Researchers Eleanor Gil Kashiwabara and Celestine Willis presented the results of their study on barriers, strategies, and choices for minorities with disabilities transitioning to life after high school.

“There are over 185,000 Latinas with disabilities between the ages of 15 and 24 in the United States; 113,000 of them have a severe disability,” said Kashiwabara, a psychologist and assistant professor of social work and social research at Portland State University. “They have the highest school dropout rate of any group of girls.”

For Latinas with disabilities, the transition to adulthood is more complicated than it is for other groups. They face three levels of discrimination: being a woman, a minority, and disabled, said Kashiwabara, who is herself a Latina with a disability. Kashiwabara is principal investigator on the project “Helping All Latinas Achieve” (HALA), funded by the U.S. Department of Education.

“More than any other group I surveyed, Latina girls and their families want the girls to go to the university. However, retention efforts to keep Latinas with disabilities in school have not been successful thus far,” Kashiwabara said. “They remain the lowest group with post–high school education,” she said.

The absence of research and programs focused on Latinas in special education places them at greater risk for dropout, Kashiwabara said. “In one case, a girl using a wheelchair had to opt for a modified diploma at school, even though it was not challenging her academically, because that way she could be included in the independent skills program,” Kashiwabara said. “She had to pick between independence and education.”

Another obstacle for Latinas who want to further their education is that they have to negotiate with their cultural traditions, which sometimes discourages leaving home, Kashiwabara said. Moreover, for those in the lower socio-economic levels, the situation becomes severe, often leading to undiagnosed depression. “Their struggles build on each other, they have no support system for their disability and no resources,” Kashiwabara said.

In some cases, special school programs for people with disabilities fall short of expectations. “We talk to students and find that teachers are basically acting as baby sitters,” and said Willis, director of training at the Center for Capacity Building on Minorities with Disabilities Research at the University of Illinois. “Students feel that they are not being taught.” The researchers also found that students are not identifying themselves as having disabilities, which can prevent them from getting the right information and into the right programs.

To combat these problems, Willis is working on Choices, an intervention project to help Latino students and their teachers through the transition process. Willis has co-developed a cultural competency training model which is implemented at centers for independent living, community based organizations, and rehabilitation centers around the country. “The more people become culturally competent, the more willing they will be to offer a disabled person an opportunity,” Willis said.

In conclusion, both panelists offered some practical solutions to the problems faced by minorities with disabilities: Dissemination of information about disabilities and programs, increased involvement of minorities with disabilities in special programs, evaluation and improvement of these programs, and more research about implementation of culturally sensitive transition services.

For more information:

Eleanor Gil-Kashiwabara, gilkashi@pdx.edu or 503-725-9607

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