Insufficient aid given to disabled students

They say you shouldn’t judge until you’ve walked in somebody else’s shoes.

It took multiple fractures in my foot, three surgeries to correct those fractures, five months unable to walk and a whole summer’s worth of traveling plans cancelled to really know what being physically disabled is like.

It’s bad enough to have to depend on other people when you have been an independent person for years, but hopefully you have good friends and family to help. But when your own university doesn’t care to help you get around campus, an issue arises.

When the fall semester started, I thought the last thing I would have to worry about was getting from class to class and building to building. I had already spent three months off of my right foot and had other issues occupying my mind.

I was utterly stunned to hear that Student Disabilities Services could do nothing for me. In fact, when I visited the center to talk to the director of disabilities, she told me the only accommodation they could provide was a note excusing me from being late to all of my classes, since crutching from Moody Hall to Trustee Hall was obviously going to take more than ten minutes.

I stared at her and waited for more—anything—but that was it.

Was I seriously expected to get around this hilly campus on crutches with a heavy backpack on my own? Would I be forced to miss 10 to 15 minutes of every class just because I couldn’t walk?

All of my professors were very understanding of my situation and did not need a note to realize that I cannot walk as fast as their other two-legged students.

Another suggestion the director of disabilities made was that I should get a scooter or a wheelchair. I looked into this option, but discovered that renting a scooter costs $100 weekly, while buying it would be $1,300. Neither of these options seemed feasible after spending thousands of dollars on medical bills, and $100 a week is not a reasonable way to spend money on something I would use only 15 hours a week.

The director explained to me that they do not provide golf carts to take people around campus because St. Edward’s University is small. This may be true when you can actually walk, but the distance between Moody Hall and Doyle Hall is roughly five blocks, a distance most people on crutches should not have to face—hence the reason why the government gives us handicap passes.

Because SDS could not help me, I went to the University Policy Department since they use golf carts to get around this small campus. The first time I contacted them, they seemed very willing to give me rides as long as they had employees available. But after a few rides, they told me that this was going to have to stop. They were not a taxi service.

I am not the only person crutching around campus. Junior Amber Trueblood, who was on crutches from the spring 2008 to 2009 semesters due to a broken foot, had the same experience.

“When I called [UPD] crying in pain one rainy day after slipping on my crutches, they told me I had to be in physical danger to receive a ride,” Trueblood said. “The campus is small—a two minute golf cart ride—but the walk on crutches can take 30 minutes from the on-campus apartments to Fleck Hall.”

The St. Edward’s mission statement reads, “Students are helped to understand themselves, clarify their personal values and recognize their responsibility to the world community. The university gives the example of its own commitment to service.”

As much as this is true, I would like to see a change in their service towards those students and faculty who, because of their physical disability, need some additional, and in reality minimal, help to experience the best of this university.