By Johanna Caleron
A major problem in the E7 building is the elevator because it’s the only elevator working.
The other one doesn’t work and makes it really difficult to be on time for class, because some students don’t give space for someone in a wheelchair to get in, so the wheelchair-bound student has to wait until the elevator has fewer students.
In the past, if both elevators didn’t work, I would miss class.
The left elevator is broken and it has more space. The workers will fix it until the right elevator stops working, but that’s not fair because it breaks and the student in the elevator would get stuck.
If I was in a situation that I was stuck on the any level, I would be able to get off my chair and use the stairs or crawl my way out, but other students can’t do that.
How will they get help? There is a basket strecher that could help them, but it is too small.
Plus, the disable students come in different sizes with different conditions that may need more help.
Being disabled can be really hard, because sometimes the school doesn’t have the right accommodations for students with disabilities, especially when trying to use the bathroom.
There’s often someone using it and sometimes students use it to talk on the phone or to change clothes for physical fitness.
Sometimes it feels like a game because people are using the handicap restroom and running all over campus just to use it.
At noon, the restroom gets packed with people, especially for the females, but there is hardly a line for the males who feel like going to the male restroom.
I feel that I’m not going to make it on time and will have an accident and it will be too embarrassing. No one should feel that way.
In the S2 Building, the art department restroom can be difficult to access.
Getting inside it is the easy part, but the hard part is getting out, because the pathway from inside the restroom is too narrow to get out.
At times, students may have to wait for someone to open the bathroom door to get out.
The library doesn’t have tables that raise up and only one computer desk that does raise, but sometimes students use it and when they are asked nicely to change computers because someone in a wheelchair needs it, they get mad.
Even when I take the shuttle, the students get upset and I have been called bad names.
I require classroom accommodations, meaning that I get a table for every class I take, but this year is the hardest because I am getting tables that don’t work.
Other buildings have new tables that other disabled students can use. Why not me?
The notetaker wouldn’t take the notes. Sometimes they wouldn’t show up or called to let me know they were not coming.
The Disabled Student Program and Services is supposed to help those who need it, but lately I feel that my request is a problem they didn’t want to deal with because they think I’m complaining too much.
Every time I ask why the student workers haven’t fixed the problem, they tell me that I complain.
I don’t feel like going there to ask for help because I feel that the workers won’t listen.
That makes me feel that I don’t matter and my voice is not being heard.
They are not organized because some students can take their exams at the office, but they’re never on time to pick up the test.
Students can’t focus because it so noisy in the tesrt-taking section of the Hi Tech room that students can lose their train of thought.
There are students with disabilities that have the same problems, but for some reason students don’t speak up. But it’s time to take a stand for our rights and get unions together to do some thing about it!