Dismantling the Intersecting Forms of Exclusion in Higher Education View Digital Media

Workshop Presentation
Isabelle Kim,  Jordan Say,  Maria Teresa Valencia,  Emily Hedrick,  Jessica Black  

Currently, institutions of higher education require that neurodivergent individuals disclose and document their disability to the Disability Student Services Office (DSSO) in order to receive accommodations that are necessary for their learning. Claiming the identity of “student with disability” is necessary to access the resources, tools, and spaces that are readily available to their neurotypical peers, illustrating the biographic mediation of disability as a form of social oppression as disability is a social phenomenon that ultimately perpetuates oppressive, ableist practices in higher education. Thus, transformative, emancipatory pedagogies that systemically provide anti-ableist, equitable, and inclusive practices (i.e. Universal Design for Learning and Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy) must be implemented for all learners in the classroom while also acknowledging the intersections of identities, including race. In the field of inclusive education, there is an increasing need and interest to examine educational inequities at the intersection of ability and race as the fields of genetics and education have historically racialized ableism. This session seeks to build a dialogue among participants concerning translation and relevance between the fields of research and practice. First, participants will be introduced to background information on neurodivergence, biographic mediation, and the intersectionality of ableism and racism in relation to the Disability Critical Race Theory (DisCrit). Then, important concepts related to emancipatory pedagogies will be introduced and bridged with an overview of social justice and multicultural education. The importance of considering students’ decision to disclose their disability status to the DSSO will also be considered.