Becoming Teacher Researchers: 3D Printing Individualized Assistive Technology for High School Students with Disabilities

We are a team of dedicated education students who set out to increase access to education for three local high school students with disabilities as well as develop our skills as effective researchers. Through engagement in research methodologies, engineering processes, community outreach, and authentic interactions with the students themselves we collaborated to design and fabricate individualized assistive technology devices to meet the unique needs of the individual students and support their confidence academically and socially. We sought to study both the development of the customized devices as well as our development as future teachers, researchers, and advocates.