While there are many, many different activities involved under the headings of placements, study abroad and field trips, nevertheless these elements of courses often involve common factors, such as the uprooting of students from their usual study (and perhaps also living) environment to one which is very different, and the control of the environment by people outside the student's home HEI, for example, employers, or professional bodies. The range of activities also calls for a standard response, namely careful and timely planning, and clear identification of the purpose of the placement or trip.
What is the purpose of the placement, study abroad or field trip, and its role in the overall course?
All students are likely to want as much information as possible about all aspects of the activity, such as answers to:
A clear, accessible outline providing as much information as possible as early as possible, will help to prepare all students for the activity, and be useful for any student who would have difficulty (for reasons which might be financial or personal, as well as those associated with some impairment) in completing it.
The question of purpose is likely to be central to a department's considerations when designing an element of a course, such as a field trip, for example. If the point of the trip is for students to demonstrate and extend their skills in climbing, then more challenging terrain may be needed. But if the purpose is to collect specimens for geological analysis, then challenge may be less important. Inclusive field trip design will envisage a variety of potential participants, and accommodate as many varied needs as possible without compromising the educational objectives.
Departments organising placements, field trips or study abroad for students with impairments will need to consider, ideally alongside students themselves, the differences between the new context and environment and the more usual, and often more structured, context of study. Sometimes, the use of equipment, arrangements or personal assistance could, with a little planning, transfer to a different context.
"In Social Work practice, the same arrangements as tutorials work. When everyone is talking or working in pairs, I can go to an empty room so that I can hear more easily."
Software supportive to dyslexic students could be used in a workplace to enable a student to produce written work of a satisfactory standard. Similar equipment might be appropriate for trainee teachers in classrooms.
Some equipment or educational support may not be so easily transferable. Taping lectures may be acceptable in a way that taping interviews with clients in a setting requiring confidentiality may not be. Portability may be a factor to be considered for field trips and study abroad. Some non medical, personal help, such as communication support for lectures, could be regarded as obtrusive in some one to one work involving clients.
It will sometimes be necessary to identify additional items of equipment for specific purposes. For example, a sound monitor could be used as a visual indicator of classroom noise for a trainee teacher with a hearing impairment. A laptop with speech synthesis linked to a data projector could allow a blind trainee teacher to do the functional equivalent of writing on a chalkboard. This latter arrangement could clearly have uses in other work contexts involving presentations. The fact that funding may need to be found to purchase additional equipment for placements, field trips or study abroad, underlines the necessity to plan and prepare long before the placement start date.
Travel, physical access and length of working day may be relevant considerations for students who have impairments affecting mobility or stamina. For some students, the option of carrying out a placement or field trip over a longer period, or on a part-time basis could be helpful, and reflection on the large numbers of people in employment who, for many different reasons, work part-time, might recommend this option.
"On field trips I need to be able to take my time, which isn't always possible."
Some students travelling abroad may benefit from an additional 'settling in' period, to allow for time to locate local facilities and support, such as transport, student services, accommodation and health care. For some students, the climate and terrain can be issues.
"The organisation arranging the year in St Petersburg wasn't overjoyed to learn that a student with juvenile chronic arthritis wanted to go! But a student who came back told me that the hostel where students live was in the same building as the teaching block. This meant I wouldn't even have to go outside in the morning to get to classes... I got a grant from SAAS to cover things like extra transport, as well as laundry and cleaning, things I find hard as my hands are weak."
If the work placement, field trip or study abroad is an integral part of the course, then it is to be expected that most issues would have been considered during the pre-entry admission process. Nevertheless, environments, whether in the UK or not, may not always be predictable. Indeed, changes, which bring about increased access for people with impairments, may be more likely than the reverse, with the progress of anti-discrimination legislation, bringing new obligations to employers whose employees develop disabilities. This in turn may impact on the requirements laid down by professional bodies, whose regulations, where relevant, must of course be taken into account. Changes in available work placements could produce either new constraints and challenges or new flexibility and freedom of choice for students with impairments.
Students with impairments are positive assets on courses, where a reminder of the diversity of human experience is important. It can be instructive to be reminded of substantial gains for all students from organising placements in such a way that students with impairments are safely included, and not to think exclusively about problems.
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Copyright: The University of Strathclyde 2000
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