Education involves not only the academic realm but that to which we are exposed. Observation and experience lead to growth and ultimately shape students into the fully developed individuals they aspire to be. With that said the role of the Disabilities Services Office is crucial in that it not only provides students with an opportunity to an equal education but also accepts and assists those with disabilities allowing for the cultivation of awareness in students who have little or no exposure to diverse lifestyles.
The Seaver experience in regards to the Disability Services Office has varied from student to student. Although individuals who have trouble hearing the professor can usually receive notes from volunteers who are paid for the service physical challenges such as the use of a wheel chair are often difficult to accommodate due to the structure and landscape of the campus.
According to the DSO’s mission the office strives to provide “all students with equal opportunity to succeed in the classroom.” The DSO also assists students with learning manual mobility hearing visual and other disabilities. With this goal in mind the most common services offered on campus are class note-takers specialized testing locations lengthened testing time interpreter services and real-time captioning (a form of transcription in which each word the professor speaks is typed by the appointed aide and automatically appears on the student’s computer). In addition the DSO also offers psychological and psychiatric counseling.
Several students say these services are consistent overall but some have complained that relying on note-takers is risky as the notes do not always come in on time. More important is students’ reactions to the fact that there are very few students on campus who appear to be physically disabled.
Lack of exposure to students with more physically apparent disabilities has caused a kind of sheltered blissful ignorance on campus. Waking up every day to a student body that overwhelmingly consists of able-bodies students does not fairly represent our generation’s students.
Living on what we might safely call a shielded campus prevents exposure to different human experiences. Junior Angela Sultan who is half-deaf was surprised to find that there was not a large deaf community on campus let alone a developed sign language program. “The deaf community is a culture in itself; I’m surprised to see such a lack of it here.” While UCLA is currently considering the addition of sign language in their linguistics department at Pepperdine it is still rare to find even a handful of fully deaf students. Additionally while wheelchair accessibility is easy and feasible at LMU at Pepperdine it is dreadful to even walk to class let alone journey on wheels. Though it is clear that it would be extremely difficult for one in a wheelchair to navigate throughout the Malibu campus measures can be taken to provide the means for this possibility and many others.
Such integration does not only provide justice to students in these conditions but it also creates the most appropriate environment for an education embracing a realistic view on life and its many forms.