The issue of disability at HE institutions in the UK is often underpublicised: many students with real difficulties may not know about the schemes and assistance available at their chosen place of study. To counteract this, I thought this article would highlight some of the help available at York for disabled students, whether physically or mentally disabled, or if they have a learning difficulty of some sort. According to the university's own statistics, slightly over 10% of the student body is registered as disabled in some way, which is marginally higher than the UK university average, so there is no shortage of people in the university – just over 1000 – who might benefit directly from this information in the course of their studies.

Compared to my undergraduate university, Oxford, York's campus is pretty accessible. For instance, here there is at least some allowance made in many buildings for lifts, which could not easily be placed into buildings in Oxford without radically altering the structures of many historical artefacts. York is also quite a small campus in size, at least when compared to campus universities of a similar stature, such as Birmingham or Warwick. I have found this campus fairly easy to get around by foot, though I do also have a car, which makes things considerably easier at times. As most of the teaching for many options on my course takes place within a central 'triangle' of colleges – Vanbrugh, Goodricke, and Derwent – most of the classes are spaced close together. It also helps that most of the university (with the notable exception of the JB Morrell Library) is pretty flat, which means few steep climbs on difficult terrain.

Most of the students who fall under the rubric of 'disabled' at York, however, do not have mobility difficulties – the university's own statistics indicate that up to 70% of all students listed as disabled have either an 'unseen disability' such as epilepsy or asthma, or have disability related to cognition and/or motor functioning, like dyslexia or dyspraxia. These students obviously face different challenges, some of which can be overcome with aid from the Disability Services unit here on campus, such as extending exam time-limits  for dyslexic students to take account for any potential problems in word-choice and writing essays under exam conditions. Disability Services also provide help for deaf or blind students in lectures or classes: they can tailor a bespoke package of support such as notetaking for deaf students, and recording lectures or books onto tape for blind students.

The university can also make special provision for disabled students in general, aside from the academic assistance previously mentioned. People with mobility difficulties can have rooms located on the ground floor for easier access, and some of these have been specially adapted to cater for individual needs, such as hand rails in shower units for instance. It's also possible for disabled students, if they request early enough, to be able to stay on campus accommodation on the main site for the duration of their degrees. Staying on campus for three years could obviously be beneficial, as that means no travelling to the university from areas like Heslington Road or Hull Road everyday, a stress which could be unnecessarily burdensome on top of any academic pressures faced by a disabled student.

One other advantage of living on the main Heslington campus is the close proximity to the University Health Centre, which, by the law of averages, may be needed more frequently by the disabled student than the non-disabled one. I don't think the Health Centre offers anything specifically designed for disabled students, but being close to a dedicated health centre open twice-daily on weekdays between 8.30 to midday, and again from 2pm to 6.30pm, with a free drop-in service, can only be reassuring to people who may require specific medical attention due to certain chronic conditions. For instance, let's look at the 'unseen conditions' I mentioned earlier: if an epileptic has a severe grand mal fit on campus, or an asthmatic is caught by an attack without their inhaler readily to hand, then the fact that qualified GPs are nearby could be life-saving.

The key aim of the university for all this provision, such as the Health Centre and Disabilty Services, is ultimately the academic and general well-being of the students studying here. This starts even before the beginning of a student's career: there is a system in place whereby the university sends out a student questionnaire to new undergraduate students before arrival – any students who tick the disabled box receive information concerning the work of the Services in the first week at university, and also an invitation to an informal meeting outlining the range and nature of support available for students if required. When I went along to the meeting after seeing posters around the university in Fresher's Week, I was impressed with the promptness and the attention given to the individuals who sought support, and also that there are trained specialists on hand for different disabilities, with expertise in separate fields.

Obviously, as more and more students become aware of the type of support on offer, the workloads for the support staff can only increase, as word gets around. Deb Taylor, the university's Disability Support Co-Ordinator, arranged support for a caseload of only 8 students with mobility difficulties in 2003: that has now risen in a fivefold increase up to 40 students in the academic year which began in October 2005. She attributes this rise to physically disabled students going through mainstream education, and taking on the habits and norms of their non-disabled peers, for whom going to university can be seen as almost routine nowadays. If disabled students require support, though, ultimately the onus is on them to alert the university to the presence of any problems, and to make Disability Services aware of their problems, and from there the university can try to accommodate a student's needs, if it is at all practicable.

The purpose of the Disability Services, and the philosophy which lies behind it, is ultimately one of equal opportunity for all. As Ms. Taylor remarked, the intention of the university is not to give any special privileges to disabled students above and beyond what they require: the intention is to "level the playing field, we want to make sure students can achieve to the best of their ability, as their non-disabled counterparts do." Similarly, academic ability is meant to be the only criterion on which applications are accepted or rejected by the University – other considerations about access are made and taken into account after this basic academic competence is fulfilled, which counts as giving disabled people a fair chance at accessing HE on their own merits.

York University's policies on disability, in summary, are closely aligned with the explicit remit of the Disability Discrimination Act, which asks that "reasonable adjustments" will be made if possible to allow students to fulfil their academic potential. From my experiences, and from talking to other disabled students, and consulting with the staff located in the Sally Baldwin Buildings, it seems York is largely successful in this student-led and student-centred approach to meeting the DDA guidelines. The aim of the University is to ensure that disabled students have opportunities to progress to the highest available level which their intellect, and not their bodies, allows them to reach, and that's surely a laudable cause.

The Disability Services website can be found at:

http://www.york.ac.uk/admin/disability/index.htm