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What is Self-Advocacy?

Posted by on March 18, 2016 - 4 Comments

Self Advocacy

Jenny demonstrates Self-Advocacy strategies at a No Boundaries session.

Self-Advocacy is about speaking up for what you want and need. It can be something as small as asking your supervisor for help, or requesting to not have onions on your burger at a restaurant. Self-Advocacy is important, because it helps us become more independent.

What Does Self-Advocacy Look Like?

Here is an example scenario to help you gauge how strong your self-advocacy skills are. There is no right or wrong answer. This question just helps you raise self awareness of how often you self advocate and whether you need to improve this skill or not!

You are taking the bus to the store and need to sit near the driver so they can tell you when you have arrived at your stop. All of the seats near the front of the bus are full. What do you do?

  1. Ask the people sitting near the front of the bus if they can please move.
  2. Sit at the back of the bus
  3. Ask the bus driver for help

Which answer did you choose and why?  Tell us in the comments!

4 Comments

Abegail J. Stahr says:
Mar 22, 2016

I really like this article ” great job on explaining about Self- Advocacy ” this article really does explains a lot. It is okay to have self-advocacy in everyday life.

Justice says:
Mar 23, 2016

I would tell the person driving the bus and tell them I need an empty seat.

Christopher Wiatr says:
Mar 23, 2016

I waiting for the bus on the street. When the bus arrive get the vertra card to get in the bus and find the seat. I ask the bus driver when the bus driver need to pull over. So when the bus stop at the place pull that until the bus stop. I get lost to place wait for the bus to ask the bus driver for help to get back to place. When the bus stop at the street I get off the bus to Dempster and Ridge. I have a lot of time to getting the bus.

markdeafmcguire says:
Jun 15, 2016

I do this for those who are deaf or hard of hearing, myself included (deaf), especially when it comes to captioning or making people aware that if they don’t know sign language, to speak better or write it down.

My experiences on the bus has been 50/50 because I either know where to get off or not familiar with the route. In the case where I am not familiar, I often ask the bus driver to wave their hand so I can see when I arrived at the desired stop. Sometimes they remember, sometimes they don’t. Some bus and train systems are slowly adapting by including text notification ahh…. what’s do they call them, screens located above the driver which helps.

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