Students express frustrations obtaining Disability Resources & Services accommodations

Pitt students have been frustrated with the process of obtaining accommodations from the Pitt Disability Resources & Services Office for several years, according to Max Wasserman, president of the Student Disability Coalition.

“We’re all paying, however, many thousands of dollars of tuition each year. Everyone deserves an education and a college experience that helps them succeed in all the ways they possibly want to. We deserve that much,” Wasserman said.

According to Leigh Culley, director of DRS, DRS is responsible for identifying and minimizing barriers to equal access, guided by federal and state regulations. Accommodations, which are essential modifications to prevent discrimination based on disability, are provided per student’s request. 

To obtain accommodations, students must complete an online application, provide medical documentation and be interviewed to assess eligibility for accommodations. Requested accommodations are reviewed on a case-by-case basis by evaluators and, occasionally, committee review. 

Culley explained the DRS has nine staff members, including six student disability specialists and one staff and faculty disability specialist. They currently serve 2,830 students in undergraduate, graduate and professional programs on the Oakland campus.

Culley said that all students registered with DRS are assigned to a disability specialist who determines and facilitates accommodations and provides ongoing support for students. This means each disability specialist takes care of hundreds of students.

“Six specialists for 2,000 students — that is not enough,” Wasserman said. 

Talyn Summers, a first-year undecided major, struggled with executive dysfunction, a common problem for people with ADHD which leads to struggles with time management and completion of assignments. They told the DRS specialist exactly what accommodations were needed, one of which was extra time on assignments. 

This accommodation had been provided to them throughout middle and high school and was backed up by several years of medical documentation and psychological evaluations from the school and medical professionals.

“DRS did not approve my request because the committee determined that early notification of assignments had already been a provided accommodation for me,” Summers said. Early notification of assignments refers to being told about an assignment and its deadline prior to the activation of the assignment. 

They had completed their application and sent in five documents detailing their diagnosis, school psychological records and educational accommodations over several years, each around 10 to 20 pages long. Summers emphasized that the accommodation for extra time was very clearly outlined in the application and documentation as a specific, necessary accommodation that their learning had benefited from throughout their academic career. 

“Advanced notification of assignments doesn’t really mean anything because you already have it in the syllabus,” Summers said. “Extended time, in my case, doesn’t cost them anything, nor is it any kind of inconvenience to the school. It’s purely non-material and is something that I very much need.”

Summers stressed the lack of transparency around how DRS decided accommodations’ approval or rejection.

“I wrote up a very lengthy application, and they get back to me with a short email with broad, general information for why they rejected my accommodation,” Summers said. “They asked me very specifically to outline what my issues were and what accommodations I wanted in writing and then provide a lot of supporting documentation. So, I would kind of like to see a similar process from them.”

Summers sent in their initial application in January and received an email of the accommodation rejection in mid-February. They sent an appeal in early March and haven’t received information on the decision yet.

“I just found it to be a sort of lengthy, frustrating and kind of opaque process,” Summers said. “By now, if I get this accommodation, it’ll probably be too late to have it this semester, but I’m hoping for the rest of my time at Pitt, I might be able to get it.”

Kay Schaefer, president of Delta Alpha Phi, the honors society for students with disabilities, also emphasized the difficulty of the process of getting accommodated, which may turn students away. 

“I don’t want to have to go through this whole process just to get accommodated. That’s already a lot for me, as someone disabled,” Schaefer said. “The process is strict, and it has to be strict to avoid people taking advantage of it. But you’re still harming disabled people by making it so strict with so much paperwork.”

However, steps are being taken toward increasing student voice in DRS. Wasserman said the Student Disability Coalition secured a meeting that is yet to be scheduled with heads of various departments related to accommodations of housing, dining, transportation and DRS, as well as the Disability Resources Committee, a Student Government Board committee. 

“I am hoping that this will be the first in a regular series of contact between administrators, student organization leaders and the Disability Resources Committee,” Wasserman said.

Furthermore, the Student Disability Coalition also recently obtained a seat last month on the Student Government Board’s assembly, a lower legislative body of student organizations representing large portions of the student body. Wasserman is hoping to further promote awareness by making the Disability Resources Committee a permanent committee as its term ends at the end of the year. 

Wasserman stressed the importance of speaking out to the administration about student struggles. He hopes that the administration will improve and work to make things better for students. 

“We do try, and it’s important that we try,” Wasserman said. “We’re going to keep doing everything we’re doing, and we’re just going to keep getting louder and louder as long as we can help it.”