Counternarratives of Inclusion: Exploring Disabled Youth Agency in Restrictive Educational Spaces

• In Event: Between Constraints and Possibilities: Narratives of Agency and Hope in Surveilled Educational Spaces

Abstract

Ableism, a preference for the able body, is widespread in public schooling spaces and society. This means that when disabled students are fully included in the general education environment there are questions about the authenticity of this inclusion and how disabled students are attended to and interacted with in spaces deemed less restrictive (Valle and Connor, 2019). I argue that to actualize fully accessible learning spaces more attention is needed to how disabled young people describe their lived experiences while receiving services in more restrictive learning environments. This paper is not a critique of the inclusive education movement or the idea that learning spaces should be made accessible for all young people (Kozleski, 2020). Instead, it is an inquiry into one restrictive learning space to explore counternarratives from disabled youth who occupy it.A self-contained classroom is defined as a classroom composed of students who are identified as disabled and receiving individualized education plan (IEP) services. These settings are deemed more restrictive due to the frequency and duration of services provided such as specialized academic instruction, speech and language, physical, occupational therapies and counseling. A major criticism of self-contained classrooms is how they operate to segregate disabled young people from same-age nondisabled peers (Valle and Connor, 2019). Research demonstrates that self-contained classroom spaces often lack curricular cohesion and lead to limited outcomes for disabled people across their lifespan (Allan, 2004). Still, these schooling spaces continue to exist.

This paper uses data from a qualitative research inquiry that used a combination of ethnographic, narrative and multimodal methods. I draw from data collected during 6 months in the Media Arts classroom at an independent state funded school for youth aged 5-21 who are identified as disabled and receive complex supports. Collected data included: detailed ethnographic field notes, photographs of the physical classroom space, images of youth participant-created digital art and oral history style interviews from youth and adult participants in the study. An analysis of the collected data surfaced layered interactions between adult and youth research participants which disrupted commonly held assumptions (or definitions) of independence. I use the concept of co-production (Liddiard et al., 2018) to describe how adults and youth interacted, often in concert, to produce curricular artifacts across the school day at Saturn. In the Media Arts classroom use of technology and an openness to teaching digital approaches helped to solidify co-production as a phenomena that disrupted and re-framed how student agency was attended to and supported. This was reflected in the exploratory instructional activities. Students filmed videos, created digital portfolios, learned how to use PhotoShop, created mock food truck businesses, designed graduation programs and created collage silhouettes. Most of this work was done with support from adults in the room. These projects always had specific assignment directions and parameters, which left room for students to bring their own understanding and creativity. This highlights a productive tension in restrictive educational spaces that provides important new pathways for supporting schools in the development of more inclusive and accessible learning environments.

Author

• Katherine Newhouse, New York University