The National Resource Center for Parents with Disabilities at Through the Looking Glass announced the winners of its 2006 College Scholarships for Students of Parents with Disabilities. Each award is a $1,000 college scholarship for an outstanding high school senior who has at least one parent with a disability. Selection criteria included academic performance, community service, letters of recommendation and an essay describing the experience of growing up with a parent with a disability. As one of several projects of the National Resource Center, these scholarships are funded through the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR), U.S. Department of Education.

The 2006 scholarships have been awarded to the following students:
Rebecca Beaulieu (Lawrence, Kansas); Chanelle Boucher (Redmond, Washington); Lamont Cobb (Los Angeles, California); Michele Hinton (Baltimore, Maryland); Shira Jacobs (Suffern, New York); Clare Kaufman (Brookfield, Wisconsin); Holley Kohler (Empire, Michigan); Abel Lawal (Glendale, California); Thomas Tobin (Myrtle Beach, South Carolina); and, Kaitlyn Woodward (Yardley, Pennsylvania).

Although there are over 9 million American parents with disabilities, there are almost no scholarships specifically available for the hundreds of thousands of students who have parents with disabilities. Nearly 400 contenders from across the U.S. included those with parents who were quadriplegic, blind, deaf, amputees, as well as parents with spinal cord injury, cancer, multiple sclerosis, diabetes, mental illness, polio, traumatic brain injury, muscular dystrophy or intellectual disability. These awards not only recognize the diversity and contributions of these families, but their financial need. Approximately 25% of families with a disabled parent live below the official poverty level for families of their size and geographic location, and are twice as likely to be below the poverty level as are families with non-disabled parents.

The winning essays describe routine, remarkable, and sometimes difficult stories of parents with disabilities and their children. Individual stories are dramatic, candid, humorous, loving, provocative, and moving. Now preparing for to major in Sports Medicine at the University of Wisconsin - La Crosse, Clare Kaufman of Brookfield, Wisconsin begins her essay:

Every family has its own troubles and situations that separate them from another family. Being different is nothing new to my family. My father is living with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, more commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease. His disease has put strain on our family, but has also taught us many lessons on how to live our lives as a family and as individuals.

Yet, despite medical, social and financial obstacles, Kaufman suggests another perspective on her father's condition:

In some strange way I found myself lucky, because my dad was always there for me. He was never off on some business trip or at work; he was always at home where I wanted him. He never missed a soccer game, basketball game, track meet, or theater performance, unless the distance was so far that no person in his or her right mind would go. People may think his disease would put somewhat of a strain on our relationship, but we always were doing many activities together. I would often play games on his computer, the source of his communication, and there are many pictures of me sitting on his lap reading a book. Also, he was my coach for many of my sports. He'd tell me to go shoot around for an hour, and now, as I train for my 2006 track season, he gives me workouts and I lift weights in his room so he can make sure my form and weight amount is right, in order to side step injury. He even helps me with my personal life and my homework, like any supportive and loving father.

In some families, a parent's disability struck unexpectedly and traumatically. Many students recalled a particular moment when their lives and their family's life changed forever. Michele Hinton is starting her freshman year at Cornell University. When she was 12, her mother's life-threatening accident catapulted the whole family into a new trajectory:

Fortunately, mom lived, but suffered major brain damage that affected her both physically and mentally. Never again would she return to her old self; the mother I knew, who had woken me up that November morning for school.

Like many families in which one parent suddenly acquires a serious disability, the rest of the family scrambled to find the resources and the resilience to maintain. Frequently, as in Hinton's case, the student and other family members had to absorb additional responsibilities and adjust their roles:

I found it natural for a sister to take care of a brother, but incredibly difficult and agonizing for a daughter to now have to care for a mother whose personality, spontaneity and emotional expression abilities had radically changed...I do not mind at all what I had and have to do for her. Her disabilities have taught me that sometimes life requires you to step it up and be there for the ones you love.

Soon to be a freshman at Stanford University, Tommy Tobin of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, describes a Halloween far scarier than fairytale goblins - early signs of his father's chronic inflammatory demylenating polyneuropathy:

I was only six. It was October. We were going trick-or-treating. I remember how disappointed I was when we did not go. Jimmy, my brother, cried; he was only three, so this was not too surprising. Seeing my mother and father cry was scary, however. Over time, seeing them cry stopped surprising me…. So we began our journey, the journey of a family standing with its male provider stricken with a chronic and debilitating disease. In the face of such a stressor, some families are torn apart. Ours faced each moment with dignity though overcome with mourning…. No comfort seemed able to chase the sadness away. But nothing made my mother run away or my father give up.

Shira Jacobs of Suffern, New York (Barnard College of Columbia University) knew about multiple sclerosis from ninth grade biology and that her mother had been diagnosed with it thirty years earlier. But, it wasn't until her mother gave her a book about MS that Jacobs began to re-assess her mother's condition:

Before this life altering revelation, I had thought that my mother was simply lazy after she refused my repeated requests for drives to friends' houses or to the nearby mall. I unsympathetically scoffed at her incoherent attempts to communicate her ideas to me after her pain medication made her woozy…. As this dehabilitating neurological disease continued to deplete my mother's myelin sheath in her central nervous system, I began to fall on adaptability, that glittering jewel of humanity. I took one arduous step after another, even as my world of parental security began to crumble, even as my mother could no longer step with ease.

Several students described how their mother or father's ongoing determination squared off against daily inconveniences, occasional surgeries and hospitalizations, as well as broader societal scrutiny. These young men and women have also become quite knowledgeable about the specifics of their parent's disability, prescriptions, and treatments. Lamont Cobb of Los Angeles (Morehouse College) writes:

Mom has arthritis, but somewhat different from those middle-aged women pushing extra-strength Tylenol or Bayer on T.V. She has a more serious kind. The disease disrupts the immune system, and fools the body into attacking vital joints and bones as it would a virus. She has had both hips replaced, one knee, one elbow and four bones in her left hand. About every 5-7 years, she has to go back in for another surgery to replace the artificial joints, because the plastic wears down quickly. The inflammation has also spread to her eyes, and cataracts reduced her field of vision to just her left eye…. Mom is probably one of the strongest women I have ever known, because she continues to get up out of bed everyday, and find some way she can be of use to the world. Yet her body hinders to the point that many times she can't keep up in an increasingly fast paced society.

Not all students wrote of family trauma or upheaval. For some, life with a disabled parent was more about how normal their families were -- especially if the parent's disability was lifelong and stable. For many students, family life was a matter of learning to do things differently. Abel Lawal of Glendale, California (Glendale Community College) describes how having a mother who is blind expanded his own interpersonal skills - and also gave him a much greater sense of human capability:

My mother's blindness also forces our family to communicate in a slightly different way than usual; physical gestures such as nodding and pointing are almost non-existent in my family as my mom cannot see them. Over the years I have noticed this has helped me to communicate verbally in a much better way even without noticing what I was doing…. Walking with my mom requires being observant and I have to verbalize any of the different obstacles present (i.e. curbs and stairs). At that time, I didn't realize why people would always look at us strangely and stare often. But, now I realize that they couldn't understand what was going on and felt compelled to stare. These "stares" used to make me angry; I used to think, 'If only those ignorant eyes knew what a wonderful person my mother is, then they wouldn't stare.' On the other hand, the people who stop and stare are not as lucky as I am. They are not lucky enough to know that society is stereotypical and prejudiced, and to know how disabled people overcome these obstacles to become successful.

While many of these women and men wrote about how they had to take on new and additional responsibilities, at the same time they also wrote how their parent inspired them. Kaitlyn Woodward's mother contracted polio as an infant, underwent endless corrective surgeries, had her good leg damaged in an auto accident as a young adult, and now has Post-Polio Syndrome. The Yardley, Pennsylvania resident writes:

Despite all these physical problems, she is the strongest, most passionate person I know. She has faced adversity head on, and although simple tasks like walking down a flight of stairs is a struggle for her, she never gives up. In her life, she has experienced prejudice and pain, but she has been able to find strength in herself to overcome the hardships. She is filled with so much love, beauty and good humor, and she is the one person in my life whom I can rely on.

When Woodward herself was diagnosed with Dyslexia in seventh grade, her mother proved to be her strongest role model.

Watching my mother while growing up and seeing her positive attitude and resolve, I never questioned that I could overcome my own disability. From the way she handles her own disability, I have learned to be an advocate for myself. Even my own disability has given me a better understanding of my mother's, and I have always thought we are kindred spirits, meant to be mother and daughter. Because of her belief in me and the values she has always taught me whether through her words or example, I am now on my school's honor roll and have been accepted to a wonderful university [Penn State University]. I can sincerely say I owe it all to her.

Holley Kohler (Empire, Michigan) wrote of her mother's struggle with clinical depression -- going in and out of hospitals and group homes, suicide attempts, revolving medications and even electric shock therapy:

Unlike most kids my age, I was forced to grow up, fast…. I saw how much my mother struggled throughout the years; I didn't want to go through all the pain I saw her go through. Everyday was a new obstacle for her to overcome; whether it was an issue of money, time or depression, she always had something on her plate that seemed to make things that much harder.

Kohler's mother proved to be both a mirror and a role model, as Kohler herself described her own struggle with clinical depression:

Through seeing my mother improving, I was given the strength to move on and admit that I was in fact depressed…In the upcoming fall I will be attending Alma College and I plan to major in psychology. My mother still has breakdowns now and again, but she hasn't been in the hospital in a couple of years. I know that depression is a disability because I know how hard it is to overcome, and it can be overcome, with treatment and support depression can be managed no matter how hard life seems to get.

Despite the wide variation in parental disability and other demographic features among the 400 scholarship applicants, consistent themes emerged that have been documented over the years by Through the Looking Glass in several national research studies: the normalcy of growing up with a parent with a disability, and the resilience and strength of these families despite social and financial obstacles. Many of the essays underscore the need for increased resources and accommodations for disabled parents and their families throughout the U.S. Despite some progress, parents with disabilities and their families remain largely invisible in the larger society and are often left to fend for themselves with inadequate and inaccessible resources. For many families, their best and only resources are the family members themselves.

Having a bipolar dad, Rebecca Beaulieu became used to mental hospitals, manic episodes, disruptions, and outbursts. While her family had the support of neighbors, extended family, teachers, and their church, ultimately Beaulieu had to find her own way:

My best source of guidance was my pen and paper, or really, the computer. Everything I wrote about dealing with my dad's illness is bad writing. I would never consider them complete or good poems. Reading them now, however, I can follow my train of thought from the initial confusion to the ending where I was starting to understand how I was feeling.

Beaulieu wrote a poem after one particular visit with her hospitalized father, simultaneously learning that her parents would separate and suddenly seeing that her father had shaved his head bald:

trying to shave off
more than just hair
perhaps memories
of the old him
everytime I see him
it's an abrupt reminder
of how my life is changing
whether I like it or not
i want to go back
to confirm it's not permanent
the hair will come back
my life as I know it
won't.

Chanelle Boucher of Redmond, Washington begins her essay by describing her mother's horrific accident that left her with serious head injury almost ten years before Chanelle was born. She ends her essay with a tribute to her mother:

She showed me that you can accomplish your dreams no matter what the circumstances may be. She raised me alone, and I have to say that my mom didn't raise a fool…She has taught me respect for all things no matter how insignificant they may be. She has taught me humility, loyalty, honesty, consistency and taught me strong morals upon which to base my life. She has taught me to laugh at my mistakes - if you can't laugh at yourself, then you will live a miserable life. She has taught me to think things out before I speak them or do them, even though she herself has not been able to show me that in perfection. She has shown me that no mater how much 'dis' might be in the 'able', you can always live your life to the full ability and potential with which God has blessed you. This is my life with Mom.

Boucher recently started at the University of Michigan, where she is planning to major in Ancient Civilizations and Biblical Studies.

Please note that all materials including these essays are copyrighted by Through the Looking Glass. If you need additional information on re-printing or using any of these materials, please contact us.

Complete essays of the scholarship winners will be posted on Through the Looking Glass' website shortly.

Congratulations to these deserving students and their families. Thank you to all the students, teachers, counselors and parents who took the time to participate in this process.

2005 Scholarship Winners

Information on Additional Scholarship Resources

Will these scholarships be available in future years?