Students’ Perspectives
4.6 Accommodations and Support Services
A limited but growing body of post-secondary educational research on disability has also addressed issues relating to the provisions of academic accommodations and support services for disabled students. In terms of disability service provision, researchers have examined; program standards and performance indicators (Shaw & Dukes, 2001), services for disabled students (Madaus, 2000), faculty willingness to provide
accommodations (Rao, 2002). Lynch and Gussel (1996) highlighted issues, including benefits and attitudes relating to disclosure and self-advocacy for disabled students in postsecondary education. Particular attention was given to the role of counsellors and counselling services to enhance disclosure and self-advocacy skills regarding disability- related needs. My research examines academic accommodations and services by drawing from the perspectives of disabled students to contribute new knowledge on the work of office workers.
Predominantly, research on disability access issues has focused on issues relating to the physical accessibility of campus environments and less on services. Wilson, Getzel, and Brown (2000) suggest that the following criteria may be used to assess the degree to which a campus may be disability-friendly: campus climate, program
philosophy, awareness and support, academic adjustments, waivers and substitutions, course load and graduation time, tutorial support. According to Wilson, Getzel and Brown (2000): “Too much emphasis is placed on the removal of the architectural barriers without adequate consideration of the “service oriented” barriers, which are most critical to student success” (p.41). This demonstrates a need to further investigate disability support services, as well as programmatic and institutional barriers to academic success.
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In addition, this reflects a disproportionate research focus on issues surrounding physical access where less attention is paid to disability-related service provision. This emphasis suggests that although there remains a need to examine physical access issues, it also important include an examination of how service oriented barriers and alienating institutional practices may limit the participation of disabled students.
The roles and interactions between disability office workers and the supports they provide have implications for disabled students in promoting increasingly inclusive university learning environments. Investigation of professional standards including the promotion staff development in working with disabled students in postsecondary education has also been a topic of inquiry (Dukes & Shaw, 1999). Barnes (2007) notes: “although all universities and colleges of higher education now have a dedicated disability services unit, the rhetoric of support is rarely matched by the reality of provision” (p. 142). Thus, this is an area where my research contributes knowledge on disabled students’ socio-spatial experiences of disability-related services through
examining enabling and disabling institutional attitudes practices. Scott (1996) examines current practices and discusses how collaboration can enhance support services provided to students with learning disabilities. Fichten et al. (2004) examined disability-related service providers in relation to access to information and instructional technologies. My research adds to this body of literature by examining the socio-spatial implications of how disabled students obtain access to services, information and are impacted by the uses of certain technological institutional supports.
According to Matshedisho (2007) disability service provision is shaped by national, regional and local policy contexts. In a Canadian context disability support
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provision in higher education is implemented in a human rights framework (Matshedisho, 2007). Matshedisho indicates that such a human rights framework emphasizes respect for diversity, equal opportunity and fair advantage for students who qualify for
postsecondary programmes and courses. My research focuses on a Canadian context while also being attentive to international perspectives on disability service provision, policies and practices. My study contributes student perspectives on how disability access and equity policies are interpreted and enacted in Canadian, Ontario universities.
Matshedisho (2007) discussed structures of support services for students in South Africa in higher education in comparison to support service provision in Canada, United Kingdom and United States of America. This research involved conducting a national survey of 24 higher educational institutions and found that the intersection of
benevolence, rights and the social model of disability are important considerations for institutions to consider when designing and enacting disability policies. Training and familiarity with disability institutional policies were mentioned as important for staff and instructors.. Matshedisho notes that the majority of staff in student services were trained as psychologists, while others perceived their work as helping all students including disabled students. My study is attentive to the institutional milieus and organizational structures of disability service offices and also to the professional training of disability office workers. For example, I examine how student services, disability services and health services and counselling services are linked, related and spatially located,
combined, or separated by distance on university campuses. Attention to the organization of these student services in relation to disability offices has not been discussed in existing literature.
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The provision of support services and access policies may in fact reinforce and (re)produce oppressive disabling structures in higher educational settings. Madriaga (2007) conducted twenty-one life history interviews with disabled students who
transferred from South Yorkshire schools into colleges and higher education institutions. This research reports that society and institutional norms and practices perpetuate
oppressive disabling structures in higher education:
Quality assurance regimes and anti-discrimination legislation have required universities to formulate disability policies and establish disabled students’
support services to address disablism…There is a gap between policy and practice where disabled students continue to lack necessary support. This gap cannot simply be explained away by insensitive lecturers lacking disability awareness. Confronting disablism is a university-wide issue. So far it has not been. This is possibly the result of disability issues being confined within the student services arena. (p.410)
Thus, despite specific university policies aimed at promoting access and participation often though service provision, students identified with disabilities continue to be marginalized, alienated, and experience discrimination in post-secondary learning environments. Access issues are related to wide systemic institutional norms, attitudes and values, which either enhance or limit the inclusion of student with disabilities.
Madriaga (2007), for example, asserts: “It is no secret that disabled students are under-represented in higher education” (p.400). This researcher believes that disabled persons are under-represented in universities due to disablism, which is a process where individuals and institutions may discriminate against individuals who identify of are
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categorized as being disabled and who deviate from the norm. According to Madriaga , students with non-visible disabilities encountered issues disclosing and: “were sometimes placed in an uneasy position to disclose and convince others of their disability” (p.403). As a result, many students with non-visible disabilities do not disclose impairment to lecturers and other individuals in the academy. Although some research has discussed issues relating to disclosure from the perspective of students’ personal identities and institutional attitudes and stigma, more inquiry is needed to better understand how students negotiate and interpret university policies and regimes of practices in disclosing disability in official and unofficial contexts. Experiences of disclosure from the
perspectives of students with non-visible disabilities represent an under-examined area of research.
Sahlen & Lehman (2006) state that it is often the responsibility of disabled students to provide medical documentation to obtain access to accommodations and services:
The student’s request for an accommodation is an individual matter in which the locus of control resides with the student. The student initiates the process of requesting or receiving an accommodation. Additionally, to remain qualified for an accommodation, the student must also continuously prove her or his academic capability. The student is also responsible for identifying the accommodation that she or he needs to help him or her succeed. In contrast, the postsecondary
institution reviews the same factors from an institutional perspective. (p.32) Disabled students are thus subject to examinations to demonstrate their need and to qualify for particular academic accommodations. This demonstrates that students need to
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disclose their impairment in order to access disability-related services. As Ferguson and Titchkosky (2008) attest institutions of higher education monitor and assess students, or have them undergo particular medico-psychological-clinical examinations to determine if they qualify for accommodation services and to what end these services with be to their benefit:
Institutionally organized conversations make disability appear as if it is detached from the demands of institutional life. Most, if not all, Canadian universities have individualized accommodation programs to which people can apply for
individualized services. Yet there is little consideration of how a commitment to the values of equity, accessibility or inclusivity are reflected in the organization of institutional application processes, websites, reading lists and course outlines, library resources, washrooms, classrooms, offices, computer labs, photocopiers and mailboxes, extra-curricular events and all the other arenas for active participation in university life. (p. 70)
This focus demonstrates that disabled students may need to negotiate through an individualizing institutional discourse. Institutional values and attitudes toward equity relate to issues of access and inclusion for disabled students. Ferguson & Titchkosky (2008) further assert that when assistive technology is used as a form of accommodation, it may also serve to alienate and marginalize disabled students in the academy:
The solutions proposed in response to the problem of disability in the academy, when it appears, revolve around the use of personal technology to “level the playing field” and “help the individual” maintain the appearance of typical
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participation in the academy, in effect making disability disappear yet again. (Ferguson & Titchkosky, 2008, p. 70)
Thus, forms of assistive technology and their administration should also be critically examined as these forms of assistive technologies may in fact perpetuate exclusionary institutional practices that further marginalize disabled students. The ways assistive technologies are used and impacts these technologies have on disabled students merit further investigation.
Harrison, Nichols, and Larochette (2008) examined the quality of Learning Disability (LD) documentation provided by students to receive academic supports. The authors made recommendations for improvement of documentation and diagnostic practices at the elementary and secondary levels and viewed this as important in allowing students with LD increased ease in transitioning and gaining access to higher education. My study examines how and why disabled students seek supports, self-advocate for accommodations, may also resist diagnostic medical and clinical practices, and may embrace or reject labelling practices and disclosure of their impairments in university settings.