Ableism is ripe within academia, and the University of Iowa is no exception. It was not until the student protests in 2019 that the university gave a proper and accessible place to Student Disability Services (SDS), formerly in the basement of Burge Hall and now currently in the Old Capitol Mall. While SDS’s change in location was a significant improvement for disabled students at UIowa, there is still much more that needs to be done.

The University of Iowa has seen a large growth of its disabled population; an 80% increase over a decade for student accommodations and 77% increase in recorded student disabilities. However, research has shown that graduation rates for disabled students are as low as 18% due to colleges having little to no additional resources beyond legally mandated accommodations. This is because academia as a whole refuses to understand disability beyond ADA mandates. A study for the Journal of Postsecondary Education and Disability recorded the attitudes disabled students face in academia, such as, “I am waiting for the day after my graduation to see pictures of me on social media and the school’s website. Look at this wheelchair user rolling across the stage getting a degree…” and “people assume disabled students are not on campus because they assume someone with disabilities cannot succeed at the university level.” These attitudes cannot persist any longer.

To solve this issue, UI Students for Disability Advocacy & Awareness calls upon you Dr. Wilson to grant a designated space on campus for its disabled community. This space will serve students by “normalizing disability as well as communicating value for disability” as well as serving “as a hub for bringing together students who seek community with one another or for organizing students striving to mobilize efforts to… campaign for change” (Chiang 1184). There have already been several successful examples of this action, as shown by Syracuse University, Miami University Ohio, University of Minnesota, Stanford University, and many others. It has been seen time and time again, through the experiences of Judy Heumann and others at “Crip Camp” to the Berkeley-based disability group “Rolling Quads,” that people disabilities share a unique history and life experiences based upon disability, forming a common culture that bred an entire movement for the progression of disability rights. Let us help our own disabled students discover and prosper through this found community.

With communication, resource allocation, and ingenuity, we will find the space and resources needed to create this space for the wellbeing and preservation of UIowa’s disabled community. Any lack of response and/or effort towards this movement will be deemed as willful neglect from hereon.