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Protecting Equal Access to Education: Dispatches from Fellows Advocating for Education Access
/ Blog Post
Equal Justice Works recently spoke to 2023 Fellows Makiah Lyons, Vanessa Aceves, Breanna Bollig, and Rachel Niegelberg, who are all working on education access, educational rights, and special education issues. Read more about their work and how public interest law can serve our educational systems below:
Makiah Lyons
At the Intercultural Development Research Association (IDRA), I am developing a legal youth participatory action research project co-led by a group of youth researchers to investigate the school discipline experiences of Black girls in Georgia public schools. I also work to develop accessible legal advocacy resources for parents, students, and community members interested in challenging discriminatory discipline and identity-based bullying in schools.
What does an average day working with your clients look like?
A typical day in my fellowship involves drafting toolkits, developing webinars, and other resources for advocates and community members. Recently, I have spent much more time planning and coordinating with youth researchers on a legal youth participatory action research project. Legal participatory action research (LPAR) is a method of inquiry that can be used to understand the impact of laws, policies, and systems on people and communities and build the community knowledge and capacity necessary to challenge unjust systems. Youth participatory action research (YPAR) is a similar framework that situates youth as researchers. We are combining these two modes of inquiry to study the discipline experiences of girls of color, Black girls specifically in the Atlanta area., which has been both fun and exciting.
What have you accomplished or learned so far?
My project highlights how important it is to build capacity and democratize legal resources, tools, and advocacy skills. There is such a huge gap between the need for education advocacy and the capacity of education advocates and attorneys. I am really proud of the work I have done to develop resources that can help to bridge that gap, including the development of a resource providing guidance on school discipline representation and a library of resources about writing complaints to the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights.
What are you most excited about continuing your project?
I am looking forward to seeing our legal youth participatory action research project take off and finding ways to translate this research into better laws and policies that better serve Black girls and all students. I am excited to be publishing and presenting my resources, building greater capacity for advocacy in education.
Our hope is that we gain a better understanding of the impact of school discipline on Black girls in the Atlanta area, and identify opportunities to advocate for better policies, discuss our findings with legal and education systems actors, and to find ways to bridge the gap in access to legal advocacy for Black girls and their communities.
Vanessa Aceves
My project helps students of all ages who have trouble talking or communicating at school by getting them access to communication devices. These communication devices are instrumental to building a student’s independence, social skills, and academic success.
In one example of how communication devices are able to assist students, I have a 14-year-old client who hasn’t had a communication device for three years. In the last two months with a communication device returned to him, his parent told me that his communication has been “explosive.” He is opening up to his mom about his feelings, his goals for the future, and is strengthening his bond with his family. His mother is incredibly thankful for my help in giving her son a method to express himself.
What does an average day working with your clients look like?
My workday includes intakes for new cases, speaking with current clients (in English and Spanish) on resolving their issues in school, and collaborating with other organizations throughout Illinois who have a shared goal of expanding access to communication devices.
What have you accomplished or learned so far?
I have provided brief service to 110 families and full legal representation to 28 families. I presented trainings (in English and Spanish) and attended resource fairs totaling outreach to 589 people throughout Illinois. I also developed a key relationship with the state’s assistive technology program to expand outreach efforts to students in need of communication devices.
What are you most excited about continuing your project?
I am excited to take the knowledge I have gained from individual issues families face to address systemic issues, like failing to complete evaluations within the 60-day deadline (instead, evaluations are taking almost a year to complete) and inadequate training for communication devices. I plan to help meet the needs of communities dealing with these issues through FOIA requests and state complaints. I am also excited each time I hear a parent tell me that their child finally has a voice and is learning new things about them.
Breanna Bollig
At California Tribal Families Coalition, I assist tribes and tribal social workers in providing education advocacy for tribal youth with disabilities in California’s child welfare system.
What does an average day working with your clients look like?
On a day-to-day basis during my Fellowship, I provide direct representation to tribes in California child welfare proceedings. Through this representation, I help tribal social workers identify and address education and disability right issues involving tribal youth. I also develop educational trainings and resources to support tribes and tribal social workers in providing education advocacy.
What have you accomplished or learned so far?
Through my work at California Tribal Families Coalition, I’ve learned that education and disability right issues for tribal foster youth are often overlooked by child welfare agencies. The efforts of tribal governments to identify and address these issues has been extremely impactful in improving education outcomes for tribal foster youth.
What are you most excited about continuing your project?
At California Tribal Families Coalition, I am able to observe firsthand how tribal governments are able to support their youth in both education and child welfare systems. Moving forward, I am excited to support tribes in expanding their role in education advocacy.
Rachel Niegelberg
Through a medical-legal partnership, I provide direct representation to low-income families of children with disabilities who are experiencing health-harming legal needs. This can be done by supporting clients in obtaining appropriate special education services so that all children have access to the education to which they are legally entitled.
What does an average day working with your clients look like?
I have the honor of working directly with my client families, advocating at Individualized Education Plan (IEP) team meetings at schools, facilitating positive and effective communications between families and school teams, informing client families about their rights as parents in the school system, and preparing filings for due process hearings when families and school teams are unable to reach an agreement without the intervention of the law. Through this work, I help ensure that students have the IEPs they need, that these plans are being followed, that IEPs are based on current and accurate evaluations, that appropriate services are provided to students, and that students have all the tools they require to be able to access their educations.
What have you accomplished or learned so far?
My clients have been fiercely advocating for their children far before my organization’s or my own involvement in their education cases. They are the expert voices in what their children need to successfully access their education and get prepared for their futures. My role is not to give voice to my clients–they already have strong voices–but to use legal avenues to amplify their voices and ensure that they are being heard, resulting in obtaining the appropriate and necessary educational supports so that all children can acquire their education, regardless of disability.
What are you most excited about continuing your project?
In the final year of my Fellowship, I look forward to continuing to build strong connections with client families as well as medical provider teams to strengthen our medical-legal partnership and access as many families as possible. Additionally, I look forward to providing trainings for client families to help ensure that they know their rights when it comes to their children’s education. Finally, I look forward to assisting families in increasing their self-advocacy within the school system.