Intersections of Marginalization and Possibility: A Phenomenological Analysis of Disabled Students’ Experiences with Online Learning

Abstract

During the covid-19 pandemic, online learning allowed for accommodations that were previously unavailable. However, this reconfiguration of supports did not always occur. Research centering student experience alongside the complexity of social contexts in online learning is lacking. Using Intersectional Critical Disability Studies and Queer Phenomenology, we investigate disabled students’ experiences with online learning. Interviews with secondary and postsecondary students reveal that online schooling reinforced barriers and hindered full inclusion and support. The pandemic emphasized the feelings of insignificance of their education, restricting their societal roles. Disabled students in this study relied on individual relationships and support to navigate their schooling. Using the concepts of inheritance/disinheritance to explore how the shift to online learning further affected secondary students with disabilities, this paper argues that the changes functioned primarily to protect the non-disabled and perpetuate ablebodiedness, thereby placing access further out of reach and thus entrenching limitations to dreaming past barriers.