3. Growing My Community Network
This activity aims to explore resources to build advocacy skills and ways to connect with them.
Discuss
How can you build your advocacy skills? Sure, you can practice what you know and what you’ve learned. But what if you need help getting started? What if you want to practice with others? What if you want to learn from other students like you?
We’re going to learn about advocacy resources that can help you speak up for yourself and others. These resources provide information about support services, independent living, making your own choices, and more. By knowing how to advocate, you can build confidence, make better choices, and be more involved in your education and community. This knowledge helps you to become more independent and makes sure your voices are heard. Some of these resources may have ways you can get involved, so think about how you may want to share your advocacy voice with others.
Review
Let’s explore an advocacy resource we want to know more about. Review the Advocacy Resource and Groups Guide. This is a list of advocacy groups and resources for individuals with disabilities. This is a starting point of resources, feel free to add more or share local resources in your community.
Reflect
After reviewing the different advocacy resources and groups, students will complete the Advocacy Resource section in the Self-Evaluation Tool. How students complete this section may vary based on available technology, time, and skills. Here are some options to help students complete their Advocacy Resource section:
- Instructor Assisted: Instructors can look up a local resource and show or print relevant information to help students.
- Guided Activity: Instructors can guide students through the process of looking up one of the resources listed.
- Independent Activity: Students can independently research an advocacy resource.
