October 27, 2020. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  5. ↑ Brown, Genevieve Shaw (November 18, 2015). "Florida Teacher Starts Each Day Complimenting Students One by One". ABC News . American Broadcasting Company. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  6. ↑ Ready, Lauren (November 19, 2015). "Teacher starts each day with compliments for every kid". USA Today . USA Today Co. ISSN   0734-7456. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  7. ↑ Heigl, Alex (November 29, 2015). "Special Education Teacher Spends 10 Minutes Complimenting Every Student at the Beginning of Each Class". People . ISSN   0093-7673. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  8. ↑ Baron, Steven (2023). Teaching with a Strength-Based Approach: How to Motivate Students and Build Relationships. New York: Routledge. p. 79. doi:10.4324/9781003368014. ISBN   978-1-03-243257-1. OCLC   1352795636.
  9. ↑ Gelbart, Hannah (March 31, 2017). "Meet the former teacher giving a voice to disabled children". BBC News . British Broadcasting Corporation. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  10. ↑ "Special Books by Special Kids's YouTube Statistics". Social Blade . Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  11. ↑ Francis, Enjoli; Schwartz, Susan (April 28, 2017). "Florida teacher is teaching acceptance of all people, one video at a time". ABC News . American Broadcasting Company. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  12. ↑ Devine, Adele (2016). Flying Starts for Unique Children: Top Tips for Supporting Children with SEN Or Autism When They Start School. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. p. 127. ISBN   978-1-78592-001-1. LCCN   2016007161. OCLC   1026747890. S2CID   203055805.
  13. ↑ Hale, James (March 14, 2019). "After YouTube Disables Comments On 'Special Books By Special Kids' Organization's Channel, Founders Say It's Discrimination". Tubefilter . Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  14. 1 2 3 Park, Gene (April 10, 2019). "Special-needs children were getting validation through comments. Then YouTube turned their comments off". The Washington Post . ISSN   0190-8286. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  15. ↑ Osiadacz, Alexander (March 17, 2019). "No more comment section: First Coast non-profit says YouTube policy is 'discriminatory'". First Coast News . Nexstar Media Group. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  16. ↑ Puterman, Shari (July 10, 2017). "Tripp Halstead gets a very special visit". The Daily Advertiser . USA Today Co. Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  17. ↑ NORD (April 25, 2018). "Chris Ulmer: 2018 Rare Impact Award Honoree". National Organization for Rare Disorders . Archived from the original on March 27, 2026. Retrieved March 27, 2026.
  18. ↑ Spangler, Todd (September 25, 2018). "2018 Streamy Awards Nominations Unveiled, YouTube Signs as Sponsor". Variety . Penske Media Corporation. ISSN   0042-2738. Archived from the original on July 3, 2024. Retrieved July 3, 2024.
  19. ↑ THR (September 25, 2018). "Streamy Awards Nominations Revealed". The Hollywood Reporter . Penske Media Corporation. ISSN   0018-3660. Archived from the original on July 22, 2025. Retrieved July 22, 2025.
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