Enhancing Diversity: Thinking
Differently About Disability
Clayton Keller
Disability Symposium
Creighton University
April 21, 2005
Enhancing Diversity: Thinking
Differently About Disability


“How can you be a teacher?”
An uphill struggle to have the issues of
educators with disabilities recognized and
addressed within a special education
professional organization
Overview Of My Talk

Different ideas about disabilities



Descriptions
Implications for diversity efforts
Fostering opportunities



Justice
Education
Advice
Ideas About Disability

A typical or lay view


Person = disability
Language





The handicapped
The blind musician
Suffers from…
Wheelchair-bound
Implications for diversity

Diversity as a value doesn’t honor what is viewed as
unfortunate or missing
Ideas About Disabilities

An enlightened view

Person ≠ disability



Language



Person is the same as everyone else
Person first, then the disability
The person with disabilities
The teacher who is deaf
Implications for diversity

Diversity as a value doesn’t honor what is viewed as the
same
Ideas About Disabilities

An environmental view

Person ₪environment ≈ disability

Emphasis is on changing the environment


American Association on Mental Retardation’s classification of
mental retardation “focuses on the pattern and intensity of
supports needed to enable a person to participate in valued
settings and activities”
(http://www.aamr.org/sis/pdf/sis_overview_nasddd.pdf )
 Intermittent, Limited, Extensive, Pervasive
Implications for diversity

Diversity as a value doesn’t honor changing differences
Ideas About Disabilities

An activist and rights-based view


Disability → person
Language


Disabled person
Implications for diversity

All of what diversity as a value honors is present
Ed Roberts

Parallels in Time: A History of Developmental Disabilities
 Minnesota Governor’s Council on Developmental Disabilities
Creighton’s Mission


Service to others, the importance of family
life, the inalienable worth of each
individual, and appreciation of ethnic and
cultural diversity are core values of
Creighton.
…Creighton’s education is directed…to
the promotion of justice.
Fostering Opportunities

What constitutes justice?

“[This book] is based on the view that while notions of justice
have always been implicit in the discussion of the theoretical,
policy and practical issues concerning the education of people
with disabilities, these notions are seldom made explicit and
subjected to sustained analysis….[W]hile there is widespread
recognition that as a group people with disabilities have been
subjected to social practices which are fundamentally unjust,
there is a lack of clarity on what constitutes injustice and what
would constitute a socially just community for people with
disabilities.”

Rizvi & Christensen, 1996, Disability and the Dilemmas of
Education and Justice, p. 2
Fostering Opportunities


What might constitute justice in the
education of students with disabilities at
Creighton University?
Such justice will not consist of



Charity
Service
Such justice will require compliance with
laws like Section 504 and the ADA
Fostering Opportunities

Such justice should go beyond compliance
with the laws


Legal compliance may not be enough
The education should be invitational

Anticipating needs and having many
accommodations or supports in place
normally versus solely providing them only
when asked
Universal Instructional Design

Universal Design: The design of products and
environments to be usable by all people, to the
greatest extent possible, without the need for
adaptation or specialized design (North Carolina
State University, Center for Universal Design)

Universal Instructional Design: A pedagogical
analogy

“[Such qualities] should be built into the instructional
design and operating systems of educational
materials--they should not have to be added on later.”
(Orkwis & McLane, 1998, p. 9)
Fostering Opportunities



The education should be inclusive
Students with disabilities can see themselves,
their lives, and their concerns in their education,
in ways that can also be seen by others
For example:





Civil rights
Ethical debates
Policies
Literature
http://www.disabilityrag.org
Supports Within Professions

Careers for All and Workforce Development


Breaking New Ground Resource Center: Cultivating
Independence for Persons with Disabilities in Agriculture


American Association for the Advancement of Science
 http://www.aaas.org/programs/education/CareersAll/index.sh
tml
Purdue University
 http://pasture.ecn.purdue.edu/ABE/Extension/BNG/Resource
%20Center/resourcecenter.html
Educators with Disabilities Caucus

The Council for Exceptional Children
 http://www.cec.sped.org/diversity/edc.html
Fostering Opportunities

Suggestions for individuals with disabilities (Karp,
Anderson, & Keller, 1998, p. 275)










Take control over your life
Desire to succeed
Strive for your goals and be persistent
Find opportunities that best fit your goals and your needs
Reframe your disability to see it as a positive
Use learned creativity
Construct networks for support and personal improvement
Be independent and interdependent by using those people and
resources that can help
Ask for accommodations you need
Use a portfolio of experiences and accomplishments
Fostering Opportunities

Suggestions for faculty (selected from Karp,
Anderson, & Keller, 1998, p. 277)







Ask about each individual’s conception of him- or herself and his
or her disability
Create a campus environment where individuals feel accepted
Encourage all students to actively determine how they best learn
and function as students and how to communicate that to others
Allow students to make accommodations and adaptations they
need
Encourage students to be both independent and interdependent
Create mentor-mentee relationships
Assist students in building a portfolio of accomplishments
Characteristics for Developing a Just
Education for Students with Disabilities at
Creighton University





Openness to communication
Willingness to question one’s own and others’
assumptions about disabilities and education
Creativity to generate solutions
Courage to put solutions to appropriate tests
Honesty to accept the results of such tests

Adapted from Keller, Anderson, & Karp, 1998, p.11