Don't Blame the Help: Calling Out Special Education Malpractice in a Small Urban Predominantly Black School District

• In Event: Crises and Corruption: Navigating the Conditions of School Culture and Climate

Abstract

This study explores how institutional practices within an urban, predominately Black school district limit teachers’ ability to comply with special education inclusion of students with exceptionalities in general education classrooms. Using Disability Critical Studies (DisCrit) as my framework, along with Critical Race Narrative Inquiry, the combination of CRT’s counter-storytelling and narrative inquiry as a methodology, I attempted to examine explore how teacher’s narratives: 1) reveal interdependent ways racism and ableism form ideas of normalcy within the district’s special education inclusion practices; and 2) reveal teachers’ voices on systematic practices that support or arrest special education inclusion; and 3) reveal legal aspects of special education practices within the school district that deny the rights of students of color.

Author

• April Eddie, Northern Kentucky University