Community-Based Instruction as a Pathway to Belonging, Voice, and Citizenship for Students with IDD

• In Event: Practicing Restorative Justice: Preparing Aspiring Educators to Transform Schools Using Anti-Racist Strategies

Abstract

This presentation explores community-based instruction (CBI) as a decolonizing educational practice that affirms the rights, capacities, and civic agency of students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). Drawing from autoethnographic reflection and practitioner experience in rural Alaska, this work contributes to inclusive and culturally sustaining pedagogies by centering the voices of multiply marginalized students—those who are Indigenous, disabled, and often excluded from general education and civic life.
I will share grounded practices developed at Homer High School, where students with IDD engage in transition planning that extends beyond the classroom into the broader community. Through structured partnerships with local nonprofits, libraries, food pantries, animal shelters, and vocational rehabilitation agencies, students learn functional, pre-vocational, and
social-emotional skills in authentic settings. These experiences offer more than job training—they foster agency, visibility, and dignity by positioning learners as contributors to their community, rather than passive recipients of services.
My chapter contributed frames of this work within a broader critique of how traditional school systems have historically marginalized Indigenous and disabled students through exclusion, surveillance, and assimilationist curricula. Community-based instruction, by contrast, is presented as an emancipatory practice—one that honors cultural knowledge, promotes reciprocal relationships, and reconnects students with intergenerational wisdom and collective identity. Through personal narrative, the author reflects on how her own experiences as a multiply marginalized student informed her teaching philosophy and advocacy for educational justice.
Participants will gain insight into the structural and relational elements needed to implement CBI successfully, including relationship-building with families and community stakeholders, the importance of cultural responsiveness in curriculum design, and the role of educator reflection in dismantling internalized bias. Specific strategies shared include rotating monthly CBI schedules, aligning student IEP goals with community partner opportunities, and creating alternative assessment pathways that elevate student voice and choice.
This proposal aligns with the 2026 AERA Annual Meeting theme, “Unforgetting Histories and Imagining Futures,” by examining how community-based education can redress past educational injustices and co-create liberatory futures for students with disabilities. It also engages with calls for ability justice, civic engagement, and democratic education, showing how schools can act as sites of healing, connection, and transformation when educators commit to practices rooted in equity, care, and community empowerment.

Ultimately, this work invites scholars, practitioners, and aspiring educators to rethink the boundaries of schooling. Rather than containing learning within four walls, CBI encourages us to view the community as the classroom—and the student as a whole person whose lived experience, culture, and agency are central to their education. By embedding justice into everyday instructional practice, educators can become bridge-builders for belonging, ensuring that all students—especially those historically silenced—are seen, heard, and included in shaping the future.

Author

• Winter Marshall-Allen, The Homer Organization for More Equitable Relations