Resources for teachers regarding students and self-advocacy
Teaching Self-Advocacy Skills to Students
An online resource kit for educators to teach students self-advocacy skills.
What is self-advocacy?
An online resource kit for educators to teach students self-advocacy skills.
What is self-advocacy?
- Self-advocacy is, ‘[…]one form of advocacy, occurring any time people speak or act on their own behalf to improve their quality of life, effect personal change, or correct inequalities’” (Concunan-Lahr and Brotherson as cited in Brown, 1999).
- Self-advocacy is referred to as the ability to articulate one’s needs and make informed decisions about the supports necessary to meet those needs (Strodden, as cited in Test et al, 2005).
- Adolescence is the usual period during which students without disabilities begin to question authority and generally move toward becoming autonomous, self-determined individuals (Wehmeyer, 1995).
- Rather than breeding dependency, it is important that students with disabilities also be given opportunities to establish personal goals, make choices and become involved with the adults who have usually been making decisions for them (Wehmeyer, 1995).
- In postsecondary school, it is considered the student’s responsibility to advocate for himself/herself. Therefore, self-advocacy training in previous grades is of paramount importance (Brown, 1999).
- Self-advocacy skills are needed before commencing post-secondary education, which is usually a much larger, depersonalized setting. (Brown, 1999).
- Learning self-advocacy skills also develops self-determination skills, which could foster increased personal satisfaction and happiness.
- All students, whether or not they have a disability, must learn through opportunities and experiences to explore, take risks, learn from consequences, become self-motivated, develop positive self-esteem and gradually gain control over their lives. All students would benefit from being directly taught these skills at any age level.
- Students are able to appropriately describe their abilities and needs, and the accommodations and assistance that support their learning.
- Students are actively involved in setting realistic goals for their learning
- Students stay in school longer
- Many students attend post-secondary education
- Students are successful in the workplace
- 1973 – A “People First” group formed in the USA- wanted to be recognized as people first, rather than as disabled people.
- 1973 – British Columbia Association for the Mentally Handicapped organized first conference for people who had been “labelled”.http://www.peoplefirstofcanada.ca/growth_en.php
- 1974 – First “People First” group in Canada began in British Columbia.http://www.peoplefirstofcanada.ca/growth_en.php
- 1979 – Canadian Association for Community Living organized a self-advocacy workshop, the first of its kind for individuals who had been labelled. Some of these original self-advocates formed an alliance: the Consumer Advisory Committee for the Canadian Association for Community Living -stressed normalization and deinstitutionalization.
- “The Arc” formed in the USA – an advocacy group for parents of individuals with disabilities.
- 1980’s – many People First groups were formed across Canada and USA.
- 1983 – “Self-Advocacy Development Project” began to help organize self-advocacy groups across Canada.
- 1990 – The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) initiated idea that individuals should be involved in their own future planning.
- Research began to show a strong correlation between the development of self-advocacy skills and a successful transition to adult life. (Aune, 1991, Izzo & Lamb, 2002; Wehmeyer, 1992 as cited in Test et al., 2005.)
- Research in the 1990’s indicated self-advocacy skills and opportunities to self-advocate were not frequently being offered (Test et al, 2005).