Promoting Access and Success for students with disabilities

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Promoting Access and Success for students with
disabilities

• Disabilities Advisory Committee
• December 9, 2008
• Illinois Board of Higher Education

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Background on the DAC

• Established in February 2004 by Board Chair, Jim
  Kaplan to provide advise on how to improve
  educational outcomes for students with
  disabilities
• Operated informally for a few years, then
  appointed a chair and set specific goals annually
• Endorsed new reporting requirements for web
  accessibility as part of the Underrepresented
  Groups report in Winter 2006

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Background on the DAC

• Expanded the membership from 2006 2008 to
  include more colleges privates, for-profit, etc.
• Made first presentation to the IBHE Board in
  December 2007
• Formally organized with a chair, co-chair and
  minutes recorded from each meeting starting July
  2008
• Participated actively in the development of the
  Public Agenda for Illinois higher education

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Goals of the DAC

• To improve reporting and data collection/analysis
  about students with disabilities in Illinois
  institutions
• To promote improvements in web accessibility at
  all Illinois colleges
• Encouraging the development of training
  consortia
• To study the funding of Disability Services and
  advocate for stability
• Build the capacity of Disability Services
  providers

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Trends Changes

• Students with disabilities (registered with DSS)
  make up from 2 4 of Illinois enrolled
  students.
• Studies by the American Council on Education show
  9 of freshman self disclose a disability
• More students with psychological disabilities are
  enrolling nationwide
• More students with developmental disabilities are
  enrolling at community colleges

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ACE study of enrolled students
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Trends Changes continued

• Students are using more time-intensive assistive
  tech resources, i.e. books in digital format
• Support for high cost interpreting and captioning
  services, previously subsidized by Department of
  Rehabilitation Services is ending
• Growth in the use of audio files, YouTube other
  on line video and course management systems pose
  increased barriers to access

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Reporting and Data Collection

• Concluded a multi-year HECA grant project on
  Disability Metrics in Higher Education
• University of Illinois-Urbana/Champaign lead the
  project, with three other pilot colleges involved
• Evaluated data gathering on students with
  disabilities and piloted a systemic method of
  gathering comprehensive data five surveys
• Collaborated with other national survey projects
  NSSE, CCSSE and CIRP
• Recommending the following see slides that
  follow and resolution regarding the
  Underrepresented Groups report

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Metrics on Disability and Postsecondary Education

• Project Recommendations
• Seven recommendations follow

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MDPE Recommendations

• 1. IBHE member institutions use the ISEG
  disability data submission protocol to
  incorporate MDPE primary, secondary and tertiary
  disability demographic items in the Illinois
  Shared Enrollment and Graduation Database. MDPE
  disability data should be reported at the same
  time and in the same manner that such
  institutional data are typically submitted to the
  ISEG.
• ISEG continuing funding is needed

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MDPE Recommendations

• 2. IBHE member institutions that do not collect
  and store disability data in a centralized
  student data warehouse and whose disability
  offices have insufficient resources to
  effectively collect and store person-level data
  electronically evaluate the feasibility of using
  AccessTrak once available. This software will be
  provided free of charge to IBHE members.
• Access Trak is being developed at UIUC

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MDPE Recommendations

• 3. The IBHE Disability Advisory Committee review
  the MDPE Administrative Report, and make
  recommendations for AR item inclusion in the
  annual Underrepresented Groups Report submitted
  by member institutions.
• The Administrative Review report is one of the
  survey tools developed in the Metrics project a
  detailed annual report

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MDPE Recommendations

• 4. The IBHE Disability Advisory Committee review
  the MDPE Disabled Student/Registered Student
  Survey, and make recommendations for DSRS item
  inclusion in the annual Underrepresented Groups
  Report submitted by member institutions.
• The DSRS survey was one of the tools developed as
  part of the Metrics project.

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MDPE Recommendations

• 5. MDPE disability demographic variables be
  included in all entering student surveys, student
  experience and learning outcome surveys, and
  graduate/completer surveys that are reported to
  IBHE, and report findings for students/alumni/comp
  leters with disabilities
• This is an approach that has great utility and
  low cost.

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MDPE Recommendations

• 6. IBHE member institutions that participate in
  the ISEG Consortium, in collaboration with the
  IBHE Disability Advisory Committee, submit an
  annual statewide aggregated report to IBHE on the
  overall performance of the IBHE system with
  regard to the critical MDPE questions that have
  been identified as answerable by the ISEG
  database.

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MDPE Recommendations

• 7. IBHE member institutions advocate for the
  inclusion of the MDPE disability demographic
  items (see recommendation 5a) in all national
  surveys to which their institution subscribes
  (e.g., CCSSE, NSSE, CIRP) of which they are
  contemplating use.

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Promote Improved Web Accessibility
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Original Web Accessibility Resolution
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DAC Proposes

• Modifying the existing web accessibility
  reporting requirements in the Underrepresented
  Groups report to the new proposed requirements
  (document dated 12-08-08) produced by the
  Illinois Consortium on Web Accessibility
• These requirements will have an impact on
  community colleges and universities and serve to
  create mechanisms for improving access

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DAC Proposes continued

• That the IBHE Board form a working group of IBHE
  staff and DAC members to review the findings and
  recommendations of the Metrics HECA grant
• The primary intention and expected outcome is to
  create a systematic means of gathering data on
  students with disabilities progress and success
  in higher education
• The DAC recommends adoption of the seven
  recommendations from the Metrics project.

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Building the Capacity of Disability Service
providers

• The DAC plans to survey member institutions in
  Illinois to find out about their practices
  regarding
• Production of E-text materials for students
• Services provided to students with psychological
  disabilities
• A task force is being created to create
  guidelines for disability documentation in
  Illinois
• Will review work completed in Iowa Virginia
• Will review national guidelines from AHEAD

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Questions and Discussion?