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Disability Dynamics within the Student Veteran Community

Disability Dynamics within the Student Veteran Community. Amanda Kraus, Ph. D. Veterans Symposium February 21, 2011. Disabled Veterans Reintegration and Education Project. Goal to more authentically understand how disabled veterans experience higher education

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Disability Dynamics within the Student Veteran Community

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  1. Disability Dynamics within the Student Veteran Community Amanda Kraus, Ph. D. Veterans Symposium February 21, 2011

  2. Disabled Veterans Reintegration and Education Project • Goal to more authentically understand how disabled veterans experience higher education • Produce a model with recommendations on strategies that contribute to the success of veterans on campus • Four year Congressionally-directed grant

  3. Disabled Veterans Reintegration and Education Project • Research • Participatory-action research and mixed qualitative methodology • 35 individual, semi-structured interviews • Outreach • Professionals’ Roundtable • Sports and Wellness Camp • Liaise with Student Vets Center • and campus and community • Academic initiatives • SERV • Online faculty resources • Direct Services • DRC accommodations • Healing Touch

  4. Impact of DVRE

  5. University of Arizona trends

  6. Disability trends • As of February 2011, the number of American troops who have been injured in OIF, OEF, OND is 42,346 • Nearly 20 percent of the 1.6 service members deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan report symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder or major depression, yet only slightly more than half have sought treatment (RAND, 2008) • Nineteen percent report a probable TBI, seven percent report TBI, PTSD and depression • Costs associated with mental health care for service members in the first two years after deployment is an estimated $6.2 billion over two years (RAND, 2008)

  7. UA V.E.T.S. • Veterans Education and Transition Services (V.E.T.S.) • Research philosophy has guided program development

  8. UA V.E.T.S. • Student Vets Center • SVA@UA, SVA Law • SERV Classes • GI Bill counseling • Network of point people on and off campus • PTSD support group and on-site VA counseling • Veterans in Higher Education National Clearinghouse and Conference

  9. Preliminary findings – characteristics of student veterans • Access issues related to higher education • Bias, can encounter hostile climate • Use Student Vets Center as safe space • Space to cultivate identity as student vets • Identify as vets • Norms, rites of passage • Vet-speak • Cohort mentality • “Mission” oriented • Identify “friendlies” • Focus on justice • Hypervigiliance

  10. Preliminary disability –related findings • Reluctant to identify personally, but acknowledge disability as important aspect of community • DOD statistics, VA VR rating • Language • Wounded Warrior • Injured • Hierarchy • Combat-related injury • Service-related injury • Non-service-related injury • Service provision • Cohort mentality • Divide between invisible and visible

  11. Implications • Discuss social model of disability • “Universally” designed space • Physical access • Assistive technology • Integrate disability into community • Partner with DRC events • DRC/Mental Health marketing in Student Vets Center

  12. Implications • Incorporate student feedback • Committee to discuss veterans on campus, including students, administrators, staff and faculty • Marketing and outreach re: language • Meet veterans where they are at related to their interest in vets’ identity

  13. Implications • Strong relationship with VA re: mental health and benefits • Adaptive/wheelchair athletics • Open gym to vets (P90X) • Healing Touch

  14. Discuss • The social model of disability promotes disability as a sociopolitical construct, not an individual impairment. • What challenges do the DOD disability statistics and the VA disability rating system pose to operationalizing the social model of disability? Disability identity? • Reflect on how students make • meaning of disability? What • implications might this have • for service provision?

  15. Resources • Disabled Veterans Reintegration and Education Project drc.arizona.edu/veterans/ • UA V.E.T.S. vets.arizona.edu • Radford, A. W. (2009). Military service members and veterans in higher education: What the new GI bill may mean for postsecondary institutions. Washington, D.C.: American Council on Education. • US Department of Defense (http://www.defenselink.mil/news/casualty.pdf). • Tanielian, T., & Jaycox, L. H. (2008). Invisible wounds of war : Psychological and cognitive injuries, their consequences, and services to assist recovery. Santa Monica: Center for Military Health Policy Research, RAND. • U.S. Census Bureau, 2005-2007 American Community Survey.

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