Challenging Ableism: Disability Allyship Through Service-Learning
This interactive service-learning course offers a hands-on introduction to being an effective ally for people with intellectual and physically diverse abilities. In the classroom, students learn basic concepts about ableism and the social construction of disability.
An important part of this course is field trips where students to go a community-based location to engage in socialization and recreation with people with divergent intellectual or physical ability. A main goal of the class is to deepen understanding of the challenges, opportunities, and complex lives of people with disabilities.
This pre-college program is based on and draws from the oldest and largest civic engagement program at UMass Amherst. Founded in 1969, the Boltwood Project involves over 100 undergraduate students each semester. This student-run civic engagement and leadership program is designed to provide enrichment, recreation, and socialization for adults and children with intellectual or physical diverse ability. Through seminar and classroom activities, and through the weekly sessions at a variety of service provider sites, students learn how to be friends and allies with people of diverse physical and intellectual abilities. Advanced students also learn about and engage in legislative and policy advocacy to fight ableism and support the rights of people with disabilities.
Boltwood is an interdisciplinary course and students of all majors participate. Many Boltwood students are pursuing professions in medicine, psychology, public health, speech & hearing therapy, and education. Significantly, Boltwood provides these future health professionals with a grounding in the “social model” as distinguished from the “medical model” of disability. The experience seeks to broaden and enrich ideas about the concept of disability and people labeled as disabled.
Undergraduate students have had this to say about their participation in Boltwood:
“Being a part of Boltwood has been one of the most meaningful and important experiences I have had at UMass.”
“Personally, I learned that I want to orient my career to disability and advocacy for accessibility.”
"I feel like I have learned a lot about communicating with others and how not to fear what others think because labels should not define people".
Learn more about the Boltwood Project at UMass Amherst
This course is offered at the UMass Amherst campus as a residential program. Local students may apply to attend as a commuter.
Class activities will include:
- Reading/viewing and discussing materials on civic engagement and disability studies, rights, and justice
- Using creative means to reflect on in-class and community-based learning
- Presentations from disability activists and professionals in the field
- Off-campus trips to a local disability program or community
- A final project/presentation that synthesizes and reflects on your learning and its significance for your future life.
Classes will meet on the UMass Amherst campus. In addition, students will participate in several off-campus sessions at local community-based programs that serve people with disabilities. These programs engage adult participants with varying levels of cognitive and/or physical disabilities and cultivate a safe space where high school students can make meaningful connections.
Through a range of activities, including arts and crafts, making snacks, playing board games, telling jokes, and/or outdoor activities, students and participants create a high energy, life-loving space. The visits to the inclusive recreation/socialization community sites that are part of this course will be coordinated and supervised by UMass upper division undergraduates who are student leaders within The Boltwood Project.
Pre-Requisites
There are no pre-requisites for this class. Students should have an interest and enthusiasm to engage in recreation and socialization with people across intellectual and physical differences.
Materials
Students should bring:
- Notebook and pen/pencil
- Personal laptop or tablet
The course emphasizes real-world skills high school students can use at school and in their communities, and it focuses on partnership—engaging people with disabilities as learning partners, rather than objects of study. A key goal of the course is developing the ability to challenge and reduce the segregation and isolation from mainstream society of people with intellectual and/or physical differences.
At the end of the course, students will:
- Develop a deepened understanding of the joys and challenges, as well as the diversity and complexity of the social identities of people with intellectual and physical differences
- Understand and reflect on the value of the social model of disability and how it differs from the medical model
- Examine themes of ableism and its structures within society, while learning ways to dismantle them and promote equity and inclusion
- Reflect on how their own values, assumptions, and commitments influence the meanings and relationships made through this experience
- Develop student capacity for civic engagement and civic leadership
Class time is Monday-Friday from 9am - 4pm.
The community-based activities will follow the community partners' schedules and some may be scheduled in the early evening. Transportation to the sites will be provided.
|
Time |
Activity |
|
9:00-10:30am |
Debrief site visit |
|
10:30am-12:00pm |
Service Thermometer activity |
|
12:00-1:00pm |
Lunch Break |
|
1:00-2:30am |
Reading: disability rights history |
|
2:30-4:00pm |
Reading discussion |
In the evenings and on weekends resident counselors will run a series of social activities. Students are encouraged to join in, relax and have fun with new friends! With social events on campus and in the surrounding Amherst area, and access to the UMass Recreation & Wellness Center, there's something for everyone to enjoy.
Learn more about student life at UMass Amherst Summer Pre-College
Meet the Faculty
Ellen Correa, Senior Lecturer, Department of Civic Engagement and Service-Learning
The Boltwood Project Academic Director
Ellen Correa has a BA in Human Communication, an MA in Intercultural Relations, and a PhD in Communication Studies from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where she also earned the Certificate in Latin American, Caribbean, & Latino Studies. She worked for many years as the manager of a government antipoverty program in California and was involved in community activism on behalf of immigrant and Latinx rights. Most recently she has spent 10 happy years teaching interdisciplinary civic engagement classes for the office of Civic Engagement & Service-Learning, including her role as the Academic Advisor for The Boltwood Project, the student leadership program on which this summer learning experience is based.
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