Counternarratives of Students With Significant Disabilities in One Rural Elementary School

• In Event: 47.083 - Performing Dissertation Research and Liberating Academic Writing

Abstract

The passion for the researcher to engage in a critical counter-narrative inquiry into the curriculum of exclusion of students with significant disabilities in one rural elementary school is derived from her experience of teaching students with significant disabilities, building relationships with them, and helping them to better their education and, ultimately, their lives.

Although the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) guarantees that students with disabilities will be educated with students without disabilities to the greatest extent possible, students with disabilities graduate at a lower rate than students without disabilities. According to the Georgia Department of Education, in 2014, in the county in which the researcher teaches, the graduation rate of students with disabilities is only 9.1, while the graduation rate for all students is 56.4. The graduation rate for students with disabilities is significantly lower than the county average. This gap is not just in the number of diplomas handed out to high school students, but the difference in the number of students who go to college, find “good” employment, understand how to manage their finances, and understand the complexities of political and legal systems to access benefits and protections.

Theoretically draw upon critical theory (e.g., Freire, 1970/1992), critical disability studies (Erevelles, 2014, 2016) and critical geography studies (Soja, 2010), the researcher turn a critical eye toward ablism and equity for students with disabilities to improve their educational situations and to create equitable educational opportunities for them to thrive in spite of adversities they experience in their lives. Methodologically drawn upon the works in personal-passionate-participatory inquiry into social justice in education (He & Phillon, 2008) and photovoice (Delgado, 2015), the researcher gathers placed based counter-narratives through pictures filled with memories to counter the meta-narratives which portray the deficits of children with disabilities rather than their strengths and capabilities. Putting cameras into the hands of children enables their voices to be heard, which empowers those children who are denied basic rights and access to supports provided to those privileged by social and governmental institutions. Through the use of photovoice, children can tell their stories of joy, sadness, success, and disappointment and give others opportunities to see the world through their eyes, from outside of the privileged world of “ability,” with the intention of changing that world into a place of equity and acceptance.

Author

• Christy Howard, Houston County Schools