Accessibility at St. Clair College

At St. Clair College, we are dedicated to providing high-quality education to all of our students and have established policies to guide our efforts in this regard. As part of our commitment to accessibility for students with disabilities, we have established processes for students to request accommodations and have an Accessibility Committee in place to review our policies and work to promote accessibility on campus.

As faculty members, it is our responsibility to ensure that all students have equal access to learning. This includes being mindful of the needs of students with disabilities when creating online and in-class learning materials. By creating accessible materials, we can demonstrate our commitment to excellence in teaching and ensure that all students have the opportunity to succeed.

Additionally, making materials accessible can also have benefits for all students, not just those with disabilities. For example, closed captions and transcripts can be helpful for English language learners, and text-to-speech tools can assist students with reading challenges. By prioritizing accessibility in our teaching practice, we can contribute to the college’s vision of “excellence in all we do.”

Accessibility and Access

Accessibility, simply put, means being able to access something without barriers. For Titchkosky (2011), “access is a way people have of relating to the ways they are embodied as beings in the particular places where they find themselves.” Accessibility requires proactivity and planning. It is not individual accommodations or retrofits that occur after the fact. Instead, we need to think about access and accessibility beyond just individuals but within systems and norms as well.

True accessibility and access means disabled people can exist as themselves in relation to their surrounding environments. As Emily Ladau (2021) puts it, “accessibility is about making things more equitable so that disabled people have the same opportunities and support to thrive as do nondisabled people.” Accessibility is not about convenience — that is, if something is inaccessible it is not simply an inconvenience for the individual. Instead, if something is inaccessible, it is exclusionary.

Accessibility, Disability and EDI

In postsecondary discourses, EDI (Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion) has become a catch-all phrase to address and label systemic inequities within higher education. Accessibility and disability, however, are often absent from EDI discussions in postsecondary education. A 2021 review of EDI focused academic literature found little to no engagement with disabled students and staff (Wolbring & Lillywhite, 2021). The authors point to a necessary need to “critically analyze EDI efforts in relation to disabled students, non-academic staff, and academic staff, the intersectionality of disabled people with other EDI groups and the impact of the EDI efforts on the social situation of disabled people beyond educational settings” (Wolbring & Lillywhite, 2021). The lack of engagement and centering of accessibility and disability within EDI discourses needs to be addressed and changed if we are to truly embrace the possibility of an accessible postsecondary sector.

Accessibility and Education

A 2017 report by the Canadian Human Rights Commission found that barriers in education cause close to 10 percent of individuals with disabilities to quit pursuing their educational goals before achieving them (CHRC, 2017). The OHRC outlines the main barriers to education for students with disabilities (including postsecondary students) as inadequate funding, physical accessibility, the accommodation process, lack of individualization, ineffective dispute resolution mechanisms, and negative attitudes and stereotypes.

These barriers and more are prevalent for students in the postsecondary sector. Prioritizing efforts to achieve barrier-free access for disabled students beyond just individualized academic accommodations is critical. First, accommodations do not equal true access for disabled students. Accommodations are retrofits to an inaccessible environment that do not empower us to make changes. As Dolmage (2017) notes, “The nature of the retrofitted accommodation requires that we make no lasting changes to our pedagogy or to the culture.”

Second, academic accommodations do not equitably serve disabled students within teaching and learning institutions. Many students that need academic accommodations either do not receive them or do not seek them. Some have estimated that at least 100,000 postsecondary students in Canada (if not close to 200,000 students) need accommodations but never seek them (Dolmage, 2017). Olson (2015) cites a variety of reasons that prevent students from accessing the required medical documentation to access academic accommodations including lack of access to medical care, lack of financial means, barriers to adequate healthcare and documentation, and more.

Moving past a compliance framework to approach accessibility is one way to ensure equity for disabled students. As Harry Paul has pointedly asked, “if you recruit disabled students, are they going to feel like their disability is a burden that the school is complying with as it’s the law…or are they going to feel like they are valued for their perspective?” (as cited in Burke, 2020).

Relevant Policies available on St. Clair College Intranet

• 1.1.14 ONLINE AND DISTANCE EDUCATION
• 1.1.16 LEARNING MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
• 1.1.19 USE OF DIGITAL LEARNING RESOURCES FOR INSTRUCTIONAL AND ASSESSMENT PURPOSES
• 1.3.14 QUALITY LEARNING ENVIRONMENT POLICY
• 2.2 ACCESSIBILITY POLICY
• 2.4 COLLEGE MISSION STATEMENT
• 2.6 COLLEGE VALUES
• 7.1 CODE OF STUDENT RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES
• 7.4 STUDENT EQUITY, INCLUSION AND ACCESSIBILITY SERVICES

Accessibility Committee:

The Accessibility Committee at St. Clair College is responsible for reviewing a wide range of disability issues and providing advice to the college community on improvements including in regards to compliance with Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) and the Integrated Accessibility Standards Regulation (IASR). The committee is chaired by the Director of Student Services and includes membership from a cross section of the college community.

2. PURPOSE OF THE COMMITTEE

2.1 The College Accessibility Committee shall provide advice and/or recommendations to the Senior Operating Group (SOG) and to the Accessibility Services department, on a wide range of disability issues
including, but not limited to funding, physical, attitudinal and educational barriers, awareness issues, policies, philosophies, etc.

2.2 The Committee shall provide liaison with the following groups: students, faculty, staff and alumni; local, municipal, provincial and federal associations, agencies and service groups; the Provincial College Committee on Disability Issue; and all Standing Committees of St. Clair College.

2.3 The Committee shall observe, review and make recommendations with regard to legislation pertaining to the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) and the Integrated Accessibility Standards Regulation (IASR).

Accessibility Committee Documents

References

The three sections, Accessibility and Access; Accessibility, Disability and EDI; Accessibility and Education, were remixed from the article Why Accessibility by Niagara College licensed under CC BY 4.0 International. The references below relate to this material.

St. Clair College. (2022). College Policies and Procedures

St. Clair College. (2021). Accessibility committee: Terms of reference. St. Clair College.

Burke, L. (2020, November 12). Disability as diversity. Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/11/12/could-disability-be-further-included-diversity-efforts  

Canadian Human Rights Commission. (2017). Left out: Challenges faced by persons with disabilities in Canada’s schools. Retrieved from https://www.chrc-ccdp.gc.ca/sites/default/files/challenges_disabilities_schools_eng.pdf

Dolmage, J. (2017). Academic ableism: Disability & Higher Education. Michigan: University of Michigan Press.

Ladau, E. (2021). Demystifying disability: What to know, what to say, and how to be an ally. California: Ten Speed Press. 

Olson, S. (2015, July 27). Every student uses your access statement. Retrieved from https://tenureshewrote.wordpress.com/2015/07/27/guest-post-every-student-uses-your-access-statement/ 

Ontario Human Rights Commission. (n.d.). Main barriers to education for students with disabilities (fact sheet). Retrieved from http://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/main-barriers-education-students-disabilities-fact-sheet 

Titchkosky, T. (2011). The question of access: Disability, space, meaning. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. 

Wolbring, G., & Lillywhite, A. (2021). Equity/equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) in universities: The case of disabled people. Societies, 11(49). https://doi.org/10.3390/soc11020049