University Centers for Students with Disabilities: A Pilot Study

Abstract

The vast majority of US universities and colleges have specialized centers to support students with disabilities. These centers have various names (Student Accommodation Centers, Student Access Services, Disability Resources), but the goal of these centers is to support students with disabilities who are obtaining a postsecondary education. The previous research reviewed 30 universities that had listed information about their student center in the public domain (through Web sites). This research will move beyond the review of Web-based pages by surveying those employees who are in charge of these centers at the 30 institutions in addition to targeting public 4-year regional universities who not have a publicly accessible webpage. This paper discusses future research and implications from results of the pilot study and the need to further investigate university accommodation centers.