Unisa to aid students with disabilities

Unisa Western Cape regional director Keith Jacobs said: “A person with a disability can achieve great things.”

Cape Town – The capacity technology has to improve the quality of life for people with disabilities cannot be underestimated or discounted, was the focus of the University of South Africa’s (Unisa) Western Cape campus celebration on International Day for People with Disability on Friday.

Speaking at Unisa’s Parow campus, Unisa Western Cape regional director Keith Jacobs said: “A person with a disability can achieve great things.”

Several young school pupils from Noluthando School for the Deaf opened the event by singing the national anthem in South African sign language.

Jacobs, in his address, noted how people with disabilities were marginalised and excluded from the economic system and how equality was needed on many different levels. “People with disabilities experience a great deal of discrimination,” he said.

According to United Nations statistics, about 15 percent of the world’s population, or one billion people, had disabilities, and 80 percent of these lived in developing countries. In South Africa, according to the 2011 census, 7.5 percent of people living had one or more disabilities.

People with disabilities had much to offer society and many were not able to fully participate in society due to limitations and negative attitudes they encountered regularly.

Attitude was the critical lever in driving change, as people with disabilities were capable of so much more than society believed. “If we marginalise people with disabilities, the economy suffers,” he said.

A marimba band consisting of youth with physical to intellectual disabilities provided entertainment.

SA Guide Dog Association for the Blind representative Avril Salo explained there were two different kinds of guide dogs – guide dogs specifically for the blind and service dogs for people who used wheelchairs and needed other forms of assistance.

Jacobs urged people with disabilities to be cognisant of their rights, especially when it came to education. “It is your constitutional right to fight for education,” he told the audience of young students and lecturers.

Educational institutions had a huge role to play in helping to make education accessible to people with disabilities, and the campus’s Advocacy and Resource Centre for Students with Disabilities (ARCSWiD) was designed with this purpose in mind, he said.

Launched in March earlier this year, the centre - a computer laboratory equipped with various computers with different technologies and audio books to assist persons with disabilities - had made a difference to the quality of their students’ studies.

He noted how, before the resource centre was established, few students with disabilities came to the campus to use the resources available. Now, more students used the centre, as it provided them with access to information and services they could not easily access before.

Unisa Student Representative Council (SRC) member Sello Nkgatho said education was the most powerful weapon anyone could have, and it was important for people with disabilities to “claim justice and continue to fight, to struggle to be included everywhere”.

He urged students with disabilities to get involved in their SRCs as advocates for change. “Education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today.”

A Unisa ARCSWiD administrative officer said it was important for people with disabilities to stand up for their rights and be fearless in pursuit of the education they deserved.

Unisa student development representative Lizette le Roux said four elements played an important part in ensuring accessibility for students with disabilities.

These were integration of services, celebrating the differences and abilities of people with disabilities in communities, empowerment training that broke down barriers and built bridges of trust, and skills training.

She said students should inform Unisa of their needs so that the university could make plans to provide reasonable accommodation for them, and help solve their problems around accessibility.

Unisa, Jacobs concluded, was committed to inclusivity and making education more accessible for people with disabilities.

African News Agency

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