Parents as Advocates: An Investigation of How Spanish-Speaking Parents Navigate the Special Education Legal Processes and Learn to Advocate for the Needs of Their Students

Due to special education's individualistic and legal nature, increased parent participation is required to achieve the desired outcomes for their students. Parents who do not speak English fluently, do not understand the special education process, or are unfamiliar with the American school culture are disadvantaged when participating in special education processes. Linguistically and culturally diverse parent experiences, such as Spanish-speaking parents, have been studied homogeneously compared to the standard white, English-speaking parent experiences. Research has yet to depict the variability of experiences within the wide category of Spanish-speaking parents. In this paper, I aim to supplement emerging literature by understanding the experiences of Spanish-speaking parents and exploring the heterogeneity within this diverse group. Using qualitative methodology to interview ten Spanish-speaking parents and five school district interpreters, I find that Spanish-speaking parents must become advocates, to differing degrees, to receive desired student outcomes. Specifically, Spanish-speaking parents have varied support systems and conceptions of the school, resulting in distinct types of parent advocacy than the school may consider. Based on these findings, I recommend that local education agencies enforce diverse parent advocacy within individual schools. I argue that schools should promote diverse parent advocacy through culturally responsive practices, creating a bilingual parent liaison position, and encouraging parents to request school staff training. The findings presented here inform how school and district resources should encourage culturally and linguistically diverse parent advocacy in special education processes.