What has changed since the DSN report? An interview with UCL’s Disabled Students’ Officer

One year after the publication of the Disabled Students’ Network report revealing discrimination faced by disabled students at UCL, the network’s co-Officer comments on the report and its consequences.

Photo by Matt Clayton for UCL

In January 2020, the Disabled Students’ Network published their report “Disability Discrimination Faced by UCL Students & Recommended Measures”, a 65-page document sharing the testimonies of 33 students. Each student was asked about their positive and unsatisfactory experiences in the following areas: Academic Department, Student Support & Wellbeing (SSW), Student Psychological & Counselling Services, and Bloomsbury and UCL East Campuses. The final section of this report outlined approaches and solutions to the previously explored problems.

Zohar, the DSN’s co-Officer for 2019/20, discussed with Pi Media the developments that took place in the year since the report’s publication, especially in light of the major changes that have ensued since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.

One of the issues discussed by the DSN were cases of students being overcharged by the university for accommodation adapted to residents with disabilities. Since the Disabled Students Allowance (DSA) made funding changes in 2016/17, the responsibility of providing en-suite accommodation for disabled students without additional charge was assigned over to the individual educational institutions. Zohar describes their negative experience with requesting a price adaptation for their room in 2018 as the moment they decided to get involved in disabled students’ advocacy. Prior to enrolling in UCL in 2018, the DSN Officer had been a student at Imperial College. When asked to compare these two institutions in terms of responsiveness to disabled students, they expressed that UCL’s DSN is the university’s “great strength”: It is because of the committee of eight very committed members that disabled students are able to connect, and to advocate for their rights and needs, making them visible within UCL.

Zohar describes the report as the result of high motivation and ambition, in particular of the network’s new members, to not only share fellow students’ testimonies, but to work on the very extensive and comprehensive last chapter, providing suitable solutions to the highlighted issues. They stress, however, that the performance of this task required a total of approximately 20 weeks’ worth of full-time work distributed among a small team of individuals whose primary occupation is being university students. Thus, the mission’s execution should, in Zohar’s and the committee’s opinion, be assigned to a professional disability consultant and be funded according to their charge. “Universities gain a lot of money by overlooking us”, Zohar stated, “for instance, by overcharging us for accommodation.” Moreover, in this case it seems clear that the concessions UCL agreed to since the report’s publication were based on free labour, allowing the university to cut corners where greater attention would have been necessary: “It is a systematic decision to not pay when so much free work is being done for disability consultancy by the DSN.”

According to the report, problems such as repeated ableism and lack of knowledge or recognition of responsibility range from members of the teaching staff to the Students’ Psychological & Counselling Services and even Student Support and Wellbeing, which Zohar confirmed in the interview. When responses to the report focused on dismissing particular UCL staff members, Zohar’s reaction was to re-emphasise something that was made clear in the DSN’s report: The general issue does not seem to stem from problems at the individual level, but is regarded as a result of overall under-training, resulting in structural inequality. Hence, the concentration on smaller, sporadic incidences is not an adequate solution.

This is underlined by a statement shared on the DSN’s Twitter account in May 2020, regarding the changes being made in university teaching due to restrictions brought on by the outbreak of Covid-19: “What really stands out is how forgotten disabled people have been at the same time as some of our technology and ways of working have become mainstream”, the tweet read. The necessity of basic material being provided online for disabled students at certain university departments had been highlighted in the DSN’s report, which incidentally was published only a couple of months before online teaching was made accessible to every student enrolled at UCL, including of course non-disabled persons. Zohar clarified that accessibility is designed to make things easier for people without disabilities, too. “Now, even more than the core parts of learning have been made available for everybody; it is the majority’s problem”, they said. “This constitutes a double standard, and it is incredibly dehumanising.”

Zohar’s key goals for their 2019 and 2020 terms had been to increase the network’s visibility, as read on the DSN’s homepage. Due to Covid-19 this has been difficult, especially since Zohar themselves, as well other committee members, are otherwise involved outside of their regular curriculum. “We have tried to keep up our minimum level of activity”, Zohar said, adding: “Getting the word out used to be easier.”

Nevertheless, DSN members continued cooperating over this past year with UCL on implementing solutions outlined in the report. Overall, Zohar expresses a feeling of hope. “The biggest thing that has happened”, they say, “was the post on UCL’s website finally clarifying the accommodation issue.” They are also hopeful about the university’s new Pro Vice-Provost (Equity and Inclusion) role. Additionally, UCL has agreed to fund a part-time officer position: “Compensation has been made more formal for part-time officers, who come from an external agency”, Zohar stated, and added that full-time officers’ portfolios are currently being reviewed.

“The way things work is so slow”, the student officer said. “But overall, funding has appeared. Things are happening. Things are changing.”

The Disabled Students Network can be reached on Instagram (@ucldsn), Twitter (@DSN_UCL) and on Facebook. For further information on Zohar and the DSN’s work, visit https://studentsunionucl.org/make-change/representing-you/who-can-help-you/disabled-students. To read the full report, visit https://studentsunionucl.org/articles/disability-discrimination-faced-by-ucl-students-and-recommended-measures.