3 The Unseen Challenges of Students with Disability
Although a laboratory setting may present unusual challenges to students who have a disability, it is very likely these students will have already overcome numerous obstacles prior to setting foot in a teaching lab. While by no means a complete list, we highlight herein a few of the difficulties students with disability may face while pursuing their education, summarizing many hours of interviews with undergraduate students about their experiences. Keeping these challenges in mind can be helpful in identifying ways to best support our students achieve their goals.
Accessing accommodations takes time. An issue educators should be aware of (particularly at the start of an academic year) is that is may take several weeks for applications for academic accommodation to be processed. Please keep this in mind if you are approached by a student(s) requiring accommodation that has yet to be formally documented by the institute. Please also keep in mind that some students (particularly with cognitive and/or learning disabilities) may be grappling with newly diagnosed conditions, possibly unmasked by the challenges of living outside of a supportive family home for the first time. These students may have a more difficult time ascertaining what accommodations would be most beneficial to their learning, and are likely to be less than familiar with the process of seeking accommodation.
Arriving to class “on time” may be difficult. University campuses may be quite large, and scheduling of classes does not always take into account how difficult it may be for students to get from class A to B on time. A student with impaired mobility sent me her class schedule to review, and I was shocked to see her schedule required a 1.1km walk from one side of campus to another within 10 minutes, with a Google estimate of an able bodied person requiring 14 min to cover this distance. After the second class, she was then required to walk another 1.2km (Google estimate, 15 minutes for an able bodied person) to return to a building located adjacent to the first class. Despite her best efforts, she was frequently late to both classes, and unnecessarily exhausted by the ordeal. If you observe students struggling to arrive on time, consider asking for a change in venue. At the very least, ensure you NEVER go over the allotted lecture time, as this will make it difficult for all students to reach their next class on time, and will disproportionately disadvantage students with physical disabilities.
In many countries, mobility on campus is difficult in winter due to ice and snow. For some students with disability, this is such an issue that they avoid registering for classes that require attendance on campus in winter months. The advent of online/hybrid lectures during the COVI-19 pandemic offered many disabled students unprecedented access to their classes, regardless of weather. Consider recording your lectures on a platform such as Zoom if possible, and providing the link to the class.
Accurate captioning and scientific terminology. If you have ever switched on the ‘Live transcript’ feature in Zoom whilst giving a lecture, you’ll quickly realize that these systems do not marry well with scientific terminology. ‘Apoptosis’ becomes ‘A pop Josias’ and ‘Xanthamonas’ is reformulated to “exam the bonus”. Judicious inclusion of terms on your slides during a lecture will help to clarify meaning (for all students), and ideally transcripts would be edited to ensure words are correctly transcribed. If possible, providing students with a copy of your presentation before the lecture may also help.
Expense. Having a disability can be very expensive, with government subsidies and support from charitable organizations only partially offsetting these costs. For this reason, many students with disability may be required to work part-time to subsidize their cost of living, which may reduce time available for study. Most people can readily appreciate that the purchase of specialized equipment such as a wheelchair may cost thousands of dollars, but you are likely unaware that service dogs (for example) may cost as much as a small car depending upon their training. Other less obvious expenses include the acquisition of medical documentation that may be required to access accommodations, and/or doctor’s notes that may be requested when a student is unable attend a lab or complete an assignment / evaluation (such as a midterm or final exam) ‘on time’. Medication and treatments are not always fully covered or reimbursed by insurance policies, further stretching a limited budget. If an individual has a mobility impairment, there may be additional costs associated with transportation, and individuals with disability are likely be disadvantaged with respect to finding affordable, decent housing that accommodates their needs yet is located near campus. As a consequence, many students opt to live on campus, yet that is often more expensive than off campus housing.
