Many Americans are aware of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). This legislation, which is celebrating its 35th anniversary this year, mandates inclusion and accessibility for those with disabilities.
The ADA is prominent in nearly every aspect of public life, including at UW-Whitewater. The Center for Students with Disabilities (CSD) is dedicated to ensuring that students, faculty and visitors with disabilities have a positive experience on campus.
Molly Grodey is a disability service coordinator for the CSD. Grodey shared that the CSD serves around 12 to 13 percent of the campus population and that the ADA is crucial to the office’s mission.
“The ADA is such an important law for society,” Grodey said. “It protects all people with disabilities, but it really hones in on the fact that they need to have equal access.”
Grodey explained that the ADA requires buildings to be physically accessible. Some examples of this at UW-W are automatic doors, braille and accessible curbs.
Grodey also highlighted that the ADA is crucial to the accommodations that the CSD offers to students.
“The ADA really gives a great backing for what we do as our philosophy and our mission. All of our accommodations are on access,” Grodey said. “We want to make sure the students have the same access as every other student.”
The CSD is not the only office on campus that promotes the ADA. The Continuing Education office, which supports lifelong learning, received a grant to bring disability advocate Rebekah Taussig as a guest speaker to campus.
The office’s Outreach Program associate director Kari Borne explained that Taussig’s memoir was read in several book groups. Originally starting with faculty and staff, the book groups expanded into the Whitewater community.
Borne wrote and submitted a grant application to the Tommy G. Thompson Center for Public Leadership to bring Taussig to Whitewater. Once approved, Borne began preparing for Taussig’s arrival.
“We worked with Center for Students with Disabilities, the Special Education Department, and the College of [Education and Professional Studies],” Borne said. “Those are the key departments that we worked with to help spread the word about the event.”
Taussig described the beginning of her disability advocacy as an evolution of her passion for writing stories about her life. Taussig explained that becoming an advocate was not a conscious process.
“The advocacy is something that seemed to naturally evolve through the process of narrating a very specific life, a very particular point of view,” Taussig said. “I think that the writing and the sharing has connected me to so many more people.”
Taussig was 4 years old when the ADA was passed by Congress. Taussig explained that prior to the ADA becoming law, it was legal for people with disabilities to be denied education, jobs and the right to be in public spaces.
According to Taussig, there was legislation passed that granted protections to those with disabilities, but those protections only applied to publicly-funded institutions. When the ADA was passed, these protections were expanded to all segments of life.
The ADA is the most robust system in the world for protecting those with disabilities. However, there are instances where the accessibility of a place is in question.
“It’s not a perfect system. There’s plenty of ways that there is discrimination that expands beyond a law,” Taussig said. “It’s almost like a promise of ‘this is how the world should be.’ It does its best to make the world bend to that in some ways.”
On March 11, Taussig spoke in Timmerman Auditorium about the ADA. Taussig shared how disability advocates such as Hale Zukas and Judy Heumann fought for decades for disability rights.
Taussig explained the many definitions of ableism and how society has viewed those with disabilities over time. Additionally, Taussig spoke about the variety of demonstrations that took place regarding disability rights.
While Taussig discussed the triumphs caused by the ADA and disability rights advocates, she emphasized that much more work remains to be done.
Taussig stated that there is still a lot of resistance to the provisions in the ADA, alongside a culture of misunderstanding and stigma surrounding disability and those who have them.
“I think protecting what we already have is an important part of the work that we need to be doing,” Taussig said. “I think coupled with that, it is that piece of cultural understanding of people understanding the value of including folks with disabilities in our communities.”
Taussig also stated that disability is a human experience, and everyone will know someone with a disability at some point in their lives. Taussig also believes that many people do not know about the history of disability rights in America.
Taussig hopes that through her work, people will see disability differently.
“Building the world to be accessible for disability is building the world to be accessible and sustainable for all of us,” Taussig said. “You [have] to know this great story, you [have] to know this amazing history. Let’s take that with us into the future.”
