Handicap accessible?
Navigating through Polk Place on Thursday, students struggled to make their way up the brick pathway, battling the heat and uneven terrain. What might have seemed like a normal stroll to class was complicated by the wheelchairs students were using to maneuver up the walkway during an event hosted by the Perfectly Able Club. "The campus is our obstacle course," said Joanna Solkoff, president and founder of the club - a student group that seeks to raise awareness about the day-to-day impediments faced by the disabled. Other interactive activities Thursday included a station where students could learn to write their names in braille and a sign language demonstration. "It kind of exposes you to a world we're not use to," said senior Alicia Huff who had her name written in braille. "You don't see a lot of disabled people on campus." James Kessler, director of UNC Disability Services, said the University does a good job overall of providing handicap accessibility. He said recent renovations to campus buildings and construction have presented only minor access problems. "There have been a few challenges," Kessler said. "I think construction is just going to inconvenience all of us. That's just the history of construction." Accessibility for the disabled is discussed early in the design process to avoid potential problems, facility planner Michael Pierce said. "All the designers as part of the design phase work with the pedestrian safety committee and the disabilities advisory committee to make sure that students can get through or around the construction site," he said. Kessler said Caldwell and Smith halls are the only buildings that aren't handicap accessible - which only accounts for five classrooms. "Both buildings are both scheduled to have renovations," he noted. In February the University appointed Ann Penn as the new equal opportunity/Americans with Disabilities Act officer. She previously served as the director of the Office of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action at Kent State University in Ohio. Penn's responsibilities include ensuring that the campus is compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act. "I am certainly very concerned with access and making buildings more accessible," she said. The Rams Head Plaza was designed with the goal of making the path between North and Middle campuses as accessible as possible to the disabled. Planners often hear complaints about the unevenness of campus walkways. Those at Thursday's event said they have encountered some problems with facilities on campus and the administration. Lindsey Green, vice president of Chapel Hill Adaptive Sports Experience, said she has faced difficulty receiving a parking spot despite the fact that she is classified as disabled and uses a wheelchair. But Green said she has never been presented with outright bias. "Coming here I've never had to deal with that," she said. "I've never had to deal with anything derogatory." Perfectly Able, which was created in the fall, works with a variety of other groups to ensure that students with physical impediments are able to live their lives in an ordinary fashion. Group members say they hope to shed light on issues that might not be easily recognized by those lacking firsthand experience with handicap issues. "The easiest thing to see is mobility issues, but what you don't see is something like changing text to Braille," Solkoff said. Philip Woodward, a member of the N.C. Governor's Advocacy Council for Persons with Disabilities, said the group is seeking to establish American Sign Language as an official language to be taught for credit in colleges and universities. "We want to get more colleges to offer ASL for credit and standardize ASL instructor qualifications," he said at the event. "We're planning to present the bill at the January 2007 (legislative) session." Freshman Abby Wilson said that generally, disabilities do not affect the way students interact on campus. "For the most part people ignore it - (it's) almost indifference." Contact the News Editor at udesk@unc.edu.