INCLUSION AND AGENCY OF UNIVERSITY STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES IN HIGHER EDUCATION: CONSTITUTING COLLABORATIVE PRACTICES
Agency. University student with a disability. College education. Collaborative practices.
The basic objective of this dissertation is to apprehend the subjective dimension of the inclusion/exclusion process in higher education of university students with disabilities and to establish collaborative practices that favor to the development of the agency. To achieve it, we seek support in the theoretical-methodological assumptions of Socio-Historical Psychology, which, based on Historical and Dialectical Materialism, guide us to understand the human as an active subject that is constituted in the relationship with the material and the social world. The data were produced during thirteen meetings with a group of ten university students with disabilities. We met not only with the aim of discussing objective reality in a reflective and critical way, but with emancipatory and activist goals. Consistent with the , this goal the investigation is oriented towards the construction of a more just, inclusive and democratic society, given that, we could not choose any other path than the collaborative approach. We bring to the centrality the discussion of the agency category, as we understand that it contributes to human development as well as to personal and collective becoming, consequently, it points to the transformation of realities. For interpretive and explanatory analyses, we used the Meaning Nuclei, which allowed us to analyze the process even more in depth, based on the speeches of the participants themselves. The results show that there is still a long process to go through for effective inclusion, but for changes to start to happen, it depends on multiple, continuous and collective efforts, which involves a commitment to social justice. This is a constant reflection/action that we must do as a social and critical subject.