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College of Education

Experiences in Equity and Agency: Disability in Higher Education

The exhibit Experiences in Equity and Agency: Disability in Higher Education is a culmination of two photovoice projects carried out within two separate University of South Carolina courses in the fall of 2022. Instructors Chelsea Stinnett, Ph.D. and Rebecca Smith Hill embraced the tenets of participatory action research in their efforts to empower students to become co-researchers and to co-create knowledge to be shared with the wider USC community. The lived experiences and co-created knowledge of students with and without disabilities on campus is reflected in this exhibit.

Students who took the Honors College course Equity in Action: Disability and Accessibility in Higher Education, identified the accessibility needs on USC’s Columbia campus through the eyes of undergraduate students with and without disabilities, as they lived out these experiences in real time. Students who took the CarolinaLIFE course, Agency in College used photos of their experiences in college as students with intellectual and developmental disabilities to express their understanding and development of self-determination and agency. Our hope is that these experiences shared through photovoice will inform USC stakeholders of the experiences of a marginalized community and bring awareness to the issues of inequity for those with disabilities on campus.


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