By Pola Folwarczny
“The contrast between the urgency of some issues versus the length of administrative procedures is probably one of the biggest challenges,” says Lisa Dondainas, an AUC graduate who personally experienced the lengthy administrative procedure which students must undergo to receive disability support at AUC. The process, despite being significantly shorter than its equivalent at UvA, where students have to request education facilities at least four months before the start of their studies, has been generating increasing dissatisfaction among AUC students who often feel like it is unnecessarily complicated.
The process of obtaining study accommodations starts with submitting a request to the Board of Examiners (BoE) through the Digital Service Desk. Students must provide medical documentation of their disability and a justification for the support they are seeking. The BoE then takes up to six weeks to respond to the request, either granting or denying the accommodations, which can happen “if granting the request would put a disproportionate strain on the organisation/resources of AUC,” according to Article 6.6 in the Academic Rules and Procedures (AS&P). The BoE makes all its decisions with the “goal of the AUC program” and “AUC learning outcomes” in mind, as per Article 12 of the BoE Rules and Guidelines.
Defne Celik, a second-year Social Science student with a physical disability, stresses the importance of contacting AUC shortly after being admitted to the programme, in order to be able to start arranging for the necessary accommodations as soon as possible. While this proactive approach ensured that things have run smoothly during her time at AUC, it is not applicable in the case of unexpected circumstances and acute conditions. In such cases, receiving adequate support in time might prove to be more challenging.
Apart from complaints about the length of the process, some students also find it challenging to navigate the resources available to them. Despite the information provided on the AUC website, as well as in the AS&P, they often have difficulties with identifying the kind of support they need, which might further stall the entire procedure. For Milla Marttila, a second-year Science major with a mental disability, the AUC class structure is what makes it difficult to think of possible solutions that could alleviate her struggles, which include participation in in-class discussions and staying on top of her coursework for the required four courses during the 16-week period.
Unsure whether their request will be approved, students are often discouraged from approaching the BoE as they try to figure out whether the effort put into the process will eventually pay off. Inge Dormans, a second-year Humanities student with a physical disability, has long given up on the hope that the BoE can provide them with sufficient support. Instead, Dormans approaches each teacher individually, explaining the visible symptoms of their disability and the accommodations it might necessitate.
Dormans is not alone, as students often learn from the BoE that certain exemptions can only be requested directly from the teachers. “It’s unsettling that my whole academic career here is based on […] teachers deciding whether my disability is valid or not,” says Shani Boyd, an exchange student from Birmingham, who was denied several accommodations by the BoE upon coming to AUC in September. The facilities she was refused include flexible examination and assignment dates, no penalties for absences, a separate room for exams and computer privileges. At her home university, Boyd receives help from the Student Disability Service, which provides students with a range of accommodations regarding logistics, examinations, and coursework. To access these services, students have to submit an extensive questionnaire regarding their disabilities, accompanied by medical documentation.
Despite being a part of UvA and VU, AUC does not have the resources that these two larger universities have. As a significantly smaller institution, it has to take into account such limitations as its budget or the number of attending students. These restraints make some solutions, such as a separate office dedicated to disability support, unfeasible, explains Thijs Etty, a lecturer and tutor at AUC. Instead, AUC students can seek guidance from their academic tutors and the Student Life Officers (SLOs). They can also turn for help to individual lecturers, who have been granted increasing authority to permit some study accommodations, such as assignment extensions. This change has been implemented in the recent AS&P revision, taking a fraction of the decisive power from the BoE. While it does significantly shorten the time spent awaiting the decision, keeping it within the responsibilities of the BoE was a way to “ensure equal treatment” for all students, explains Etty.
According to SLO Lisa van Berkel, making more extensive changes to the policies in place at AUC “seems easier said than done.” She explains that behind the rules is a larger, heavily interconnected mechanism. The role of the BoE is to ensure that these rules are obeyed, as developed by the administration in collaboration with student bodies, so that “the quality of the diploma remains uncompromised.”
In an effort to alleviate the students’ struggles, Dondainas created the Disability Handbook, a resource which outlines the most common disabilities and the accommodations which could be deployed to “make studying and teaching in situations related to disability easier.” It aims to inform and educate both students and staff, offering guidelines which can help them navigate the process of finding and applying for the adequate support facilities.
To further assist the students, the Student Council is currently working on making AUC more inclusive regarding disabilities. One of the projects in the works concerns the implementation of the Disability Handbook guidelines into the AS&P.
Simultaneously, AUC’s Diversity Commission (DivCom) is working on developing a series of workshops for lecturers and staff to better educate them on the topics of disability and ableism in academia. Pauline Lütticke, one of the members of DivCom, explains that while the project is still in the beginning phase, the current main focus of the committee is to “map out what the needs are.”
The Herring 