INCLUDES: Network Connectors: Disability Inclusion Support Network (DISNET)

The DISNET (Disability Inclusion Support NETwork) project establishes a virtual platform to connect NSF-funded teams conducting disability research, STEM students with disabilities, disability organizations, and community members with disabilities. This network seeks to address the persistent underrepresentation of people with disabilities in STEM education and careers nationally.

DISNET uses research and insights from surveys, interviews, focus groups, and advisory board recommendations to develop a collaboration portal that supports the network partners and enhances their collective impact. The virtual platform will include materials and tools based on best-practices for the meaningful involvement of students with disabilities in STEM and facilitate networking among researchers and practitioners.

The project aims to expand the pool of scholars who conduct disability-related research, and it meaningfully involves people with disabilities in these directing these efforts.

DISNET connects NSF-funded projects and their scholarly teams in the State University of New York (SUNY) system into a cohesive network of research labs across five institutions. An important component of the project is the purposeful and intentional collaboration with the broader disability community including leaders from disability organizations to inform the development, implementation, and evaluation of DISNET.

The project adopts three strategies for meeting its goals: (1) an on-line portal (information, best practices, mentoring and collaboration tools), (2) workshops (knowledge exchange, skill development, and the refinement of network strategies), and (3) engagement (advisory boards, focus groups and networking). The project advances knowledge by building on research that investigates the underlying factors that motivate the pursuit of disability research.

The DISNET model could be expanded beyond SUNY, serving as a model for connecting researchers of other STEM education and workforce topics while ensuring the active involvement of important stakeholders. This project is funded by the NSF Eddie Bernice Johnson Inclusion across the Nation of Communities of Learners of Underrepresented Discoverers in Engineering and Science (INCLUDES) Initiative, which seeks to motivate and accelerate collaborative infrastructure building to advance and sustain systemic change to broaden participation in STEM at scale.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.