Open AccessExploring Needs and Requirements of Differently Abled Students at Equal Opportunity Cell, University of Delhi
Author(s) -
Kimi Mahawariya,
Meera Yadav
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
athens journal of social sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2408-0004
pISSN - 2241-7737
DOI - 10.30958/ajss.8-1-1
Subject(s) - new delhi , reading (process) , information and communications technology , special needs , medical education , engineering , multimedia , psychology , mathematics education , computer science , medicine , world wide web , political science , law , metropolitan area , pathology , psychiatry
A differently-abled student needs special attention due to his or her different learning abilities, medical condition or any physical disability. It is essential that all Institutions must put efforts to provide various facilities best suited to these students and bring about their intellectual, academic and cultural development along with all other students. The purpose of this study is to look into the various resources, facilities and services which have been provided by Equal Opportunity Cell (EOC), a special Center for specially abled students established at University of Delhi, Delhi (India) for satisfying the requirements of its users to achieve higher education. An interactive and feedback approach, by way of questionnaire and verbal interviews to reach to the opinion of the specially abled students at EOC, has been practised by the author for the study. The findings show that EOC provides some important facilities to its users such as short term courses along with sports events specially designed and organized for them, computer laboratories as per their requirements, scanning and accessible reading equipments to visually impaired students and provisions of volunteers for providing support to disable students followed with transport facilities for them. It is also observed that the staff of the EOC was very helping towards the students. Overall, students have accepted that EOC has been fulfilling its motto for creating a barrier free environment for them for their learning needs. The study recommends to quantitative increase in the numbers of assistive devices, installation of advanced Information and Communication Technology (ICT) tools and softwares for better and more efficient support to the specially-abled students. Keywords: Equal Opportunity Cell (EOC), differently-abled students, specially abled students, Person with Disability (PwD), Physically handicapped students, University of Delhi and blind students.