SEMO students face accessibility hurdles on hilly campus, university works toward solutions
At SEMO, steep hills, closed elevators and stairs make the campus tough to navigate for students who may have disabilities.
However, SEMO has Accessibility Services that comply with the Disability Act and the Rehabilitation Act to help students to better traverse campus.
Associate professor of social work Dana Branson said SEMO still does all it can to be as accessible as possible.
“So if somebody has a disability issue, be it long-term or short-term, I know that you can work with parking services, and they will help you find a much closer spot to park, even if that means you get to park in faculty and staff parking for what you need,” Branson said. “I know they will also do that with women who are pregnant towards the end of their pregnancy, when they really need to be closer to their points of entry. So I know SEMO does everything SEMO can to help students of that.”
She said the biggest challenges students face in terms of accessibility are the large number of stairs across campus, and since the elevator in Brant Hall has closed, students with mobility issues have fewer options when traversing campus.
“That was the elevator that got them from one side of the campus to the other side of the campus. You can still get here. It just means you have to go way around, and sometimes that means you have to be very, very strategic in how your classes are set up, because if you have mobility issues, 10 to 15 minutes might not be enough time for you to get from Dempster Hall over to the library,” Branson said.
Junior BA theater major Johnathan Madigan, who is a visually impaired student who uses a seeing eye dog, also said the area near Brant is the most difficult part of campus for him.
“I know I'm gonna be reaching out here soon to somebody on SEMO about adding a railing to the stairwells near Brant, they're kind of curved, and there's like a huge drop off right by, and the railing only starts at the first step, and it can be a huge hazard in that sense,” Madigan said.
Madigan said is able to navigate campus relatively easily because he has memorized the route he takes to get to all of his classes.
I'm sure there's some shorter ways to get to one of the buildings, but I just take the same route because, you know, you know, as someone who's visually impaired, you go by memorization, and of course, you explore, but we gotta remember a lot of things, and so once we have that in our minds or our brains, we go with that.
Junior marine biology major Allora Hawkins spent a week in crutches her freshman year, and she said that while the stairs were difficult, the shuttles made it more bearable.
“We did have amazing shuttle drivers who were very nice to let me off as close as they possibly could to buildings, but getting around campus was just horrible because of the amount of stairs and hills,” Hawkins said.
While SEMO’s topography is the biggest challenge, director of Facilities Management Angela Meyer said facilities management always listens to the concerns of students to try to increase accessibility.
“The challenge that we have is the topography of our campus, as you know, has a lot of hills and valleys, and getting from point A to point B without extensive work can can create some problems for us, but we're we're aware of the concerns that have been brought to us, and when they happen, we've started to address them or have addressed them,” Meyer said. “And we're always looking for input and guidance from our constituents to ensure that we are meeting all of our students' needs, not just one, one group or another, and there's always room for improvement in all the work that we do across campus.”
Additionally, SEMO just spent $258,600 to build a new ramp outside of Towers North. Meyer said a lot of the cost of the ramp went to paying an architect to design the ramp around the site, along with the actual construction.
Meyer believes that while this ramp was built to make move-in day easier, it will also help to accommodate students who are unable to use stairs.
She also said SEMO will be repairing the fountain in front of Kent Library and redoing the steps in front of the building to make it more accessible.
“We are going to be focused on repairing the plumbing to the existing fountain and replacing stairs and providing a more gradual float approach to the library versus right now you have a switchback ramp next to the bus stop, and you have a switchback ramp up next to the building, right there by the entry,” Meyer said. “And so we're going to work to eliminate those two switchbacks and have a more gradual, more aesthetic approach to the accessibility on the plaza.”
To learn more about accessibility options on SEMO’s campus, students can complete a request form here.
