ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the use of a role play of a typical school meeting, designed as an advocacy project by a group of single mothers in poverty and used with school staff. Poor single mothers are accused in the media and public discourse of having additional children to increase their welfare checks, of having excessive numbers of children, of being bad mothers, of being lazy and lacking in a work ethic, and of being long-term abusers of welfare. The chapter examines the advocacy plan of a group of single mothers in poverty who are members of a community-based, grassroots organization in central Iowa called Beyond Welfare. Beyond Welfare mothers hoped that through the role play, the school staff would be made aware of how the interactions in the Building Assistance Team meetings made them feel demeaned, humiliated, and intimidated.
