The moving of the campus High Tech Center to improve accessibility for disabled students is angering many of its users.
Disabled students use the center to do their homework on computers and to study.
As of Tuesday, 49 students had signed a petition for the center to stay where it is now, on the second floor of the Student Services Building. But officials said they plan to move the center to the computer commons in the library as soon as they get the new furniture.
During an interview, Dr. Greg Chamberlain, dean of learning resources and information technology, said the High Tech Center is being moved to the north wall of the computer commons for a “variety of reasons.”
“One is to make it more accessible. The other is part of a trend to be more inclusive of students with disabilities instead of putting them away someplace in a room. We can better support them bringing them in as part of the group here,” said Chamberlain.
He said part of the consideration to move the center to the library commons was Assistant Technology Specialist Adie Geiser’s complaint about the restroom in the Student Services Building not being handicapped-accessible. Geiser uses a wheelchair.
“Adie Geiser will be moving his office down here so he can be there to support the students,” said Chamberlain.
Geiser declined to be interviewed.
Denise Conklin, a disabled student, said the center should stay where it is because it is conveniently located near the BC Learning Center.
“Everything is all right in one centrally located place. It’s an inconvenience that they would have it all the way down in the computer commons,” said Conklin.
Privacy for disabled students is another issue that she is concerned about.
“People who have disabilities could be embarrassed about it. A majority of disabled students don’t want their disabilities known to the mainstream student body,” Conklin said.
But interim Supportive Services Director Orlene Bowers reiterated Chamberlain’s comments, explaining that the current educational philosophy is to mainstream disabled students, not to isolate them.
“For centuries, persons with disabilities have wanted to be out among the mainstream and educated in the mainstream,” said Bowers.
“You know, you can’t please everybody all the time and we feel overall it’s a much more positive situation,” she said.
“My feeling is that if the more quote ‘normal,’ if there is such a thing, students are interacting with persons with disabilities all their life, they’ll understand that they’re people. That a person with a disability is a person first and the disability is secondary,” she said.
Cathleen Decker, another student who uses the center, also is upset about the move.
“It’s a mistake because students who are disabled need a small area for concentration, privacy, accessibility,” she said.
“They need a space of their own. The commons area would be congested. Wheelchair people wouldn’t be accessible to computers as easy and people don’t want people to know that they have a disability.
“They need their privacy.”
Administrators plan to renovate the Student Services Building in the future, but Bowers said that project could take up to four years.
“They’re going to be building a bigger elevator and then they’ll renovate the restrooms. You have to build almost new ones. In the old style that those are, the doors are not wide enough,” said Bowers.
They weren’t meant for wheelchair users,” she said.