"I Didn't Realize I'd Be by Myself": Working With Vulnerable Populations During a Pandemic

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Sesion 4
  In Roundtable Session: Experiences in Marginalized Communities During the Pandemic: Lessons From Students and Families

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic presented the world with innumerable challenges, from multiple health crises to job scarcity. Research within many schools shut down, and researchers scrambled to adjust projects or simply wait out the storm to relaunch. Through the lens of storytelling, this article details the struggles my participants and myself as we grappled with multiple recruitment and design issues during the COVID-19 pandemic. Working with Black girls who had been overdisciplined in school, I discovered that the pandemic was simply one among may wrenches in the spokes of their lives. The girls’ reprioritizing of their needs through the project and the pandemic showed their resilience and the need for research to be flexible in service to its participants.

Author

• Jadyn Laixely, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign