As someone who had a mild concussion, I was very displeased with the Office of Disabilities (ODR) and the accommodations they provide for temporary disabilities. A typical concussion, depending on the degree, lasts around 2–10 weeks. Mine was, thankfully, a mild one and lasted two weeks, but I still experienced symptoms that I needed additional help to mitigate. For example, while I was concussed I had an exam, because this is a university, so I reached out to my professor and he told me to reach out to ODR about taking the exam there. ODR said they could process it in two to three weeks. When it comes to temporary disability, there is a fundamental mismatch between the kind of care students need, which is immediate, and the kind ODR is equipped to offer: long, drawn-out, personalized processes that in many cases, may take longer than the need for accommodations.
The ODR is very kind and responds in a timely manner, but they don’t have a good system in place for temporary disabilities. Even for someone with a permanent or long-term disability, the ODR is similarly unhelpful. The processing and paperwork is confusing and takes forever, and by the time it’s in, you’ve missed the exam you needed to make-up in the office, and now you have to reschedule and do more paperwork. Anyone that is dealing with some sort of disability is already dealing with a lot of stress, but adding poor care from the ODR makes it more difficult and stressful.
The way that the ODR conducts its processing for temporary disabilities should be changed, at least to accommodate a different kind of form. Yes, I understand they still have to go through and process everything, but for a two to three week injury, a speedy resolution of the student’s actual care needs is essential. I can walk to class, so why was transportation reaching out to me? What I couldn’t do is take an exam in harsh fluorescent lighting without my head trying to explode. The kind of temporary disability I had doesn’t require anything major besides a dark and quiet room to take an exam, but the University is reaching out like I’m suddenly made of glass, while delaying the only accommodations I actually need
The ODR should do something for students with temporary disability needs. The idea of needing two to three weeks to process paperwork to validate a student to take an exam in a dark room because of an ongoing concussion which appeared only 10 days before the exam is deeply unfair. ODR absolutely needs to establish a two-track system for accommodations which can simultaneously handle immediate temporary accommodations for simple medical needs, and more complex permanent conditions which may need extensive personalized attention, without cramming both kinds of need into one over-strained process.
