The following are exerpts of Section 504 that are applicable
to the college environment. For a complete reading of the law
visit the: U.S.
Department of Education Office for Civil Rights, or the
Americans with Disability Act websites.
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973
In 1973, Congress passed Section 504 of the Rehabilitation
Act of 1973 (Section 504), a law that prohibits discrimination
on the basis of physical or mental disability (29 U.S.C. Section
794). It states:
| No otherwise qualified individual with a disability
in the United States . . . shall, solely by reason of her
or his disability, be excluded from the participation in,
be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination
under any program or activity receiving federal financial
assistance . . . |
The Office for Civil Rights in the U.S. Department of Education
enforces regulations implementing Section 504 with respect to
programs and activities that receive funding from the Department.
The Section 504 regulation applies to all recipients of this
funding, including colleges, universities, and postsecondary
vocational education and adult education programs. Failure by
these higher education schools to provide auxiliary aids to
students with disabilities that results in a denial of a program
benefit is discriminatory and prohibited by Section 504.
Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA)
prohibits state and local governments from discriminating on
the basis of disability. The Department enforces Title II in
public colleges, universities, and graduate and professional
schools. The requirements regarding the provision of auxiliary
aids and services in higher education institutions described
in the Section 504 regulation are generally included in the
general nondiscrimination provisions of the Title II regulation.
Postsecondary Student Responsibilities
A postsecondary student with a disability who is in need of
auxiliary aids is obligated to provide notice of the nature
of the disabling condition to the college and to assist it in
identifying appropriate and effective auxiliary aids. In elementary
and secondary schools, teachers and school specialists may have
arranged support services for students with disabilities. However,
in postsecondary schools, the students themselves must identify
the need for an auxiliary aid and give adequate notice of the
need. The student's notification should be provided to the appropriate
representative of the college who, depending upon the nature
and scope of the request, could be the school's Section 504
or ADA coordinator, an appropriate dean, a faculty advisor,
or a professor. Unlike elementary or secondary schools, colleges
may ask the student, in response to a request for auxiliary
aids, to provide supporting diagnostic test results and professional
prescriptions for auxiliary aids. A college also may obtain
its own professional determination of whether specific requested
auxiliary aids are necessary.
Postsecondary School Provision of Auxiliary Aids
The Section 504 regulation contains the following requirement
relating to a postsecondary school's obligation to provide auxiliary
aids to qualified students who have disabilities:
| A recipient . . . shall take such steps as are necessary
to ensure that no handicapped student is denied the benefits
of, excluded from participation in, or otherwise subjected
to discrimination under the education program or activity
operated by the recipient because of the absence of educational
auxiliary aids for students with impaired sensory, manual,
or speaking skills. |
The Title II regulation states:
| A public entity shall furnish appropriate auxiliary
aids and services where necessary to afford an individual
with a disability an equal opportunity to participate in,
and enjoy the benefits of, a service, program, or activity
conducted by a public entity. |
It is, therefore, the school's responsibility to provide these
auxiliary aids and services in a timely manner to ensure effective
participation by students with disabilities. If students are
being evaluated to determine their eligibility under Section
504 or the ADA, the recipient must provide auxiliary aids in
the interim.
Effectiveness of Auxiliary Aids
The Title II regulation contains comparable provisions.
The Section 504 regulation also states:
| [A]ids, benefits, and services, to be equally effective,
are not required to produce the identical result or level
of achievement for handicapped and nonhandicapped persons,
but must afford handicapped persons equal opportunity to
obtain the same result, to gain the same benefit, or to
reach the same level of achievement, in the most integrated
setting appropriate to the person's needs. |
The institution must analyze the appropriateness of an aid
or service in its specific context. For example, the type of
assistance needed in a classroom by a student who is hearing-impaired
may vary, depending upon whether the format is a large lecture
hall or a seminar. With the one-way communication of a lecture,
the service of a notetaker may be adequate, but in the two-way
communication of a seminar, an interpreter may be needed. College
officials also should be aware that in determining what types
of auxiliary aids and services are necessary under Title II
of the ADA, the institution must give primary consideration
to the requests of individuals with disabilities.
Personal Aids and Services
Title II of the ADA similarly states that personal services
are not required.
In order to ensure that students with disabilities are given
a free appropriate public education, local education agencies
are required to provide many services and aids of a personal
nature to students with disabilities when they are enrolled
in elementary and secondary schools. However, once students
with disabilities graduate from a high school program or its
equivalent, education institutions are no longer required to
provide aids, devices, or services of a personal nature.
Postsecondary schools do not have to provide personal services
relating to certain individual academic activities. Personal
attendants and individually prescribed devices are the responsibility
of the student who has a disability and not of the institution.
For example, readers may be provided for classroom use but institutions
are not required to provide readers for personal use or for
help during individual study time.
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