Abstract
If students, faculty, and staff members are back on campus this fall, your institution has no doubt taken steps to reduce the risk of COVID‐19 transmission. As a disability services professional, you can work with your facilities staff to ensure mitigation efforts don't restrict access for individuals with disabilities.
J Garofalo, Associate at KMA Architecture + Accessibility, offered tips for ensuring accessibility during the pandemic at a session at the Society for College and University Planning annual conference. Consider how her advice can be implemented on your campus.
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Remind maintenance staff to sanitize accessible features. Those include tactile/Braille signage, automatic door openers, and plastic coverings on buttons, Garofalo said. If your institution is adding plastic coverings to buttons on elevators and elsewhere to improve the ease of sanitation, make sure users can still push the buttons with relative ease and don't have to try multiple times.
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Make floor markers high‐contrast. For example, if you are putting one‐way arrows in hallways to facilitate social distancing, make sure the contrast is high enough that low‐vision individuals can see them, Garofalo said.
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Use tactile markers to indicate routes. Wellesley College is trying tactile stickers to mark routes that can be detected by foot or cane, Garofalo said.
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Ensure floor markings are clear and intuitive. You might want to use different colors for one‐way arrows and floor markers, Garofalo said. And for marking where to stand in lines, where to stand should be clear without someone having to think it through. For example, boxes individuals can stand in are more clear than lines or x markings six feet apart.
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Eliminate protruding objects and trip hazards. Wall‐mounted hand sanitizers can be a hazard for blind or low‐vision individuals because they extend more than four inches from the wall, Garofalo said. And trifold easels used for communicating information can be flimsy. Consider something heavier so that individuals with disabilities and others aren't hurt or embarrassed if they fall. Freestanding sneeze barriers can be hard to detect if they are not on tables. Add black tape, decals, or other markings to make it explicitly clear they are present.
If you add foot‐operated door openers, those should be available in addition to the door lever to ensure accessibility. The door must still open to a full 90 degrees, and there should be room for wheelchair users and others to pass through.
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Plan for classroom accessibility. Wellesley is maximizing seating capacity by using larger lecture halls and theaters as classrooms, so officials need to ensure they are choosing accessible ones. Wheelchair and companion seating must be available. And companions might need to sit next to wheelchair users, even with social distancing requirements in place.
Other classroom needs to keep in mind are that some students need chairs with removable armrests. Tables and desks should provide knee clearance for wheelchair users. And individuals with disabilities need to be able to access stages and podiums.
Also, keep in mind the importance of acoustics. You might get more requests for assistive listening solutions, because masks might make it more difficult for people to hear one another.
Markers for social distancing should also be easy to interpret. Wellesley officials realized people coming into the classrooms could not see markers on chairs if others were sitting in them, said Michelle Maheu, Director for Planning, Design, and Construction at Wellesley College, who also spoke at the conference session. They marked all chairs, not just those available for use. They used different colors to indicate whether a chair could or could not be used to make it easy for people to see at a glance whether a chair was available. Even when the plan seems intuitive, DS providers need to know what it is so they can tell students what to expect when they get to a classroom in case it is not clear, she added.
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Keep dining accessible. Wellesley is keeping dining halls open for socializing but is also providing options for meals to go. Keep in mind when arranging dining facilities that individuals in wheelchairs will need knee clearance under tables, Garofalo said. Tray slides and transaction counters should also be accessible. Some restaurants have started passing out condiment packets from behind the counter during the pandemic. However, individuals with some disabilities might find the packets difficult to open, so consider keeping push dispensers available for those who need them. Also, for meals to go, make sure your packaging is accessible.
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Review changes in housing assignments. If you are changing students’ room assignments due to the pandemic, ensure their new spaces meet their needs. And if you have plans to quarantine students who test positive, make sure the spaces you plan to use for quarantine are accessible. For example, some students need access to roll‐in showers or the ability to transfer into a bathtub. Wheelchair users need space to navigate and accessible furniture, and deaf and hard‐of‐hearing students need features such as strobe lights for alarms. Access should also be ensured for spaces such as laundry, kitchenettes, study rooms, and lounges.
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Provide access to athletic facilities. Wellesley planned to have students call ahead to use exercise equipment. If a piece of equipment requires clear floor space for a wheelchair transfer or if accommodations will be needed, officials will ensure usage is possible for the student. The college has closed locker rooms. If the locker rooms are not available to anyone, it's not discriminatory that individuals with disabilities can't use them, Garofalo said. But if you plan to open facilities, they must be accessible.
If your pool will be open, the lift must also be available.
And if athletic activities are moved to alternative spaces or will take place outdoors, make sure the route to the space is accessible. Keep in mind that accessibility applies not only to members of sports teams, but also to coaches and spectators.
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Provide access to libraries and library services. Accessible tables, desks, carrels, computers, and checkout counters need to be available in each area. Wellesley is using a reservation system so students can choose materials and then pick them up. A process like that must also be accessible.
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Communicate in multiple ways. If you create a poster with information such as how to reserve a library book, keep in mind that blind and low‐vision students might not be able to access the information. Also provide it using text, phone calls, and emails. And make sure your apps and websites are accessible.
Plan Universal Design into facilities.
Making Universal Design part of your strategic planning can move your campus toward being a much more inclusive environment — and achieving accessibility might not even add to your costs.
At Wellesley College, accessibility was part of the strategic plan, but officials struggled to meet their goals. Founded in 1870, the campus had beautiful but inaccessible buildings, and the campus typography created additional challenges, said Michelle Maheu, Director for Planning, Design, and Construction at Wellesley.
Maheu, along with Josh Safdie, Managing Principal at KMA Architecture + Accessibility; and J Garofalo, Associate at KMA, described how to use a strategic approach to incorporating Universal Design into facilities at a session at the Society for College and University Planning annual conference.
Safdie outlined the difference between accessible design and Universal Design.
Accessible design is “a compliance‐based approach to design, driven by minimum dimensional standards, established with a narrow group of users in mind, and applied in limited situations,” he said.
By contrast, Universal Design is “an attitude toward design which anticipates and celebrates the diversity of human ability, age, and culture in every aspect of our physical, information, and communication environments,” he said.
When looking at examples of Universal Design, people often comment that it's just “good design,” Safdie said.
When KMA and Wellesley officials started working together to develop a proactive approach to making the campus more accessible, they started by prioritizing the work that needed to be done. A map of the campus that showed accessibility was on display at each meeting.
To assess accessibility, the evaluation of buildings started with one‐page reports to give a high‐level overview. For upcoming renovations, officials took a deeper dive to closely evaluate features of the building, Safdie said.
Once accessible plans are created, the next step is to make sure the architect and the general contractor follow them. “Accessible drawings don't necessarily result in a compliant building,” Safdie said.
And once buildings are occupied, it's important to ensure they remain compliant. Future repairs must keep the space accessible. And even moving furniture can block access. It's not sufficient to have the space available on request. It has to be available all the time, Garofalo said.
Overall strategies for promoting Universal Design throughout campus include:
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Keep accessibility on the “front burner” by creating a proactive master plan for your campus and programs. It's key to gather good data before there's an immediate need for it, and make sure others know it's available, Safdie said.
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Remember to collaborate, communicate, and ask questions. Involve stakeholders at every step. Ask students how they feel, and make sure offices across campus share the same approach, Garofalo said.
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Don't try to go it alone. Find an accessibility partner who has solved these problems before. Input and buy‐in from senior leadership is important for getting traction, Maheu said. KMA helped Wellesley officials determine what to think about and to create a framework for addressing the needed work.