Students with Disabilities and Higher Education

This paper reports the findings of a national survey that collected data describing the selected facilities and services of 137 randomly selected institutions of higher learning. The survey was sent to the Directors of services for disabled students of the sample institutions. The findings indicate that only 7% of the institutions of higher leaming offer complete accessibility to the students with orthopedic disabilities. In other words, it is only a very small proportion of the institutions of higher learning which offer structural, academic, recreational and residential life accessibility to students with orthopedic disabilities. (This article originally appeared in the September 2003 issue of College Student Journal.)