Access can’t wait until university, says blind graduand

A blind student and disability rights advocate preparing to graduate from the University of the West Indies has called for disability access in primary schools, saying universities are inadequately equipped, and education policies too often ignore those they affect.

At age 68, Elviston Maloney will cross the stage on Saturday to receive his degree in psychology and management after seven years at UWI’s Cave Hill Campus.

He believes accessibility for disabled students cannot begin at university; it must start in primary school. He contends that tertiary institutions are not adequately equipped to accommodate students with disabilities.

He said: “If the government’s idea of inclusion and breaking barriers to include us is going to be a realistic achievement, then it has to start, in my view, at the primary level.”

Maloney began the degree course in 2019 alongside another blind student, a student with a hearing impairment, a young woman with dyslexia, two students who used wheelchairs, and a woman who used a walker. The campus was not built to accommodate that range of disabilities, he said.

“I don’t think that the university is adequately staffed and prepared for the various disabilities that apply,” he said. “However, I think one has to commend the university for the fact that even though it is not adequate in all areas, it has made an effort still to provide higher education to persons with disabilities in spite of its shortfalls.”

While the university and faculty were very accommodating to the handful of students with visible disabilities, Maloney said there was still much to navigate.

He cited the notes students normally use to study, saying he and his fellow blind student experienced difficulties converting them into a format they could use.

“We shared ideas and notes and stuff like that. It was challenging, yes, because then you had to copy the slides. You would get them; you can download them, but then you obviously have to go through them, and sometimes it could be a bit tedious.

“You’re dealing with something like 50 slides, 52 slides, depending on the topic area and the lecturer. So that in itself had its own challenge in terms of accessing the information. Fortunately, I think for us, for the most part, many of our lecturers were very accommodating.” 

For Maloney, addressing those shortcomings does not begin on a university campus.

The equipment he has in mind is ordinary enough, he said: computers, printers and large-print equipment in primary classrooms, bought as a matter of course rather than as a special case.

“If these things are going to become a reality, then these types of pieces of equipment become necessary at the primary level. And as they become necessary at the primary level, they’ll filter through into secondary, and… into tertiary.”

Where that does not happen, he said, students arrive at tertiary institutions that have never had to consider their needs: “The challenge can be that if nothing happens at the primary and secondary levels, but then you suddenly find yourself into a tertiary institution, which is not prepared for you, which knows very little about how to accommodate you, in the true sense of the word. They too are going to struggle.”

His second point concerned who writes the policies.

“The problem you have often is that plans are made for you, but not with you,” he said. “They are not made at the grassroots level. They are made at the higher echelons.”

Those who do reach the table, he said, tend to be the few with enough financial support to travel privately and enough family support to keep going, “that, generally speaking, the grassroots individuals do not have”.

Money closes doors further down the line as well. Maloney said scholarships available to people with disabilities were “very few” and subject to an age limit, leaving older students to find their own funding, the obstacle now standing between him and the master’s degree he has been advised to pursue.

Human Rights Commissioner Kerry-Ann Ifill, speaking at a Human Rights Commission workshop on data collection and research with the National Student Council at the Media Resource Department, said the ambition was for students with disabilities to be in mainstream school programmes rather than alongside them.

“We have the inclusive education policy which is in draft at the moment, which presages a lot of change,” she said.

Ifill, who is blind, said the commission wanted to see young people with disabilities at “these kinds of workshops as well”, but that getting there would take “more effort, more education, and a lot of work”.

Maloney asked that the question be turned around.

“But it really takes very little for a person to acquire a disability. Absolutely very little. A sickness, a fall, things like that. And your whole life can change without even thinking about it. 

“If people can only begin to recognise that disability does not mean inability.”

According to UWI Cave Hill Student Services Manager Dr Khaleid Holder, the university recognises that accessibility needs differ from person to person. He said the accommodations differ based on their needs. 

“What we did specifically for Mr Maloney was just trying to ensure that our learning spaces were accessible, so that included not just the physical space but also the virtual learning spaces.

“We had to ensure that when he was using his screen reader software to access electronic material, that it was in an accessible format, and so we just tried to make some adjustments to ensure that he can access the information.”

The university provided learning accommodations beyond the classroom to help students thrive throughout their time at the university. 

Dr Holder said: “A student may have a different learning or a different disability and so that may require different adjustments or accommodations for them. 

“We do try to adjust it depending on the nature of the students or the disability that they may have, so a student with blindness may have a different learning accommodation to someone who has a learning disability or someone who has deafness or hearing impairments.”

He stressed that access is one of their strategic pillars, and once they enter UWI their needs are catered to. 

Dr Holder agreed that globally more work is needed to improve accessibility and it should be addressed early rather than waiting until students reach university.

He shared the university’s goal to create spaces where students with or without disabilities can thrive. 

Maloney’s advice to anyone considering a degree wasn’t just about equipment.

“You have to have a desire in your mind to overcome the hurdles and move to the next level,” he said.

(LG)

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