This week’s class had two components to it. We were first visited by the manager of the Accessible Learning Office, Gwen Page. The Accessible Learning Office assists students with disabilities in a way that will help them reach their full academic potential. To get the class thinking about accessibility to people with disabilities, Gwen asked us where we thought people with disabilities would find difficulty getting around campus. Some of the physical barriers that were brought up were stairs, architecture, and landscaping, such as the hills throughout campus. Gwen also brought up invisible barriers, such as attitude and communication. After the discussion about the difficulties that students with disabilities face, Gwen took the class on an “accessible walk” showing us the routes that people with disabilities have to take and how they differ from our everyday routes.
An example of this is the route that we took outside from the DAWB to Mid-campus Drive and then through the buildings to the Peters building. Along this walk, Gwen made note of a number of obstacles to the physically disabled. For example, she showed us how the weight and pressure of the doors would be a struggle for a disabled person to open.
During the second half of the class, we participated in “How to Get an ‘A’ Grade” workshop. This workshop was structured to assist the class in revising our essays into university level, or academic papers. Dr. Sharpe was able to make our strengths and weaknesses evident to us, and gave the class the opportunity to revise the first draft of our papers. The class seemed to find this workshop very beneficial in developing their research papers.
By: Nadege Bertrand and Alysha D’Souza
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