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“I would like to see disability become less of an afterthought in DEI efforts - I think AU should hire a full-time staff member to work on creating disability culture at AU, which other peer institutions have already done,” Aho said. I spoke to professor Tanja Aho, the instructor of AU’s two major classes about disability in the American studies department. “I think if it is run by disabled people, it's a great opportunity to talk about disability in academics and gives us all a space to learn from people who know the most.” “It's really hard to find schools with programs like this, and having one at AU would be great representation and a great opportunity for me to study what I am passionate about and want to pursue,” Greenstein said. My vision for the University is to start a whole disability studies program. Disabled professors, disabled students, disabled activists and administrators, we need people with intense care for this community.” As Greenstein puts it, “We need disabled people from all walks of life.
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Offensive language continues and disability programs are sometimes run by abled people. Katherine Greenstein, a CLEG major in their second year at AU, wrote in an email “I think disability is generally left out of academia, and when it is included, it's always abled people speaking over our community - especially when it comes to language like ‘special needs’ and ‘differently abled,’ both of which are super offensive.” “But we definitely need advisors and people and experiences within the community itself in order to gain that education so you are not just tokenizing people who were already here.” It is great that we have staff and faculty that can not only run and start this, but support students who identify with the community,” Jaromin said. “You can’t teach about something that is not represented in your own culture. We must bring our social justice activism to the forefront by including disabled voices.Įmma Jaromin, third-year anthropology major at AU, allies with the disabled community because she has familial experience with its activism. AU is ranked in first place for colleges with the most politically active students, according to the Princeton Review. While the certificate seems promising, there is little to no push for a department in disability studies.