About Me

I chose this project, “Overcoming Hidden Disabilities” as my Girl Scout Gold Award project because I wanted to reduce the stigma of being a student with hidden disabilities and to help other students be more successful getting their disabilities accommodated so they can be successful too..

Growing up with hidden disabilities, I had to learn to advocate for my accommodations to be successful in my studies and activities. Some of the people who worked with me were really great about embracing my accommodations. Other people were very intimidated or did not know a lot about hidden disabilities. I found that I had to do a lot of repeating myself every year to my new teachers and coaches so I started to write down “the basics” of my accommodations to share with the people working with me. This was really helpful for everyone. I was surprised that many educators, especially newer teachers, may not know much about hidden disabilities or were really intimidated at having to accommodate disabilities. Some of my accommodations were very easy, like writing in a larger and plain font, to the more complicated ones that involved technology. For my project, I wanted to document and share the lessons I and my friends learned growing up with hidden disabilities, as well as increase awareness of different types of accommodations and resources that are available.