Disability advocates want greater accessibility

Matthew Shapiro
Contributing Writer

Late to class last week, VCU freshman Liam Cornwall was speeding down the sidewalk in his electric wheelchair. He arrived at the building where his class was located and punched the automatic door button. Nothing happened; the doors remained shut.

“I had to wait for someone to come along to get them open,” said Cornwall, who had been stuck outside several times before.

His experience is typical for people with disabilities trying to get around their community or college campus, including VCU. They still face issues with accessibility 20 years after the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The ADA, signed into law in 1990, was designed to help people with disabilities have successful lives. Jack Brandt, a disability advocate who has cerebral palsy, said VCU has done a fair job of meeting ADA requirements.

Those efforts have increased the number of students attending VCU with disabilities, Brandt said.

For example, VCU has tried to address “the physical access of the buildings, even though it is tricky,” Brandt said. “There is not much you can do with a pre-existing building. If a building is not accessible, the attitude of staff is that they are willing to make other arrangements so the programs are accessible.”

New construction at VCU fully complies with the law, Brandt said. “The buildings after the ADA are fully accessible.”

Dana Yarbrough, a fellow disability advocate and mother of a child with a disability, praised the steps VCU has taken in recent years regarding accessibility at both its Monroe Park campus and the Medical College of Virginia.

“The Monroe and medical campuses have added many new buildings over the past 10 years, and all are very accessible relative to ramps and elevators,” she said.

However, many feel that VCU could improve support for disabled students.

At one time, VCU had an accessibility committee. It was disbanded sometime last year; Yarborough doesn’t understand why.

“This is pretty disgraceful,” she said.

Yarborough also said the ADA is not solely about physical barriers; it’s also about inclusion for all the VCU students, no matter what makes them different.

“I think that while most folks view ADA compliance as making sure that there are ramps and elevators, it is really about respecting the inclusion of all individuals onto the VCU campus,” she said.

“That includes ensuring that videos and classes that are broadcast online should be captioned; it means that students with intellectual and other disabilities should be welcomed as students; it means having individuals with disabilities represented on every committee VCU has.”

Yarborough also had some advice for VCU President Michael Rao. She wants “to ensure that when President Rao talks about diversity, we are not just looking at the color of skin or the language someone speaks.”

Representatives of VCU’s Office of Disability Support Services declined to comment for this story. However, Elizabeth Cramer, a professor in the School of Social Work and co-chair of the University Equality and Diversity Committee, said she believes that VCU promotes a positive climate for its students with disabilities.

“The diversity work at VCU is committed to the concept of inclusive excellence. Inclusive excellence focuses on developing competencies and skills that prepare us to live in and contribute to a more complex and demographically diverse world. It also refers to values and processes that embrace, encourage and require meaningful participation of diverse voices and perspectives. This includes persons with a range of disabilities,” Cramer said in an e-mail.

“A core assumption of inclusive excellence is that excellence cannot be achieved without valuing and practicing inclusion. In other words, in order for an institution to be excellent, it must practice principles of inclusion.”

Cramer said VCU’s diversity plan includes “actions that speak to the climate for persons with disabilities and other groups on campus.” For example, in the plan, VCU pledges to “assess that our environment is compatible with the needs of persons with various disabilities.”

To promote such inclusion, VCU held its first Disabilities Awareness Week in October. The events, including a panel discussion and a movie, coincided with Virginia Disability History and Awareness Month.

Cornwall, a biomedical engineering major from Culpeper, would like everything to move faster. He wants “working door openers for all buildings and reliable elevators that don’t take five minutes to get to the next floor.”

Brandt would like VCU and the City of Richmond’s public works department to work together in addressing accessibility.

“I would broaden their support services and work with the city to ensure there is a plan to update all the sidewalks and make traffic signals for the blind or visually impaired,” he said.