Despite having recently moved to a new location in a more populated and accessible area on campus, the McBurney Disability Center and its staffers behind the scenes are still mysteries to a sizeable population at the University of Wisconsin.
The center, which services about 900 UW students facing various disabilities each academic year, relocated to East Campus Mall last spring in an effort to allow students a more social place to meet while still maintaining a professional and private feel, the center’s Director Cathy Trueba said.
While the move has been positive on many fronts, Trueba said the majority of students still fail to have a real understanding of what the center does.
Students with mental health and physical barriers can apply for services in a number of functional areas, including classroom accommodations, adaptive technology and psychological intervention. The move, Trueba said, has helped the center to transition from providing only required accommodations to capturing a more holistic approach.
“We’re trying to move away from only mandated accommodations by creating a space to be with other students who have shared experiences,” Trueba said. “They can be with students who get it – it was a very powerful move.”
McBurney was recently awarded an $80,000 annually renewable Madison Initiative for Undergraduates grant, which Trueba said the center intends to use toward creating more comprehensive services with a focus on transitioning to UW.
The grant money will allow McBurney to set up a transition program divided into working with prospective students and first year students, creating the Wisconsin Experience – showing students with disabilities they can participate in things like internships and study abroad programs, Trueba said.
“It’s our effort to look at the undergraduate experience as an entire trajectory,” Trueba said. “We want to make sure students know that while some things, like certain study abroad experiences, are not practical, study abroad as a concept is.”
The center staffs a small team of accommodation specialists, like Todd Schwanke, who work one on one with students from the moment students identify they might have a need for services. These specialists, Schwanke said, work to ensure students have equal access to the wide array of opportunities available on the UW campus and experience a smooth transition into each academic semester.
Schwanke, who also works in the center’s document conversion department, spends the weeks before each semester aiding the transfer of regular classroom materials to electronic, audio or braille formats. Still, he said, the staff is always working to find new ways students can experience accommodations, especially using new tools that can be transcended outside of the classroom.
“It’s the big picture of developing skills for students who are here to earn a degree,” Schwanke said. “We want to provide them tools they can take out into the employment environment or while looking at internships – we’re increasing our focus here to transitioning.”
A large part of making the transition onto the UW campus for students with disabilities, Schwanke said, is leveling the playing field so all students are given an equal opportunity to succeed.
Approximately 75 percent of the students who receive McBurney services have “hidden disabilities,” he said, making it sometimes difficult for classmates to understand what the center does and why some students receive seemingly preferential treatment.
“The intent is to provide equal access to all students so they can perform at their highest level,” Schwanke said. “[When people think about disabilities,] they immediately think of hearing, visual or wheelchair limitations, but we’re not a center limited by disability type. We’re open to all students.”
