Improving provision for disabled psychology students

1
Improving provision for disabled psychology
students

• Dr Lucy Zinkiewicz
• Project Manager, Improving Provision for Disabled
  Psychology Students Project
• ipdps_at_psych.york.ac.uk

2
The structure of this session

• The IPDPS project
• Disabled students in UK psychology
• Scenarios for discussion
• Good practice checklist
• Wrap up sources of further information

3
The Improving Provision for Disabled Psychology
Students project - aims

• To produce report on difficulties needs of
  disabled psychology students at UK HEIs
• To develop evidence-based guides/information for
• Prospective current disabled psych students
• Psychology departments staff, uni disability
  advisors
• Careers advisors, teachers of psychology in
  schools

4
The IPDPS project key data

• Surveys /or interviews with
• Disabled UK psychology students (prospective,
  current, past)
• UK psychology departments staff
• UK HEI disability advisors
• Other key informants
• Statistical data
• Higher Education Statistics Agency

5
Prevalence of types of disability HESA data

• 1999/00 2000/01 2001/02
• All students
• SLD/dyslexia 1.8 2.1 2.6
• unseen disab 1.6 1.4 1.5
• unlisted disab 0.6 0.6 0.7
• mental hlth probs 0.10 0.15 0.18
• Psychology
• SLD/dyslexia 1.6 2.0 2.4
• unseen disab 2.3 2.1 1.9
• unlisted disab 0.8 0.8 0.8
• mental hlth probs 0.17 0.23 0.29

6
Some scenarios to think about

• Discuss in small groups how you might deal with
  the following situations in your psych teaching
• A student with hearing loss, of which theyre not
  aware but everyone else is!
• A student whos extremely anxious about doing
  presentations
• A student with repetitive strain injury
• A student who demonstrates mood swings during
  small group work
• A student who is colour-blind

7
Issues arising from scenarios

• Youre more likely to teach students with unseen
  disabilities than with obvious ones
• What are the learning implications of a students
  disabilities? What are the teaching ones?
• What are the core requirements of the subject?
• Disability - diagnosed? By whom? Disclosed? To
  whom?
• Who has responsibility, for what?
• What are students expectations of psych staff?
• Can we require students to seek help for
  difficulties?
• Relevance of course content - difficulty or asset

8
Good practice checklist

• Listen understand the student
• Ask what support student may need
• Help them plan their workload
• Direct student to disability staff
• Be aware of own limitations
• Form student network support (e.g., study groups)
• Keep in contact if student away from studies