Measuring the Status of Disability Rights

 There is modest support around the world for training individuals with disabilities, especially through disabled persons organizations (DPO‘s), to learn about and push for implementation of the UN  Convention on Persons with Disabilities.  Emphasis is given to sharing information, perhaps some role-playing exercises, but not much time or money is spent on tracking  immediate, intermediate, and long-term impact of training.  The answer is obvious. Impact evaluation is labor-intensive, time-consuming and expensive.  So when we ask for money for yet another disability rights study/initiative, funders ask where is your evidence-based information?  We may be able to provide numbers in some cases, but often all we have to make our case is case studies and anecdotes.  This needs to change. We all have to get serious about compelling evidence and develop practical ways for collecting it.

One option might be to adapt the SMART Goals approach and use it to collect information on the status of disability rights. The “S” stands for specific, the “M” for measurable, the “A” for achievable, the “R” for relevant, and the “T” for timing. This rubric is all over the web. It is explained, used, and promoted in educational contexts usually.

 In a disability rights context the “Specific” would be what do we want to measure; for example access, availability, inclusion, participation, independence, choice. Yet, we need to place these “ outcomes” in a situation — access to what, availability to what, inclusion in what, participation in what, independence connected to what, choice over what. “Measurable” to us would mean we could count something and compare it to a baseline or compare what we find across locations, populations, or environments. We could measure satisfaction, change in circumstances, degree of influence, or scope of change.

“Achievable” means first and foremost that we have a strategy(ies)  to implement a goal AND measuring something AND the resources to do it. This component of a SMART goal is so important because if we do these things right we have the justification for sustainability and the foundation for replication by others.

“Relevant” is the key link to rights. Is what we are expressing, measuring, and achieving valued by the individual with a disability, groups of such individuals, their families, and society in general? We need to do pre-assessments on what we think is important by getting input from these several constituencies.  This input will allow barriers and unexpected allies or partners to surface.

Of course, how much time we have to design, implement, and evaluate a SMART goal keeps us grounded and practical, and also makes us accountable. If we do what we said we  are going to do by the time we said we were going to do and have compelling results to show for it, guess what — we have credibility, an army of supporters, a guide for others, and evidenced-based reasons for systems change.

As you think through the application of the SMART goal paradigm in a disability rights context, remember the five components are integral to each other.  As you shape your approach to one component that may influence how you shape others.

We need to make measurement a central, integrated element of anything we do to advance disability  rights.  If we do, others, including governments, will take us more seriously, and accept or develop policies that make sense and are enforceable.

Thank you.

Common Grounder