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UCLA

Office for Students with Disabilities

ANNUAL REPORT
2001-2002

University of California, Los Angeles
P.O. Box 951426
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1426
A-255 Murphy Hall
(310) 825-1501 (voice)
(310) 206-6083 (TDD)
(310) 825-9656 (Fax)
http://www.osd.ucla.edu (Website address updated 05/29/2007)

The Office for Students with Disabilities

The Office for Students with Disabilities (OSD) is a campus resource that assists the faculty and the University in meeting the man-dates of Federal and State law and University Policy to provide academic support services and programmatic access to students with disabilities. The OSD also provides information to faculty about academic accommodations for students with disabilities. The philosophy and mission of the office focuses on encouraging independence, assisting students in realizing their academic potential and facilitating the elimination of physical, programmatic and attitudinal barriers.

Services Provided 2001-2002

The OSD provides a variety of services including registration assistance, disability parking, on-campus van transportation, campus accessibility, assistance with housing appeals, tutorial referrals, adaptive equipment loan and the following:

New This Year - OSD serves 80% more students in 2001-02 than it did a decade ago.

During the 1991-92 academic year, the OSD provided services (other than parking) to 487 students. This past year, the number was 878 - an increase of 80%. In 1991-92, we had 85 students identified in the category of Learning Disabilities (which included students with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity (ADHD), Acquired Brain Injury (ABI) and students with psychological disabilities). For 2001-02, that number was 415 - an increase of 388%.

The level of service provided as well as the number of students receiving some services has increased significantly in the past ten years. 18,060 hours of note-taking service was provided to 122 students in 1991-92. This past year, we provided 24,121 hours to 210 students. This shows an increase of 33% in hours and 72% in the number of students getting the service. An even more dramatic comparison can be found in our test accommodations/proctoring service. Seventy-nine students received 1,344 hours of testing accommodations through the OSD during 1991-92. 269 students received 4,000 hours of that service in 2001-02 - an increase of 241% in students and 197% in the number of hours.

The types of services we provide have changed over the years as well. Captioning didn't appear as a regular service until the 1993-94 academic year. Employees of the university pro-vided note-taking services until 1993-94. Now, volunteers provide most notes. Scanning was first provided in 1995-96 and our web page made its debut in 1996-97.

The OSD continuously seeks more efficient and effective methods to provide academic support to students with disabilities. The next ten years won't be any different in that respect.

Disability Demographics

During the 2001-02 academic year, a total of 1,485 students with documented disabilities received one or more academic support services and/or parking assistance (an increase of approximately 12% from last year). Of this number, 878 students received services other than parking (an increase of 16%) and were identified in the following categories:

A total of 607 students requested and received only parking assistance. The graph below demonstrates our overall distribution between parking only and academic service users over a five-year period.

The Learning Disabilities Program

Support services were provided for students with specific Learning Disabilities (LD), Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (AD/HD), Acquired Brain Injury (ABI), and students with psychological disabilities.

The Peer-Mentor Program matched new students with continuing students in our program. The mentors stayed in touch throughout the year to provide support and to answer questions. Because workshops were not well attended, students met individually with the LD Specialists to review any specific skill strategies. Panel discussions on issues related to disclosure in the work place and in medical/law/graduate school applications were extremely well received and will be offered annually. In addition, several workshops were offered in which guest speakers presented on their specific areas of expertise related to a given disability.

OSD offered three weekly support groups. One was for students with psychological disabilities, co-facilitated by an LD Specialist and a psychologist from Student Psychological Services (SPS). Another was for students with AD/HD facilitated by an LD Specialist. The third, which was newly offered this year, was for nontraditional students with psychological disabilities.

Technology Resources for Students with Disabilities

The Office for Students with Disabilities maintains a Resource Room at Powell Library that is used by students for distraction-free testing and for use of special adaptive equipment and de-vices. There are several computer workstations with adaptive software that are used for scanning, reading, converting materials to large print and other activities. In addition, there are computer labs throughout the campus available to students who do not need adaptive software.

The Office for Students with Disabilities works closely with the Disabilities and Computing Pro-gram (located in MSA 4909). The DCP provides adaptive technology and information access training, support, and services for students, faculty and staff with disabilities. Web accessibility evaluations and recommendations along with voice synthesis, Braille print, large print, and voice recognition technologies are available, as are consulting for individuals and departments. Students can contact the DCP directly at 310-206-7133 or be referred by OSD. Also see the DCP web site at www.dcp.ucla.edu.

Mobility Assistance

A total of 742 students with documented disabilities affecting their mobility were issued disability parking permits. Placards from the Department of Motor Vehicles and letters from physicians were accepted forms of verification. Permits were issued to 607 students who request-ed no other services from this office; permits were issued to an additional 135 students who received other academic accommodations.

A total of 5440 on-campus van rides were given to 239 students with documented mobility impairments. This represents an increase of 5% in the number of riders and an increase of 20% in the number of rides.

Comparisons to Other Students

The OSD continued to work with the Registrar's Office to compare the academic progress of students who receive services from this office with all other UCLA students. The results indicate more similarities in grade point average (GPA) than differences.

Overall, students with permanent disabilities averaged just .04 grade points below all other UCLA students. The most extreme differences were noted at the freshmen level, where OSD students aver-aged .26 higher than other UCLA freshmen, and at the professional level (medical, dental and law school), where OSD students averaged .23 below other professional level students.

Students with temporary disabilities had similar comparisons. The overall average was .03 below all other UCLA students. Freshmen with temporary disabilities averaged .24 higher than other UCLA freshmen and professional level students averaged .23 below other professional level students.

The Office of the President is currently tracking graduation and retention rates for UC students who have received academic support services at all nine campuses.

Evaluation

An evaluation of services is sent each year to all students who have received academic support services from the OSD. Based on comments received, changes may be made in the way service is delivered. Students who choose to identify themselves on this evaluation can request a follow-up on their comments. A total of 645 evaluations were sent out. This number is considerably lower than the number of students we served and was primarily due to two causes. The evaluations were mailed out in early May, which left six more weeks for students to register for our services, and we only sent the evaluations to students with valid addresses. The return rate was approximately 17% (112). The ratings are indicated below:

* Indicates fewer than 10 people responded to this item.

The comparison to last year's results indicates some areas are slightly higher, some slightly lower. The items with the greatest discrepancy are also those items where so few people responded (less than 10 as indicated above) that even one response could skew the score. Keeping that in mind, the overall results were very similar to last year and indicate a high degree of satisfaction with OSD services.

* indicates fewer than 10 people responded to this item.

Resources Outside the Classroom

• Programmatic access is provided by campus departments for all campus activities including student organizations, sporting events and extra-curricular activities. Contact the UCLA Access Web at www.ucla.edu.
• The UCLA Libraries provide many services to students with disabilities. www.ucla.edu/home/lma.html
• A Support Group for students with learning disabilities and another one for students with AD/HD offers opportunities for personal growth. (310) 825-1501.
• Student Psychological Services and the OSD co-facilitate a support group for students with psychological disabilities. Contact the OSD for more information on this group.
• The Union of Disabled Students (USD) is an Associated Students special interest group.
• Chancellor's Advisory Committee on Disability is made up of students, staff, faculty, alumni and community members. (310) 825-2242.
• The Chancellor's ADA/504 Compliance Office assists the University in recognizing and acting upon access and compliance issues. (310) 825-2242 or http://www.saonet.ucla.edu/ada.htm
• The Career Center provides career counseling and other services. (310) 825-2981 or www.saonet.ucla.edu/career/.

OSD Staff

Kathy Molini, Director
Dan Levitt, Assistant Director/Coordinator of the Program for Deaf & Hard of Hearing Students
Linda Stolt, Assistant Director/Proctor Coordinator
Dr. Julie Morris, Coordinator of the Program for Students with Learning Disabilities
Dr. Sharon Teruya, Learning Disabilities Specialist
Chana Bell, Learning Disabilities Specialist
Ed McCloskey, Coordinator of the Mobility Assistance Program
Doug Gerow, Auxiliary Services Coordinator
Deb Owen, Budget Analyst/Supervisor of Technology Planning and Training
Maria E. Martin, Payroll/Personnel Administrator
George Auletta, Computer Technologist
Tim Andrews, Murphy Hall and Resource Room Asst.
Tony Buffo, Assistant Proctor Coordinator
Robert Ono, Resource Room Assistant
Michelle Crawford, Staff Interpreter
Melodie Gifford, Staff Captionist
Sally Helmerich, Staff Captionist
Kristin Larson, Staff Interpreter

Student Workers

Chris Caulfield, Kelly Cotter, Gabriella Hernandez, Yvette Martin, Franklin Montiel, Mary Oyster, Bret Pursuit, Allen Rowin, Cori Wapnowski and Narine Zardarian.