Mark West Scholarship

Jordan is a CSD major and honors student pursuing a minor in the new critical disability studies program. They come from Murrieta, California and have the intersectional identity of being autistic, genderqueer, aromantic, and asexual. Their future goals moving forward is to study audiology and use what they learn in critical disability courses to help to provide accommodations for disabled individuals along with bringing information on disabled history, culture, and issues to the medical sector- which is historically dominated by the medical model of disability. Beyond this, they want to work to help amplify voices of marginalized groups and inform the public of both past and prevalent social issues so that these problems can be acknowledged, understood, and work to be fixed.

I am a passionate student and proud advocate for social justice, and while originally from Michigan I decided to return to higher education in the PNW back in 2020. Since then, I have been pursuing a rather ambitious Triple-Major/Triple-Minor program meant to provide me with both multi- and interdisciplinary approaches to the various social & economic injustices that we continue to face today.
I am incredibly optimistic for our future and the good work that this next generation of activists will certainly bring. For my part in this mission, I have the long goal of taking what Western has taught me to Law School in order to specialize in human and civil rights law, and to fight for legal protections to the various communities who are far too often left unprotected, marginalized and oppressed.
I am a firm believer of a natural and overall goodness found in human beings, and that the work we invest today will be what decides if we can ever one day live together within a positive peace with equal security for one another regardless of our cognitive or physical makeups, ethnic or religious backgrounds, or identities of race, sexuality or gender. While It may seem utopian, the more time I spend at western immersed in my studies, actively engaged in campus clubs, and volunteering with the various grassroots community organization that proliferate Bellingham, the more certain I am that achieving this human destiny is only a matter of “when” and not “if” for ourselves. 

I have an intersectional identity that includes being crip, queer, non-binary, white and I am a first-generation college student from a disadvantaged socio-economic background. I hold a BFA in metalsmithing, a master’s in Critical Craft Studies, and am a master’s candidate in the history program at WWU.  My research passion is the topic of therapeutic craft, and I am currently exploring it from a cultural history perspective. My inquiry considers how craft was used in American medical institutions from 1888 to 1917.  I am placing my inquiry at the intersections of disability history, craft history, and occupational therapy/medical history to tease out associations and implications commonly overlooked. A deep understanding of the socially constructed nature of disability lies at the heart of my inquiry and will inform my analysis of primary source materials regarding historical therapeutic craft practices.