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People with disabilities hit roadblocks to higher education
Ramping up accessibility: A man walks up a wheelchair ramp at Multimedia Nusantara University in Tangerang, Banten
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amping up accessibility: A man walks up a wheelchair ramp at Multimedia Nusantara University in Tangerang, Banten. Some universities have equipped their campuses to accommodate people in wheelchairs.(JP/Imanuel R. Matatula)
Adhi Kusumo Bharoto, 32, studies English literature at the School of Humanities in the state-run University of Indonesia (UI) in Depok, West Java, where a colleague sits beside him and uses sign language to explain what the lecturers are saying in class.
Adhi has a hearing impairment, a condition his parents told him started when he was 6 years old and suffering from a very high fever.
After completing his diploma in the Center for Sign Linguistics and Deaf Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2013, he returned to Indonesia to work as a researcher in a sign language research lab a year later before he eventually decided to pursue his Bachelor’s degree in 2016.
Adhi said he was not fond of wearing hearing aids, a tool that helped him during his younger years.
However, every day is a struggle for him to study.
He said the university had not yet provided enough support to students with hearing impairment, especially during classes.
“I was facing many challenges because the university does not provide hearing-impaired interpreters or typists during classes,” he told The Jakarta Post on Monday.
For him to follow the lessons, he relies heavily on his colleagues at the lab to assist him with sign language in class, but that comes with another challenge.
“My colleagues have their own agendas so I have to adjust my schedule to them. I am currently being helped by four people who take turns assisting me,” he said, explaining that the four colleagues are a lecturer and three administrative staff members of the lab.
Struggles also came during group projects when he had to find ways to communicate with other group members through verbal or written means.
Adhi also explained that not all lecturers understood his condition. He said he often requested materials from the lecturers a day in advance but only some provided them.
“Some lecturers also talk very quickly even though they know my condition. These issues sometimes make me fall behind in class,” he said.
Adhi is not alone with these experiences. Citizens with disabilities have often found themselves facing roadblocks in many aspects of their lives from unfriendly public facilities and social stigma to limited access to education.
Based on 2015 data from Statistics Indonesia (BPS), Indonesia has 21.5 million citizens with disabilities, which represents about 8 percent of its population. Unfortunately, based on recent data from BPS, they only spend an average of 4.6 years at school, far less the government’s requirement of nine years.
The Research, Technology and Higher Education Ministry conducted a survey in 2017 that showed there were only 401 disabled students registered in 152 universities across Indonesia. A year later, the ministry conducted a similar survey showing there were 181 disabled students attending 48 universities in the country.
The founder of Precious One, a handicraft workshop that employs disabled people, Ratnawati Sutedjo, said the low number of disabled people who continue their education in university was mostly the result of their inability to pay tuition and a lack of support from their families.
“Many parents think their disabled children don’t really need to go to university,” Ratna told the Post on Monday.
She said their decision not to pursue higher education had created even greater struggles for them to land jobs, as many companies now required their employees to have at least a college degree.
Ismunandar, the director general of learning and student affairs at the Research, Technology and Higher Education Ministry, said the ministry had taken several measures to support people with disabilities to continue their education at university.
The ministry launched a scholarship program in 2019 specifically designated for university students who have disabilities. This year, the ministry had 200 beneficiaries, each receiving Rp 2.4 million (US$171) per semester for tuition and Rp 6 million for accommodation, he said.
The ministry, he added, started using screen-reader technology during the 2019 state university entrance test so visually impaired test-takers could answer the questions without any help.
It also issued a ministerial regulation in 2017 on special education and special education services in universities, which states that each university is required to provide facilities and infrastructure to meet the needs of disabled students.
He also explained that the ministry had carried out training for university lecturers so they could improve their ability to teach students with special needs.
The ministry’s endeavors seem to slowly be coming to fruition as more and more universities amp up their efforts to better accommodate students with disabilities.
The Jakarta State Polytechnic, for example, has set up a marketing management major that is specifically designated for students with disabilities.
So far, the campus has 68 students in the major, with various disabilities such as low-functioning autism, high functioning autism, visual impairment and hearing impairment, lecturer Tika Dwi Ariyanti said, adding that the students learned about arts, design, cuisine and computers.
“Their lessons are specifically designed so that the students learn more about skills rather than theories,” she said.
UI established in 2018 a service unit for students with disabilities.
The head of Student Welfare of the Directorate of Student Affairs, Rosmalita, said that currently there were 132 students with disabilities studying in UI including glaucoma, flat feet, hearing impairment and low vision.
“UI only accepts students based on their academic competence, so if a student gets accepted here and he happens to have a disability, we’ll try our best to provide support,” she said on Friday.
Rosmalita said that UI had built facilities for students with disabilities such as ramps and guiding blocks on some of its main sidewalks and some of the new buildings.
“We provide facilities based on the needs of or requests from the students. We encourage faculties to put students with disabilities in first-floor classrooms. We also provide braille printers because we have students with visual impairment,” she said.
UI also recently launched a pilot project on disability assistance, establishing a student volunteer group and training its members to assist their peers.
“There are 50 to 80 students who applied for the program. We train them how to assist students with disabilities, how to use sign languages and we also build their empathy for disabled people,” she said, adding that in the future, UI plans to train lecturers in the same way. (aly)
