From Disability Scoop: (click for full article)
When students on Fox’s “Glee” graduated this season, many considered college. Now a Twitter campaign is calling on the show’s writers to make the same plan for a character with Down syndrome.
Using the hashtag #College4Becky, a social media push launching this week is encouraging the “Glee” writers to send Becky Jackson to college at the end of the show’s next season. Though the character is believed to be a rising high school senior, little has been said about her future.
“All of Becky’s friends on the show are heading off to college next year. That’s something she can do too — but we haven’t yet heard what her plans are after graduation,” reads an open letter to the writers of “Glee” from the campaign’s organizers at Think College, a national clearinghouse on college options for students with intellectual and developmental disabilities that’s housed at the University of Massachusetts Boston.
“If you make college plans for Becky, you’ll be raising the expectations of all your viewers with Down syndrome and other intellectual disabilities,” the letter reads.
Currently, Think College’s database lists 199 postsecondary programs at colleges and universities across the country specifically for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Nonetheless, awareness of college options for this population often remains limited.
“We want to plant a seed,” said Meg Grigal, the co-director of the group behind the campaign. “College is a real option for people with intellectual disabilities.”
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