Valuing Disability and Crip Ways of Knowing in the College Classroom

In higher education, there is a tendency to try to diagnose disabled students and default to accommodations rather than designing more accessible teaching and learning environments. This presentation will address how principles of universal design can be implemented by faculty, administrators, and staff to design learning environments that are accessible, rather than simply accommodating of difference. Based on ideas from Rhetorics of Overcoming: Rewriting Narratives of Disability and Accessibility in Writing Studies, I offer universal design as a framework both for foregrounding accessibility and for intentionally making space for crip ways of knowing, learning, and being in college classrooms. Disability is often positioned as something that must be overcome, but I focus on ways that we can actively value disability and disabled meaning-making practices. I will identify examples of inaccessible teaching practices and learning environments, as well as practical strategies for resisting rhetorics of overcoming. LUNCH:11:00-11:30 Talk:11:45-12:30 Q+A:12:30-12:45 Space is limited. Register by March 24th.