Research shows accommodations are often underutilized by learners with disabilities. Curious to learn why? 

A 2018 study involved a systematic review of 36 articles from the US, UK, Canada, Belgium, Norway and Ireland involving youth with disabilities and accessing accommodations. 

Below are some findings: 

• The most common barriers to disclosing disability and requesting accommodations were stigma, discrimination and a lack of knowledge of supports.
• “Students with disabilities are often reluctant to disclose their condition for fear of differential and discriminatory treatment from their professors and peers." 
• Many youth encounter difficulties accessing and obtaining accommodations and supports. For example, people with disabilities often encounter significant social exclusion, negative attitudes, discrimination and stigma, which are substantial barriers for youth entering and completing post-secondary education.
• The most common barrier, noted in 19 studies, included stigma, discrimination and the related concerns about the negative effects of disclosing a disability.  
• A second barrier for youth (noted in 14 studies) included lacking knowledge of potential supports and accommodations (e.g. note takers, tutors, extra time, physical access, assistive technology) and how to access them. For example, Holloway (2001) described that students found it stressful and time consuming to arrange their accommodations. Some youth had negative experiences with faculty who often had insufficient knowledge about disabilities. 
• Others found that the physical, mental and emotional demands of disclosing presented challenges to receiving accommodations.
• Many studies conveyed that disclosing was a complex and personal issue that depended on many factors such as disability type, extent of self-advocacy skills and availability of support to access them, type of course and instructor, coping styles, and type of disability.  
• Consistent with previous research, our review found that those with non-visible disabilities often encounter additional challenges with identifying their need for support. 

Understanding the barriers learners may encounter and the reasons they can then be hesitant to connect with Accessible Learning Services can help faculty and staff who are working with learners who disclose they have a disability but have not connected with Accessible Learning Services to request accommodations.  

Source: A Systematic Review of Barriers of Disability Disclosure and Accommodations for Youth in Post-Secondary Education. (2018) International Journal of Disability Development and Education.  

Visit our ALS Information for Faculty website to learn more about accommodating students with disabilities. 

Please email us at accessible-learning@humber.ca with suggestions for key accessibility-related topics that you would like us to address through the Communiqué. 

Journal of Innovation in Polytechnic Education (JIPE) is pleased to announce the publication of “Understanding hope from the voices of service users and providers across Canada” by Cristina Alexandra Guerrero, PhD, and Tina Lackner. 

Abstract:

Although Canada is home to the second largest non-profit and volunteer sector in the world, there is an absence of an overarching framework to guide human services (HS) delivery (Hall et. al., 2005; Rahmani, 2022). This paper documents the first phase of a three-year study that seeks to begin to bridge this gap by learning from both HS providers and users’ narratives, specifically in relation to the topics of hope, self-compassion, and authentic collaboration.

The first phase of the research focused on the topic of hope via the following questions:

1. How do HS consumers and service providers meaningfully experience hope in the course of HS delivery within their lifeworlds?
2. How might these experiences inform a guiding framework for Canadian HS delivery?

A thematic analysis of surveys and interviews collected from six partner organizations across Canada revealed the following themes:

1. The importance of human connections
2. The building and evolution of hope
3. The futurity of hope

These findings point out several implications for practice and research, including a need for human-centred training that focuses more on topics like sensitivity and compassion. Respondents, particularly the service providers, also spoke to the need for strategies and opportunities to take care of oneself physically, mentally, and spiritually. This call is especially prevalent in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and funding cuts across Canada.

This study was funded by a three-year College and Community Social Innovation Fund (CCSIF) grant, which is managed by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).

Read the article on JIPE.ca.

About JIPE

Journal of Innovation in Polytechnic Education (JIPE) is an online, open-access journal that mobilizes knowledge and insights generated by the global polytechnic community. JIPE is electronically published by Humber Press at Humber College’s Office of Research & Innovation. JIPE is accepting submissions on a rolling basis. To learn more about JIPE, please visit jipe.ca or email humberpress@humber.ca.

Get ready for Career Month 2024! As part of this annual celebration, the Academic and Career Centre is thrilled to announce our eighth Career Month Event, building on the success of our bi-annual initiative. This year's theme is Futures Unleashed: Navigating Careers in the Digital Era.

Join us for the kick-off to Career Month on March 4 at the third floor LRC at North Campus.

Throughout March, we're offering a variety of workshops and events aimed at improving career services and educational accessibility, ensuring students are well-prepared for the changing job market.

Our event lineup includes:

• Informative session with Indeed (chat with experts from Indeed)
• Workshops on creating resumes, cover letters, interview skills, and LinkedIn profiles
• Career conversations panel in collaboration with Seneca College, focusing on equity deserving groups
• LinkedIn headshots with a professional photographer
• Drop-in resume review sessions
• Speed networking - Campus Connect
• Engaging workshops on Clifton Strengths and MBTI

Participate in our exciting weekly prizes and a grand prize drawing for event attendees.

To register for any of these events or get more details about Career Month, visit our dedicated Career Month webpage.

Help us spread the word by sharing information about this month-long event with your learners. Some events may require pre-registration, so be sure to check out our Career Month calendar for all the details.

We are excited to introduce you to Copilot (formerly Bing Chat Enterprise), Humber’s AI chat solution that will make your workday easier and more productive. We want you to use it as a tool to be more creative and productive while also protecting Humber’s privacy and data. To learn more, please review the general statement on Using Generative AI tools at work.

Why are we adopting Copilot?

Copilot is just like ChatGPT, but it has commercial data protection from Microsoft and offers responses based on up-to-date information. Copilot is not just an AI search engine, but it is also a conversational companion that can understand your context, follow up with you, and provide sources for every answer. To get the best results, you need to ask effective questions that are specific, detailed, and full sentences. You should also state the tone, purpose, and preferred format of your query.

Some of the tasks that you can do with Copilot are:

• Generate new ideas
• Improve your writing
• Experimenting with AI image and art creativity using prompts
• Learning new things quickly
• Summarizing a long article or paragraphs

To see examples on how you can use Copilot for the above tasks, please check out our tip sheet attached.

Here’s three steps on how you can access Copilot:

1. Visit copilot.microsoft.com using any browser. If you are using the Microsoft Edge browser, simply access it via the Edge sidebar by clicking the Copilot icon located in the top right corner.
2. Ensure you’re signed in with your work account using the format username@humber.ca.
3. You will know you have successfully signed in with your work account when you see the protected green icon next to your credentials in the top right corner of your screen. This gives you access to the Copilot with commercial data protection.

Additional resources

To read more about Copilot, we invite you to review the attached FAQ guide and Best Practice Guide. These documents outline frequently asked questions and how to use the tool safely and responsibly at Humber.

Wondering where to start? Try asking Copilot questions like “What can you do?”, “Can you help me with X”, “What are your limitations?”. Copilot will let you know if there’s something it cannot answer. To learn more, visit Copilot from Microsoft.

Please take a few minutes to share your thoughts with us. Your questions and feedback are very important to us, as they help us improve Humber’s experience using AI and tailor our training based on your needs. We hope you will enjoy using Copilot and discover new ways to enhance your work and learning.