Classroom Approach for Students with Disabilities: A Needs Assessment

Journal of College Student Development, May/Jun 1998 by Kruse, Bradford G, Elacqua, Tina C, Rapaport, Ross J

Students with disabilities are pursuing higher education in increasing numbers (Ryan & McCarthy, 1994). In response to this trend, universities must develop and implement effective methods for assessing the needs of these students. This information is essential for program development. Unfortunately, needs assessments are sparse with respect to college students with disabilities (Houck, Asselin, Troutman, & Arrington, 1992). Support programs based on needs analyses tend to use their resources more effectively and are more likely to serve the academic and personal needs of students (Erwin, 1996). A needs assessment of students with disabilities was conducted to identify aspects of the classroom accommodation process that could be improved through training and information dissemination programs. This study is an innovative application of telephone interviewing methods to gather needs assessment information from this population of students. A telephone interview provides a convenient opportunity for students with disabilities to directly communicate, in the comfort of their own home, their beliefs about needed services.

METHOD

An interview schedule was developed based on a focused review of related literature (Houck et al.,1992; Nelson, Dodd, & Smith, 1990) and the pragmatic research needs of our institution's Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Steering Committee (the project's sponsor). We also closely followed the methodology suggested in the telephone survey literature (Dillman, 1978; Rossi, Wright, & Anderson, 1983) and the recommendations of our human subjects review committee. In particular, we wished to gather information useful for focusing educational, training, and programmatic efforts for both students and faculty regarding accommodations for students with disabilities. To this end, we conducted preliminary interviews with students with disabilities, trained interviewers, and pilottested questions to develop a comprehensive 34item telephone interview schedule. Open-ended interview questions addressed particular accommodations requested (such as untimed tests or note-takers), positive and negative aspects of the accommodation process, and the concerns of students with disabilities. Likert-type questions required participants to respond using a 5-point scale anchored from strongly disagree to strongly agree. The purpose of these items was to gather information in four general areas: (a) students' perceptions of classroom accommodation requests, (b) the perceived instrumentality of classroom accommodations in enabling students to achieve personal and academic objectives, (c) student and faculty knowledge of support and referral services, and (d) students' overall satisfaction with classroom accommodations.

Students with disabilities were considered a "vulnerable" population by our human subjects review committee. With a vulnerable population, even greater care than is normally taken must be made to balance the need to motivate potential respondents with the need to eliminate any possibility of coercion. For this project, the director of Student Disability Services (SDS) sent a letter to 175 students registered with SDS inviting them to participate in this research. The letter explained potential benefits of participation (e.g., information will be used to improve the classroom accommodation process) as well as possible risks (e.g., personal questions that may be anxiety-producing), and was followed two weeks later by a reminder about the invitation to participate in the study. Both the letter and the reminder stressed the voluntary nature of students' involvement and that they were under no obligation to participate. Volunteers were asked to call the third author's administrative secretary to schedule a phone interview at a time convenient to both the student and the interviewer.

RESULTS

Thirty-seven students participated in the interviews, providing a cooperation rate of 21%. Responses to the open-ended questions indicated several issues of concern for students. First, students felt professors had limited understanding of students with disabilities and differences between types of disabilities. The participants in this project reported 15 different disabilities (e.g., learning disability, wheelchair user) and 16 different accommodations (e.g., test readers and alternate test formats, copies of lecture outlines and overheads, special classroom seating). Students also stressed the importance of respect, confidentiality, and professors' beliefs in their ability to succeed.

Difficulties due to not receiving requested accommodations included added pressure, stress, and anxiety, which resulted in poor performance for some students. The positive outcomes of receiving accommodations included lowered stress and anxiety, feelings of confidence and self-esteem, enhanced understanding of course material, and better classroom performance. Interview results also indicated that some students with disabilities were unaware of their responsibilities related to providing information to and working with faculty.