“Is There Anyone You Can Call?” Caregivers, Co-Advocates, and Cautionary Tales in Special Education Advocacy

• In Event: Critically Complicating (Special) Education Policy, Process, and Praxis Through Family, Youth, Educator, and Scholar Perspectives

Abstract

Objectives and Purposes
The purpose of this paper is to present the stories of caregivers of color navigating the technocratic context of special education. This study brings collaboration, inscribed within the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA, 2004), under critical review. The special education advocacy literature is fraught with hegemonic narratives about caregiver advocacy in special education, with fewer studies exploring advocacy among caregivers of color (Author et al., 2020). Studies that do focus on caregivers of color advocating for their disabled children, however, have uncovered persisting inequities. Researchers have reported how families endure stereotyping, anti-Blackness, racism, and disability stigma, especially for parents of children labeled with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD).
Theoretical/Conceptual Frameworks
I integrate several frameworks. I draw from Black Feminist Thought, particularly the original conceptualizations of intersectionality (e.g., Crenshaw, 1989) to interrogate how Black mothers are particularly impacted. Secondly, I implement Disability Critical Theory (DisCrit, Annamma et al., 2013) to recognize the material impacts stemming from the confluences of racism and ableism. Third, I integrate Motherwork (Collins, 2015) a counterhegemonic frame that describes how families resist and persist through complex processes and oppressive structures. Finally, I incorporate co-advocacy, a conceptual framework that resists supplanting the power, culture, and voices of families of color (Author et al., 2021).
Methodology
I use counterstorytelling (Solórzano & Yosso, 2002), a critical methodology for dismantling dominant and harmful narratives that perpetuate stereotypes. I also integrate a modified duoethnography to document the lives and narratives of families, as well as my own situatedness in this study as mother-scholar-advocate. In creating Denzin & Lincoln’s (2011) bricolage of narratives, we present interwoven stories of resistance and hope.
Data Sources
Data will be collected and triangulated across multiple sources, which include semi-structured interviews, reflective memos, observations, and dialogues between participants. Additionally, we will engage in duoethnographic storytelling.
Results
This study underscores the critical importance of recognizing and engaging families of color who care for disabled children and adults, as contributors to what advocacy is and how we might (re)imagine it.
Scientific Significance
Insights from these counternarratives will contribute to the importance of co-advocacy with families. Importantly, we position families of color as bearers of critical knowledge, learning through the lens of those who have been so often historically disenfranchised from the promises of IDEA.

Author

• Lydia L Ocasio-Stoutenburg, Pennsylvania State University