accessibility
matters. 

Just over 50 years ago, education for students with disabilities was abysmal. In 1970, US schools educated only 1 out of every 5 disabled students. (“A History”).  It wasn’t until 1973 when the first steps were taken to amend this. Section 504 of the Rehabilitation act of 1973 was the first piece of legislation to mention students with disabilities and their right to an education. Two years later, this right was elaborated on in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). The IDEA, formerly called the Education of All Handicapped Children Act (EHA), was the first piece of legislation to be passed to protect students with disabilities. The IDEA for the first time required schools to allow students with disabilities to attend, even when doing so required special needs to be met. 

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While the IDEA was a huge step in the right direction, it did not address many of the problems disabled students continued to face. While schools were required to allow disabled students to attend, they weren’t required to be physically accessible nor were they required to provide specific accommodations. So even though in 1975 disabled students had the right to education, that didn’t mean that they could truly go to school. The real change came with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) 15 years later, in 1990. 

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The ADA was monumental for disability rights in the United States. For the first time in American history, the equal protection promised by the US government was being extended to also include disabled people. While there are 5 sections (“titles”) of the ADA, title II is the one that is the most recognizable. Title II stats that “No qualified individual with a disability shall, by reason of such disability, be excluded from participation in or be denied the benefits of the services, programs, or activities of a public entity, or be subjected to discrimination by any such entity.” (Colker). In practice, this mandates the creation of accommodations (like wheelchair ramps for buildings) in all spaces open to the public, as a space not being physically accessible to a disabled person discriminates them from entrance, which the ADA prohibits. Besides the ADA, 1990 was also the year that the IDEA’s name was officially switched from the EHA, as well as was updated to include more types of disabilities and to require schools to provide additional accommodation types. 

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Today, disabled students have the right to an equal education thanks to legislation like Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. Section 504 and IDEA ensure their education itself will be accessible, as it requires schools to create individualized plans and create accommodations for disabled students in the classroom to help them learn. And because schools are a public space, title II of the ADA protects disabled students' rights to actually be able to attend by prohibiting physical barriers to entering public spaces, which schools are. However, in practice, these protections can fall short, leaving disabled students to fall through the cracks. 

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The ADA prohibits discrimination against disabled people from entering public spaces on the basis of their disability. Since 1990, public spaces have been created to be physically accessible, with ramps, elevators, or other features as needed to be in compliance with this law. Older buildings were required to renovate to meet these requirements. While not having compliant accessibility features is something that a place can be sued over, it is not something that is actively policed. Publicly funded buildings were given budget for such renovations, the responsibility for all other public spaces (ie. restaurants, stores, private schools) the responsibility to add these features is on the individuals: this is called voluntary compliance. This has led to some places not complying with the ADA, due to not being able to afford necessary changes, or because they don’t think the risk of lawsuit outweighs the need to renovate. There are also official exceptions, such as with historical buildings. Moreover, sometimes accessibility features, while technically in compliance, are created without real use in mind, leading them to be or become unusable. Elevators that are not adequately serviced, ramps created at a high slope or with bad materials, or accessible stalls that are perpetually out of service are just some examples of this.

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Section 504 and the IDEA have their limitations, too. While they require schools to provide accommodations to students with disabilities, the nature of what is required can be vague. It can be extremely hard to get a 504 or Individualized Education Plan (IEP)  in place at school. The process of proving disability and then deciding on what is a “reasonable accommodation” for the disability can be incredibly long, and at times, convoluted and confusing for many students and their families. (Raj). And even when schools do provide those accommodations, it is up to individual educators and staff members at the school to actually uphold and follow those accommodations. Additionally, section 504 and IDEA were written with public schools in mind. Section 504 has much looser guidelines for private schools. Section 504 states that private schools are not allowed to decline enrollment based on disability, even when that disability requires the school to make “minor adjustments” to allow that student to attend. (“Section 504”). However, it does not require full, specific accommodations of a disabled student. The requirements set by the IDEA also do not apply to private schools. In fact, the IDEA did not have any protections for students enrolled in private schools until 2006, allowing disabled students to get help from local education agencies (LEAs) in assisting their schools with ideas and a portion of IDEA funding to help the individuals. However, in practice this is an extremely difficult route, since LEAs have a large amount of work with the public schools alone. (“The Individuals”). Private schools are required to accommodate disabled students, but they can do it in any way that they please, and without guidelines can do so in an inappropriate manner.