Unexpected Journeys: The Professional Identity Development of Canadian Accessibility Advisors

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Through examining nine Accessibility Advisors' (AA) stories of becoming, this study provides an important entry point into understanding the individuals whose work is central to supporting students with disabilities within Canadian post-secondary institutions. This understanding adds to the existing literature, augmenting the current work on student experience and policy development. The respondents describe an unplanned, but formative, journey that led to a committed career in disability advising. AA’s construction of their professional identities provides a lens into how post-secondary disability support is tied to the medicalization of disability and advisors’ acknowledgement of the social construction of disability. Advisors start their narratives in post-secondary institutions and experiences related to disability, leading up to an unanticipated job opportunity. Once in the role, the narratives note the importance of professional development in understanding the role. As the advisors conclude their stories of becoming, they return to their pre-role experiences adding new intentionality to the past experiences, connecting post-secondary context to a social definition of disability. As a result, the narratives show how AA situate their work as policy drivers as neutral – neither faculty nor student aligned. However, this neutrality reflects the need of the AA in research-focused universities to develop cultural capital as third space professionals.