Accommodations

Index

Academic Support Services

5.1 Academic Accommodations

The presence of a disability may require that students carry out academic tasks in a different fashion than most of us have come to expect. As mentioned in the Introduction section of this guideline, the World Health Organization describes the biopsychosocial model of disability, which identifies the effect on task performance as the disability - "...disability serves as an umbrella term for impairments, activity limitations or participation restrictions." (WHO, 2001). These limitations and restrictions result from environmental factors such as attitudes, policies and systems, the built environment, or products and technology. Accommodation addresses the removal of barriers which are not essential aspects of the learning process. It does not address treatment or remediation of the primary structural or functional impairment. Academic accommodations are intended to facilitate equal participation in the learning environment and the demonstration of knowledge, to enable students to perform the essential requirements of their courses or programs, unobstructed by participation restrictions resulting from the interaction of the person with their environment. At no time should academic accommodation undermine or compromise the bona fide learning objectives that are established by faculty of the University.

Participation as a student often requires sustained sitting or standing, listening and concentrating, fairly continuous handwriting or keyboarding, and reading fine print, distant projections or blackboards, and computer screens. Laboratory work poses additional requirements for positioning and dexterity. Library research requires reaching overhead to handle heavy texts, prolonged reading and visual scanning of electronic documents, standing in line to print/photocopy materials, or accessing reserve readings in a limited time period, among other tasks. A structural or functional impairment can affect these or other academic tasks, restricting a student's participation in their curriculum.

Reasonable Accommodations
"Reasonable accommodation" refers to adjustments to how a course, program, service, or activity is delivered or executed, to provide a qualified individual with a disability an equal opportunity to participate and obtain the same benefits as those available to an individual without a disability. Postsecondary institutions are obligated to make reasonable accommodations only for the known limitations of otherwise qualified individuals with disabilities. They are not obligated to provide accommodations that would fundamentally alter the essential components of a course of study.

Reasonable accommodations are in compliance with the Ontario Human Rights Code’s duty to accommodate “up to the point of undue hardship”. (OHRC, 2000).

Essential Requirements
"Essential requirements" is a specific term used in human rights legislation, referring to the bona fide requirements of a task or program that cannot be altered without compromising the fundamental nature of the task or program. Determining what is an essential requirement and what is not is critical in distinguishing requirements that cannot be accommodated from what can be altered.

Students are advised to speak with their instructors in person as soon as they have identified difficulty with an aspect of the learning environment (curricular expectations are part of the environment as well as technology and buildings), to facilitate understanding of their needs, to answer questions the faculty member may have, and to allow sufficient time to ensure that accommodations can be arranged.

If the instructor has any questions or concerns or disagrees with the recommendations of the Disability Services Office, these should be raised with the student and/or the Disability Services Advisor, to facilitate the most appropriate resolution which allows the student to demonstrate knowledge to the instructor's satisfaction.

Some typical accommodations and the rationale for them are outlined below. Instructors are encouraged to call the Disability Services Office with any additional questions or comments. It is important that the Office be aware of the requirements of specific courses; similarly, it is important for instructors to understand the purpose of specific accommodation.

Extra Time
Limited endurance due to chronic pain from surgery, traumatic brain injury, neurological or rheumatoid conditions can require the use of extra time so that a student may change position frequently or rest the affected body parts. Students who need this type of accommodation are often distracted from concentrating on course material by the constant presence of pain, side effects of pain medications, and the procedures required to relieve or prevent accumulated effects of pain. Students with learning disabilities can use extra time to compensate for extremely slow reading speed (despite average or better comprehension), for profound difficulty with coordination of handwriting, and to implement compensatory strategies in organizing and writing down their ideas. (See section on Learning Disabilities.) Extra time can also allow students to employ anxiety management techniques, such as deep breathing or stretching.  Students may not always require the extra time allotted for their examinations

Computer Use
Manual dexterity is affected by various conditions, including arthritis, learning disabilities, injuries or other compromise of muscle performance. The use of a computer can compensate for these by employing different muscles than those used in handwriting, distributing the work of writing to both hands, providing opportunity for adaptive positioning, and producing a consistently legible copy. Students are able to concentrate on content instead of the appearance of the document, without the pain or fatigue of hand muscles affected by impairment.

Students with visual impairments use computers for enlarging print during the writing and reading process, using voice output and/or refreshable Braille to edit what they have written, and to facilitate the efficient use of a scribe while dictating answers during exams.

Computers are also used to compensate for difficulty with attention to detail, such as perfunctory spelling checks. Attention to detail may be affected by medication side effects, cognitive processing speed, attention deficit disorder, or chronic pain.

Notetaker Program
Effective notetaking can form a large portion of the method of obtaining information in the university environment. As such, this may be a frequent accommodation for students with disabilities. Students who typically require this service are those with fine motor difficulties, learning disabilities, attention deficit disorders, hearing impairments and visual impairments.

Notetaking involves listening actively and observing, processing the information, recording the relevant information in written form and finally, reviewing the information. Each process is essential and if a student with a disability is unable to perform certain components, his or her chances at succeeding in an academic environment will effectively be reduced.

The Notetaker Coordinator recruits volunteer notetakers through various means and often with much needed assistance of course instructors, faculty and staff. These notetakers (fellow students) are recruited and "matched" to students who cannot take their own notes. Faculty members are often asked to help in this process by making valuable announcements in their own class indicating the need for a volunteer notetaker. This "announcement" in itself is one of the major methods of recruitment and is often the fastest and most effective.

Volunteers are provided with an excellent course on how to take effective notes in a university setting as well as being educated on disability awareness issues. These courses are often scheduled in late September/early October for the fall term and in January for the winter term.

Both the student and the volunteer notetaker sign a contract (agreement) indicating they will attend class, listen actively and provide useful feedback to each other. Notetakers often meet with the student once a week to review the notes with the student, but they do not provide tutoring.

Many students find that being a volunteer notetaker improves their own notetaking skills in addition to contributing to a learning and volunteering experience. At the end of the year, notetakers receive a letter of appreciation and a certificate for completing the training.

Should you have any questions regarding the Notetaker Program, please feel free to contact Wendy Ross at extension 77628.

Alternate Format
The post-secondary learning experience is largely dependent on a student's ability to possess and to gather information from academic materials: course textbooks, course packs, lecture notes, research materials and exam papers. For students with a print disability, this means being able to secure the same materials made available to classmates, in an alternate format suited to their learning needs. Students with print disabilities do not have equal access to printed materials as their peers who do not have a print disability.

Some disabilities prevent or limit the reading of print material. Students with a print disability may request academic materials (textbooks, reserve readings, class handouts, etc.) in alternate format. Alternate formats include Braille, digital audio (CD MP3 format), audio cassette (nearly obsolete), Large Print, tactile graphics, and e-text. E-text is the most commonly used alternative to print materials in the post-secondary sector. E-text formats range from Word, Word Perfect, PDF and others. Other formats include eBraille and KESI format.

A print disability is defined as a disability that prevents or inhibits the student from reading print. This includes students who are blind or have low vision, students, who because of a physical disability are unable to hold or manipulate a book, and students with specific types of learning disabilities.

For students in post-secondary education where the pace of learning is rapid, the need for reading text material prior to lectures is imperative to success. Limited or no access to academic materials in alternate formats can be barriers to learning and to a positive and equitable educational experience.

Acquisition of Alternate Format materials
Requests for textbooks or course materials in alternate formats are processed by Carol Tennant, Assistant to the Coordinator for Library Services for Students with Disabilities. Carol's office is located in room 120c, within the Adaptive Technology Centre, Stauffer Library.

It is the students' responsibility to provide Carol with course outlines and reading lists containing complete bibliographic information of required texts. Due to the time involved in ordering and transcribing materials into alternate formats, it is imperative that this information must be given to the contact person as soon as possible.

Textbooks are searched in the online library catalogue of the Resource Services Library, W. Ross Macdonald School, Brantford, Ontario. The Resource Services Library (RSL) coordinates the production and dissemination of print-alternate materials, primarily textbooks, for post-secondary students who are print-disabled. The RSL is responsible for all administrative issues associated with providing print-alternate materials to post-secondary institutions, for example, invoicing payments to other service providers, processing offers, delivery of materials to institutions, etc.

Most academic texts are not available through W. Ross Macdonald School. These items must be found elsewhere. For example, electronic files of course texts may be procured from the publisher of the text. Some textbooks and course-packs are provided electronically by the campus bookstore. Many others are transcribed in-house by the Assistant to Library Services to Students with Disabilities and paid assistants. Occasionally, the Internet is used to access to copyright free titles.

• Braille
Queen's University owns a Braille embosser which is situated in the Adaptive Technology Centre in Stauffer Library. Arrangements can be made to transcribe class handouts, assignments, lecture notes, exams, etc. Considerable time may be required depending on the complexity of the document(s) to be brailled. For example, tables and other graphically-presented information must first be translated into a form that is meaningful to the Braille reader before brailling. Document(s) to be brailled should be submitted on disk whenever possible. This will save time as the document(s) do not need to be computerized prior to formatting and translation.

Braille textbooks can also be ordered through the Assistant, Library Services for Students with Disabilities. If a textbook is not available in Braille from a commercial producer, W. Ross Macdonald School can arrange to transcribe the textbook. It is essential that students are aware of course texts and readings as far as possible in advance of the start date of a course as the brailling process for one book can take from two to six months or longer, depending on the complexity of the material to be transcribed.

Students who use Braille have the right to request material in that format. Every effort will be made to meet such requests.

For further information, please contact Carol Tennant, tennantc@queensu.ca, Assistant, Library Services for Students with Disabilities, 533-6000 ext. 75570.

American Sign Language Interpretation
The use of sign interpreters is a highly specialized accommodation for students who are deaf and whose first language is American Sign Language. Trained interpreters are provided by the Educational Support Service division of the Canadian Hearing Society, or other funding sources. Consultation on how to work with interpreters in your class is provided by the Canadian Hearing Society and the Disability Services Office. Because of the work involved, a minimum of two interpreters is usually required for a lecture, as relief is needed from the fatigue of continuous interpretation. Details on interpreter services are available from the Disability Services Office and the Canadian Hearing Society.