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| Shaunqula (Shaun) Wilson, Ph.D. |
My experiences as a student, non-profit leader, and researcher have imparted both personal and observational accounts of self-advocacy. Historically, self-advocacy has been defined as “an individual's ability to effectively communicate, convey, negotiate, or assert his or her interests, desires, needs, and rights.” (VanReusen et al., 1994). According to West et.al. (1999), “students with strong self-advocacy skills are more likely to succeed in their pursuits as they will be able to request necessary accommodations for themselves. “
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| 4th graders share their thoughts with peers during a Visual Literacy workshop. |
I strongly identify with the term self-advocacy
as I continue to develop and evaluate the multitude of ways in which we, as an
American society, approach formal education. I have witnessed how countless
students make meaning about who they are and what they can achieve while
navigating between school and non-school environments. I have come to understand
and appreciate the fact that simply haranguing each other about what we should do
“for” our children simply doesn’t cut it. Personally, I am more interested in
what we should do “alongside” our children. I believe the latter framework has
implications for how we can foster greater instances of self-knowledge and
fortitude among our children.
I remember some of my early experiences
as a student and the actions I took to address a teacher who, on multiple
occasions, incorrectly graded my multiplication quizzes. Even after she noted
her mistake the first time, these mistakes occurred two more times and I asked
my mother to withdraw me from this teacher’s class. If I were a little older at
the time, I would have probably queried other students about their own
experiences with her grading. At age nine, however, most students did not want
to show their grades to each other, and so I thought, “I have to switch classes
before she fails me.” As a nine year old, I recognized early on that I could
communicate my concerns and though, there were other times I did just that and
many more times I did not, I believe that I still grasped that I must advocate
on my behalf.
As Preservation LINK’s Director of
Research and Program Evaluation, I have documented students as young as age
seven and as old as nineteen, explore what it means to be an advocate for
themselves and others. In addition to writing creative narratives and taking photographs
in the classroom as well as in the community, students have discussed how they
practice self-advocacy. Their examples include establishing a study group or
extracurricular group in their school, asking a teacher to further explain a
term taught during a classroom lesson, and taking summer classes to prepare
them for advanced high school courses.
I have also documented the experiences
of students whose beliefs about self-advocacy have faded when faced with academic
hurdles in their classroom. In
turn, these students have coped with these hurdles by practicing a form of disengagement
as illustrated by the following example:
“It frustrates me when I don’t get stuff and then when they
ask me uh’ “Do you understand,” I just sit there and say yeah because I get so
frustrated and I don’t want to ask and that’s just how I am, so I try to sit
there and figure it out myself.”
Another student shared,
“[School] is boring. It seems like it’s too easy, but I’ve always
been like that though…I’ll skip class and miss a whole lesson and then come to
class when it’s time to take the test and ace the test…As far as me sitting
down and writing and learning, I’d rather go to sleep.”
Unfortunately, the sentiments expressed
by these students and their examples of disengagement are not unique, but they
do illustrate the vital role educators, parents, and others play in helping
students understand why simply attending school is not enough. It is our duty to assist students in
developing the tools to advocate on behalf of themselves- by maintaining a commitment to academic
learning through frequent inquiry, exposing oneself to what might initially
seem foreign, and sometimes demanding other teaching methods from their
institutions when the traditional ones fail them.
Despite the efforts of some who
encourage our students to be self-advocates in and beyond the classroom, students
face a barrage of media depicting them as an overwhelmingly apathetic segment of
the population. When looking at what
kinds of supports can play a key role in countering this barrage of
deficit-framed media while fostering self-advocacy, visual arts programs
can be a powerful tool in demonstrating and redirecting how students embrace
their academic learning. In fact, the tasks that visual arts curriculums often require
are much of the same types of critical thinking and communicative skills needed
in the classroom (i.e., the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, and produce)
(Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, 2003). Students in Preservation LINK’s advanced programs have created
media that explores education, advocacy, and the communal aspects of success.
Students have chosen to interview the founders of mentoring programs, the
mothers of academically successful males, college and university administrators
and faculty, and individuals who returned to school after dropping out years earlier.
They have also interviewed each
other about the importance of researching career interests early, being able to
address academic and non-academic challenges, and learning to effectively work
in groups.
Although I encourage early cultivation of self-advocacy
tools, I recognize that this concept, this practice, does not exist among a lot
of adults. Currently working with students in their first years of college, I
periodically meet with them to discuss everything from coursework and professors
to study groups, tutoring, and time management to school and work balance to financial
and/or family issues. These discussions always provide interesting food for
thought and is enriching for me as a human development professional, researcher,
non-profit leader, and individual whose focus is youth development. I recently met with some students who are
experiencing coursework with professors they deem difficult. The students
expressed that their experiences with their professors had left them
disheartened and convinced that they did not possess the resources to be
successful in these courses. One student mentioned that she chose to shy away
from trying because she felt discouraged by her inability to comprehend the
material and the teacher’s unwillingness to meet with her. I encouraged her to
seek additional support for this coursework-pointing out that she probably
wasn’t alone in her experience and that looking out for her own educational
future was her responsibility-even in the face of what she saw as an
overwhelming situation.
Given my experiences, I believe that there
is still much to learn about how we can, as parents, teachers, administrators,
non-profit leaders, and others, encourage a generation of youth to feel
confident about their future and embrace self- advocacy. There are so many
other connections to this concept and I am truly interested in learning about your experience with young people learning
to be advocates for themselves? What are your observations in your school/home
environment? How are you encouraging students to develop positive self advocacy
traits? Please share and let’s create a force that supports our children while
supporting each other.
Kaiser, T. H. (2003). Key Facts: Media
Literacy. Retrieved September, 2008, from
The
Kaiser Family Foundation: http://www.kff.org/entmedia/upload/Key-Facts-Media-
Literacy.pdf.
Van Reusen, A. K., Bos, C., &
Schumaker, J. B. (1994) Self-Advocacy Strategy for education
West, L., Corbey, S., Boyer-Stephens,
A., Jones, B., Miller, R.& Sarkees-Wircenski, M. (1999).
Integrating transition planning into
the IEP process. (2nd ed.) Reston, VA.
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