Civic Equity for Students With Disabilities

Abstract

Background/Context: In its pursuit for equal opportunity for all students, the field of civic education has largely ignored a significant segment of the school population: students with disabilities (SWD). While numerous studies have documented the benefits of high-quality civic learning for youth, these benefits are not equally distributed among students. Indeed, White students, economically advantaged students, and students in higher tracked classes are the most likely to participate in high-quality civic learning opportunities. Meanwhile, little is known about the high-quality civic learning opportunities provided to SWD because they are routinely absent from research and policy discussions. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: Any meaningful commitment to respecting SWD as competent, contributing citizens in a democratic society requires preparing them to advocate for themselves and for others as fully as possible, which in turn requires high-quality civic learning opportunities in our schools. Moreover, we need to better understand which students are included in civic education and in what ways because these efforts communicate important lessons about who is a valued member of “we the people” and the school community. As such, this study explores the current landscape of civic education for SWD by examining the extent to which they receive equitable exposure to high-quality civic learning opportunities and engage civically within their communities. Research Design: Drawing on more than 48,000 survey responses from high school students in Chicago Public Schools, a quantitative analysis was conducted to examine the relationship between four demographic variables (disability status, socioeconomic status, race/ethnicity, and gender) and seven outcome variables attending to both traditional and digital forms of civic education. Notably, this appears to be the first large-scale empirical study to examine these indicators for SWD. Conclusions/Recommendations: There are statistically significant differences between the civic education experiences provided to SWD and students without disabilities, even when controlling for socioeconomic status, race/ethnicity, and gender. In particular, SWD are more likely to be excluded from discussion-based experiences than service-based experiences. Moreover, the magnitude of the differences based on disability status was equal to or greater than that of the differences explained by other demographic variables in the majority of cases. These findings demonstrate that disability status is a factor that deserves greater attention in civic education research and pedagogy.

Analysis Of The Concept Of Fulfilling The Political Rights Of Disabled People Reviewed From The Perspective Of Civic Education

“…Based on the comprehensive analysis above, it can be emphasized that the novelty in this research, namely, the analysis of the concept of fulfilling the political rights of disabled people in a Civics perspective seeks to fulfill the political rights of disabled people in a comprehensive and representative manner, because it includes political education, political empowerment, and political involvement, so that not limited to distributing political votes in elections, which is ceremonial. The next theoretical contribution is to complete applied theory, in the form of developing and updating the research of Voulgarides (2021) and Bueso (2022), so that it leads to the study of Civics as civic education and citizenship education, which is inclusive and accommodating to people with disabilities, to increase insight or knowledge. politics, political civility, and political skills of disabled people, individually and in communities.…”

“…Bearing in mind that it is not limited to the practice of fulfilling political rights in the form of casting political votes in elections, but also includes political education, political empowerment and political involvement, by making people with disabilities the subject, also involving students, so that it leads to civic equality for people with disabilities. Civic equality needs to be guaranteed in the existence of people with disabilities, and then efforts to realize equality for people with disabilities in the United States are carried out based on Civics in schools, considering that it is a vehicle for providing students with a holistic understanding of the urgency of equality, as well as empowering people with disabilities (Bueso, 2022). This substance makes the meaning of fulfilling the political rights of people with disabilities more holistic, positive and accommodating, to realize civic equality for people with disabilities, so that discrimination against people with disabilities can be overcome sustainably in society.…”

Voting status of people with an intellectual disability in four French–speaking cantons of Switzerland: A survey

“…The results also show that, for Genevan citizens, the law opened up voting opportunities; however, no difference in voting right usage was seen between Genevan and non‐Genevan citizens. Guaranteeing access to the right to vote is therefore not the only challenge in promoting full and complete civic participation by people with intellectual disability; it is also essential to offer them systematic civic education (Bueso, 2022), since both traditional and digital civic learning opportunities are known to lead to greater civic engagement and development of young people without (Bowyer & Kahne, 2020) and with disabilities (Fontana‐Lana et al, 2017). It is crucial to ensure they have accessible information about the issues being put to the vote (Confédération suisse, 2021), to help them prepare themselves and support them in building their decision‐making capacities (Khemka & Hickson, 2021; van Hees et al, 2019).…”

Transforming Civics for High-Need Students

“…They are left out of the planning process for community engagement projects and are given perfunctory tasks when they volunteer. As a result, students with disabilities are less likely to follow local and national politics or to participate in the full range of citizen actions (Bueso, 2022). They have lower voter registration and voter turnout rates than their non-disabled peers (National Center for Learning Disabilities, 2019; Schur and Kruse, 2020).…”

“…Civic education varies greatly in quantity and quality across-and within-schools and the breach is widening (Kaufman and Diliberti, 2023). A civic learning opportunity gap has been identified for lower-SES, non-White students (Kahne and Middaugh, 2008;Levine, 2009;Levinson, 2010) and students with disabilities (Bueso, 2022). The civics instruction and curricular materials that students of color, ELLs, and students with disabilities receive omit content that is most germane to them.…”