Like most freshmen, I was worried about adjusting to college after high school. As someone with a physical disability, I was specifically overwhelmed by the idea of navigating campus in my wheelchair and all the other complexities that can come with having a disability at UT.
However, I was able to find an amazing student organization, the Disability Advocacy Student Coalition, which connected me with other disabled students who understood my problems and shared an interest in making UT a better place for people with disabilities. Without the coalition and similar student groups, I am sure that my college experience would have been a lot more difficult and isolating.
The onus for creating an inclusive, enriching environment for disabled students at a university, though, should not be on student organizations alone. While Services for Students with Disabilities is another main resource for students with disabilities at UT, it predominantly focuses on the necessary yet narrow task of providing accommodations and assistive technology. That is why it is important for UT to establish a Disability Cultural Center.
A Disability Cultural Center at UT would create a permanent community building and organizing space for disabled students. This center could house meeting areas, a library, workshops focused on disability justice and much more. The Multicultural Engagement Center and Gender and Sexuality Center, both established through student advocacy, already provide examples of what this space could be. Moreover, there’s precedent for Disability Cultural Centers: Institutions like the University of Washington, the University of Arizona and others have built these centers on their campuses.
We have a saying in disability advocacy circles: “Nothing about us, without us.” There are disabled students at this University. By establishing a Disability Cultural Center, UT has a chance to not only recognize that saying, but also to strengthen its commitment to addressing disability as an aspect of diversity, promoting equity, inclusion and accessibility in the process.
Graves is a government and public relations senior from Austin, Texas. Rajagopal is a biology and marketing senior from Irvine, California.
