I'm Trying to Make Myself Happy: Black Students With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities and Families on Promoting Self-Determination During Transition

Abstract

Promoting self-determination for students with disabilities has proven to be a critical component of effective transition planning. However, researchers seldom consider race when promoting self-determination for people with disabilities. The purpose of the current phenomenological research investigation was to explore how Black youth with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) and their families explain transition planning experiences that promote and hinder self-determination. We found that participants in the current study experienced some hurdles during their transition experiences that they perceive are rooted in systemic and structural racism and ableism that prompted advocacy, family engagement, inclusion, building knowledge of rights, and other emergent strategies to promote self-determination. Findings from the current preliminary investigation have implications for transition and self-determination research, as well as improving the quality of services and support for Black youth with IDD and their families.

Special Education Teachers of Color Burnout, Working Conditions, and Recommendations for EBD Research

“…How do teachers’ racial/ethnic identities shape their instruction and services for students with EBD? How do they affect students’ short- and long-term outcomes (e.g., employment, postsecondary education, community integration; Scott, Thoma, et al, 2021), especially for students of color? How do these effects vary depending on teachers’ burnout?…”

Advancing Anti-Racism and Anti-Ableism in Transition: Equity-Oriented Indicators for Research

“…DisCrit has been applied in transition research. For example, researchers have used DisCrit to explore postschool transition opportunities for teenage girls diagnosed with learning disabilities and intellectual disability (Cowley, 2013) and to understand how Black male youth with intellectual and developmental disability (IDD) and their families use race-conscious strategies to promote self-determination (Scott et al, 2021;Taylor et al, 2023). Understanding variability in the way students and families of color define and promote self-determination and transition has implications for critically examining decades of self-determination and transition research.…”

“…Much of the research in transition is largely “race-neutral” (Rowe et al, 2021), focusing on improving outcomes for all students with disabilities. Race-neutral research, however, fails to recognize the additional, systemic barriers faced by students who experience marginalization because of their racial and ethnic identities (Scott et al, 2021). There has been attention directed to merging culturally sustaining practices into transition planning (e.g., Trainor et al, 2020), but this work has tended to be peripheral and has not been established as the expectation in transition research.…”

“…Centering the cultural and ecological experiences of racially and ethnically marginalized youth with disabilities is necessary to engage in meaningful transition research, and to improve and develop meaningful interventions and supports (Farmer et al, 2022; Scott et al, 2021; Shogren et al, 2021). Applying critical theories and frameworks such as Critical Race Theory, Black feminist theory, Intersectionality theory, and Disability Studies and Critical Race Theory in Education (DisCrit) is one way of advancing anti-racist and anti-ableist transition research.…”

“…We posit that a large segment of education research has been rooted in inequitable systems and the values and practices that maintain them, and this impacts teacher education and practice in today’s schools. Practices identified as research or evidence-based that do not recognize cultural pluralism and center the needs of marginalized groups harm students who are not from dominant social identities (Achola, 2019; Farmer et al, 2022; Rowe et al, 2021; Scott et al, 2021; Shogren et al, 2021; Thoma et al, 2016). There is a need to disrupt who is centered in transition research, to acknowledge and challenge systemic barriers to equitable outcomes, and to reinvent the models that are used to advance transition outcomes through research, teaching, policy, and practice.…”