About the Project

The HBCU Disability Consortium focuses on low college matriculation, retention, and graduation rates for Black and African American students with disabilities, as well as the lack of research about this population.  The project is based at the University of the District of Columbia (UDC), in collaboration with Howard University and the Taishoff Center for Inclusive Higher Education at Syracuse University. 

The project has three goals:
  1. Creating a permanent online consortium of disability services (DS) providers at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and other Predominantly Black Colleges and Universities (PBCUs), to exchange information about best practices; 
  2. Conducting research with Black and African American students with disabilities and DS providers at HBCUs, to seek out best practices that can be replicated at other campuses;
  3. Disseminate findings and research-based project materials, with a pilot test of project deliverables (a website and printed materials) in collaboration with the Washington, DC public schools. 

The project actively incorporates undergraduate and graduate students from UDC and Howard University as part of the project team.  The final project website and printed materials will contain student-centered culturally responsive and universally designed information for students, but will be relevant for parents, K-12 educators, policy-makers, and disability services offices.

Evaluation of the project is provided by an advisory group, including representatives of the consortium, as well project partners from the DC public schools, the DC Department on Disability Services, and the Association on Higher Education And Disability (AHEAD).  (A full list of advisory board members is available on our project staff page).  An external evaluator will provide formative and summative evaluation of project outcomes, including quantitative and qualitative measures, especially to determine whether the project can be replicated with other minority-serving institutions in the U.S.