SHARJAH // The American University of Sharjah has welcomed its first disabled exchange student – and learnt how to make the campus more accessible.
Natale Antonel, 24, from Argentina, is blind, and says his experience has been positive – but his dialogue with the university has highlighted the UAE’s ongoing challenges with accessibility.
Dormitories are being built that will be access-friendly, but it is not possible to retrofit some existing buildings.
Mr Antonel says Braille on doors and signs, and more software in places such as computer labs and libraries, would enhance the student experience for the visually impaired.
Mehvash Ali, director of the academic support centre, agreed there was room for improvement.
“The issue for getting around campus is mobility,” she said, citing narrow doorways and improperly angled ramps.
“When students live locally and come here, it’s much easier as they have a support person to help them on campus. But we don’t have a campus that’s fully accessible so it makes it very hard to promote the campus for those with disabilities, as we don’t have the services.
“It’s been interesting having Natale’s perspective. In terms of accessibility, there’s a lot that needs to happen.”
Mr Antonel is the university’s first exchange student from Latin America. Coming from the Catholic University of Cordoba, he is also the first person from his department of international studies to travel to the Middle East.
AUS has eight visually impaired students, but they live close to campus and have a big support network. The arrival of Mr Antonel six months ago has inspired many.
It was a struggle for him to get permission from his home university to travel to the UAE, not least because his advisers feared AUS was not equipped to deal with his disability – it is not accredited by the American Disability Association.
“My own university isn’t prepared at all for blind people so I couldn’t believe it when I came here and was offered straight away to have my books scanned to the voice reader for me, which I’m used to doing myself,” Mr Antonel said. “I’ve been doing it alone for my whole major so it has been great here.”
He said the warmth of those on campus had been very different to his experiences at home.
In Argentina, “people will help you but only when you ask, here people go out of their way to offer their help”.
Linda Angell, director of the exchange office, said students had been inspired by Mr Antonel’s independence and he had become a role model.
“He’s taken full advantage of this experience and, in the first Eid vacation, was already travelling with one of his fellow students to India,” she said.
“He’s been everywhere and nothing has stopped him being fully involved in the experience, which is more than many fully sighted students.”
Ms Angell said the team had learnt a lot from the student.
“I haven’t been encouraging disabled students so much at this point,” she said, because of the university’s shortfalls on accessibility.
They had been reluctant to take on disabled students because they did not have adequate staff to act as assistants.
“We’ve learnt a lot from having him here and about what we need to do to support people with visual impairment,” she said. “I don’t think it would be a problem to do it again with other students like him in the future.”
mswan@thenational.ae
