There are nearly 500 students that utilize campus disability services every year. In an effort to advocate for this five percent of AU, a number of students — both with and without disabilities — have revived AU’s Disability Rights Coalition.
While disability awareness might not seem to be the most visible problem on campus, the fight for equality is always a legitimate one. AU’s services for students with disabilities are already above average. We hope that this new focus will help advance them to excellence.
In pursuit of this goal, we encourage the University to incorporate physical additions that improve campus accessibility as an official effort within the Campus Plan. If the University embarked on such a targeted program, the needed improvements could be constructed together, all at once. And such improvements certainly need to be made.
The East Quad Building has time and time again been listed as trouble spot, with no elevator or even a ramp along the stairs. Other buildings like Hurst and McKinley are only slightly less in need of further accessibility, with whole floors accessible only via stairs.
The possible improvements extend beyond academic buildings. There is currently a proposal to reconfigure the elevator access system in Jacobs Fitness Center to allow handicapped users to operate it alone, rather than request an escort — as is the case now.
AU’s expansive Campus Plan offers the perfect opportunity for the administration to take inventory of problem areas and apply the funding and resources needed to solve them. It seems silly that the administration can plan to break ground on whole additional campuses without adding a simple ramp in the EQB.
To be sure, our University outperforms most of its counterparts when it comes to disability rights. Terhas Clark, the current director of disability services for the SG was forced to transfer from Bard College because its facilities were so untenable. In comparison, she calls AU “paradise.”
Clark’s own position was recently created as a concerted effort to ensure that AU’s inclusivity transcends the physical limitations of individuals. She works in tandem with AU’s Disability Support Services to provide AU students with disabilities with equal access to University programs and services. Clearly, AU takes disability rights more seriously than most.
Nevertheless, not being the worst is hardly a rallying cry for disability awareness. Indeed, the preceding paragraphs show that there is significant room for improvement. Each room that is inaccessible to the students with disabilities increases the likelihood that those students may be excluded from a club event or class. Or, in the case of Hurst, basically the entire biology program.
The Disability Rights Coalition is correct to view disability access and inclusion not as a medical issue but as a human rights issue. No attribute or lack thereof should prevent an individual from attending an event or enrolling in a class.
Students with disabilities — mental, physical, learning or invisible — are entitled to the AU experience, not some distorted version of it. And AU officials must work to ensure this. Without exception.
We do not mean to take away from the great work that the administration has already done to ensure that those with disabilities are not excluded from day-to-day activities. Rather, we encourage AU to strive for excellence. For more than simply basic access. For true equality of opportunity.
