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A friend of mine has a house that has these steps steps to get to the front door. These steps would make it very difficult for a person with a physical disability to use. The garage could be used as an entrance, but there are only stairs to the main level, with no ramps or elevators.

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Lack of Sidewalks and Curb Ramps - Maria Regas

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Lack of Sidewalks and Curb Ramps - Maria Regas

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Being a Texan, I always follow the news around the state. This is an article that posted recently about a neighboring city, Victoria. I remember visiting the University of Houston campus in Victoria, and I recall the lack of sidewalks and curb ramps around town. People with physical disabilities, especially those who use wheelchairs, have a difficult time maneuvering when sidewalks end, and they have to use the streets (with the lack of curb ramps to get from sidewalk to street). These are not safe conditions. As the article mentions, ADA requires that they have a plan to become compliant and make services accessible, but Victoria cannot find their plan (how crazy is that!). https://www.victoriaadvocate.com/news/2017/jun/24/residents-struggle-when-sidewalks-end/

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Snow and Ice on Public Streets - Maria Regas

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Snow and Ice on Public Streets - Maria Regas

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I remember this snow when I came to visit a few years back. It was the most snow that I had ever seen, and I just had to take a picture. Snow and ice can prevent people with physical disabilities and those who are blind from leaving their homes, unless towns are quick to shovel the sidewalks. The first thing most towns do is to plow the streets, which can just pile on more ice and snow to the adjacent sidewalks causing dangerous conditions for people with physical disabilities.

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This is another picture that I took from that snow. In smaller towns, such as Carbondale, many people live in the surrounding rural areas, which can lack sidewalks for people with physical disabilities and those who are blind (and keep them safe  off the busy roads). People with disabilities in more rural areas are often overlooked because these are usually poorer areas and isolated. This can force people to move to larger areas that provide more accessibility, like Carbondale, but that may not be an option to many.

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Lack of Free Case Management for Students with Disabilities at the College Level - Maria Regas

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Lack of Free Case Management for Students with Disabilities at the College Level - Maria Regas

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There are several great academic resources for students to use for classes, and there is a great Disability Support Services (DSS) on campus, but DSS can only provide so much as far as accommodations. DSS is not structured or staffed to provide what many students with learning disabilities need --case management and intrusive academic counseling. Programs like Achieve at SIU and SALT at Arizona have been created around the country for such a need, but what if a student cannot afford the services. These students are students that can use of the services of a DSS, but lack the self determination to search for the help at writing centers or math centers, and also need a case manager type to provide structure and support (just like they have probably received for the last 18 years of their life). There is a need that I do not think universities are providing, unless it is for a charge, because they cannot or will not put money into such services to provide with the cost of tuition. They are not violating any laws because they are following ADA rules, but this is an opportunity to evolve the current level of accommodations mandated by the laws because the types of students are changing. They are receiving such great help under IDEA, but all that structured and mandated support is snatched out from these students as adults, with the expectation that they would be prepared to maneuver the world after high school (which we all know is usually not the case).

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No Actual Textbook for Classes - Maria Regas

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No Actual Textbook for Classes - Maria Regas

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I have noticed this summer that many courses are being offered only online in the summer, such as ANTH 240a. The book for the course is only offered as an e-book and the bookstore does not carry the actual textbook. This is the same thing with online math courses that only offer online e-books. Students that have various learning disabilities would benefit from an actual textbook. The e-book is a great way to promote universal design for learning for all learners and the leap forward in technology, but one should not leave the "old" methods behind, such as hard copy textbooks. Especially if a student with a learning disability has not had exposure to online textbooks, then it would be so much harder for them to get used to using an e-book.

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No Automatic Door for Wheelchair Access - Maria Regas

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No Automatic Door for Wheelchair Access - Maria Regas

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This was the old location to the International Students Offices. This building looks like an old split level dormitory that they used for their offices. There are two entrance points to their offices, but neither have an automatic door button to provide wheelchair access and access to people with other physical disabilities. Even with one entrance point covered, there would be limited access to the other upper split set of offices. It can be difficult, but necessary to reconfigure and update older buildings to ADA compliance.

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This is an image of a stairwell in a campus building that does not have an elevator to its upper two floors. As with many older buildings or re-purposed buildings, these buildings may not have the appropriate accessibility for people with physical disabilities. After taking this picture, I saw an older employee, who uses a cane, badly limp up the stairs to her office; I am sure she would appreciate an elevator to her floor.

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Sidewalks on College Campuses - Maria Regas

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Sidewalks on College Campuses - Maria Regas

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This is a picture from last winter at SIU. It did not snow or ice that much. However, ice and snow can make these sidewalks impossible to navigate if you have physical or visual difficulties. Students with physical disabilities have the right to get around campus safely. Many established SIU students would tell me that if there is a big snow or ice storm, SIU is known to not plow or salt the sidewalks as well or as quickly as the streets. I have heard stories of students falling and hurting their legs and of students in wheelchairs sliding on an icy sidewalk. Hopefully, a lack of state budget will not keep them from clearing the sidewalks properly this winter.

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My cousin in Florida told me about this story in the news regarding a Florida court ruling that Winn-Dixie's website must become ADA compliant because it is a public domain. A customer sued because the website was not compatible with his text to speech technology. The ruling was very broad in its description of the Winn-Dixie's website, as defining it as a "public place for accommodations." I looked for myself and larger retail websites are not as accessible to people who are blind and to people with learning disabilities, such as dyslexia, processing disorders and ADHD. These individuals often use text to speech technology to read web content.
http://www.fooddive.com/news/grocery--winn-dixie-case-may-compel-retailers-to-make-their-websites-ada-compliant/445700/