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In case you missed it, the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission has published an online Career Options Guide to help workers explore career opportunities in disability, and it’s nailed the section on support coordination. You can check it out here.
I love that the pathway to support coordination starts with this statement: “I want to pursue my interest in inclusion and accessibility”. If I were to condense the role of a support coordinator into a single statement, that wouldn’t be far off. And if I had to choose a single word, it would be “inclusion”.
But what does inclusion mean?
The aim of inclusion is to embrace all people irrespective of race, gender, disability, medical or other need to ensure everyone can fully participate in all aspects of society.
Disability inclusion is about creating communities where people with disability feel welcome and comfortable, where they are seen, valued, and appreciated for what they contribute. The work of inclusion isn’t about inviting people with a disability to do more. It is about giving equal access and opportunities and removing barriers like discrimination and intolerance.
Communities, businesses, and other groups and organizations are considered inclusive if people with disabilities do not face barriers to participation and have equal access to opportunities and resources.
Inclusion Resources
To support you on your journey to enable inclusion, I’ve pulled together links to five of my favourite inclusion resources and frameworks for support coordinators.
- The social model of disability: The social model of disability sees impairment as another form of human diversity. According to the social model, it’s not impairment that disables people but society itself, through the interactions between people living with impairments and an environment filled with physical, attitudinal, communication, and social barriers. The social model of disability supports the view that people with disability have the right to be fully participating members of society. It does not seek to change people with impairments to fit into society but to change society to accommodate people with impairments.
- Tom Nierny’s Four Simple Dimensions of Capital: Tom Nierny cites 4 universal human aspirations important to focus on: a place to call home, community membership, relationships, and work.
- Simon Duffy's Seven Keys to Citizenship: Citizenship is about living a good life that we each choose and making contributions to the community while respecting the rights of others to pursue their own path. In this video, Simon Duffy describes 7 keys to how we can achieve citizenship in practice for everyone.
- Judith Snow’s Four Circles and Circles of Support: Judith Snow describes 4 circles of relationships that exist within our lives: the circle of intimacy, the circle of friendship, the circle of participation, and the circle of exchange. Many people have a diverse range of relationships across the four circles, giving them active and engaged lives. People with disability may be vulnerable to having fewer relationships across the circles, with an emphasis on paid supports in the circle of exchange. This can lead to social isolation. Circles of support are one tool for attempting to think through ways of addressing this imbalance.
- Janet Klees on Building a Context for Relationships (podcast recording) or Janet Klees Building a Context for Relationships (Masterclass): Janet Klees provides actionable, effective strategies for creating opportunities for relationships to thrive in the life of people with disabilities.