Prof. Degener: Disability Contributes to University Excellence
“You can only achieve excellence with inclusion [of people with disabilities]. I don’t see it as a dichotomy or something which was working against each other. In my research projects, I learned that hiring disabled researchers was a lot of work, I had to fight for benefits, for equipment and lots of things. But it was worthwhile because our research was so much better”, says Professor Theresia Degener, the former Chair of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, who visited Vytautas Magnus University (VMU) in Kaunas, Lithuania and discussed disability policies at universities and possibilities of cooperation.
Prof. Theresia Degener from the Bochum University of Applied Sciences (Germany) is a world-renowned expert of the rights of persons with disabilities who developed the human rights model of disability and contributed to the development of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. She is the head of the Bochum Center for Disability Studies (BODYS), which researches issues of the rights of persons with disabilities. Currently, in spite of having no arms, prof. Degener is successfully traveling around the Baltic states in a camper van which has been adapted for her individual use.
According to the scientist, work at the United Nations was a dream come true, even though she did not intend to become the chair of the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, as she was teaching at a university in Germany and raising two sons at the time. Work at the committee, which involved assessment of the member states’ reports on the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, as well as the strengthening of the Convention’s jurisdiction, was a tense period which demanded a lot of effort but also a successful one, because a lot was achieved during that time. For four years, Prof. Jonas Ruškus from VMU Dept. of Social Work worked at this committee alongside Prof. Degener.
The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities emphasises that disability is an important part of human diversity. One of the main principles of the Convention is respect for difference and acceptance of persons with disabilities as part of human diversity and humanity.
Prof. Theresia Degener. Photo by Jonas Petronis
Solves real human rights issues
Prof. Degener has organized fifteen PhD research projects dedicated to the rights of persons with disabilities: including violence against women with disabilities, intersectionality and other topics.
“The latest research project we did was with people who have multiple disabilities and who have lived at least for 20 years in an institution and who do not communicate in the regular way. Usually, you don’t have good research on their perspectives because typically you have proxy interviews and you ask the caretakers, the parents etc. What we developed in this project was methods to communicate directly with those people and have what is their vision of living independently. Of course, that was a big challenge but it went very well and it has led to more de-institutionalization in Germany [i.e. release of people with disabilities from care institutions]”, Prof. Degener explains.
It is planned that the expert will visit Vytautas Magnus University as a VMU Guest Lecturer and Visiting Professor, inviting students to discuss topics of human rights and disability as part of the social work master’s degree programs, including the specialization of Social Work in the Context of Crisis. The professor has accumulated a lot of experience in teaching abroad: while teaching at the University of Western Cape in South Africa, she helped set up the first Human Rights Disability Research Centre there, while at the Maastricht University in the Netherlands Prof. Degener helped to introduce a legal clinic on human rights, where law students and social workers work on real cases related to human rights. An analogous clinic is also open at Vytautas Magnus University.
Disability coordinator is a must at the university
Discussing the matters of inclusion and disability policies at universities, Prof. Degener argues that each higher education institution must have a coordinator (commissioner) who would work on issues of disabilities. The professor met with the VMU Chief Coordinator of Disability, Miglė Janušauskaitė, and discussed VMU Disability Policy as well as its implementation at the university, admission of students with disabilities, and the provision of reasonable accommodation to them.
“In higher education, I think it is very, very important to have someone like you, a disability commissioner. We have at the moment several people [working on this at Bochum University of Applied Science]: a professor who is the commissioner for disabled students, an ombudsperson for disabled employees, and a blind person who is the accessibility officer. She is quite new to our University and she made the biggest change because she has made sure that our website is accessible [to persons with disabilities]”, the researcher notes.
Mantas Simanavičius, Prof. Jonas Ruškus, Simona Pilkienė, Prof. Theresia Degener, Miglė Janušauskaitė, Assoc. Prof. Vilma Bijeikienė. Photo by Jonas Petronis
Lecturers are trained on accessibility matters
Accessibility-related matters are often a new issue for lecturers, an area in which they may lack experience. For instance, what is accessible teaching, what to do if one student is blind, another one is in a wheelchair, while yet another one has a psychosocial disability, or a whole host of multiple disabilities.
“We provide training to the lecturers, [we give advice] on what to do in such cases, how to make sure that while giving reasonable accommodation you’re still not discriminating against anyone, that every student is treated just and equal. This training is voluntary, but if you take it, you get some bonus, access to some funds. It has made a huge change because all of a sudden people are thinking about it, reasonable accommodation has become a common practice”, Prof. Degener says.
The former chair of the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is certain that it is vital for universities to employ as many persons with disabilities as lecturers and administrative staff. Lecturers and employees with disabilities usually contribute significantly to reasonable accommodation at universities. People with disabilities who work on research often can supply useful insight. They create a culture of diversity which opens up opportunities for new experiences and promotes generation as well as development of new knowledge.
“When we did interviews with people who were deaf, one of the researchers was deaf. He said that we need to think about a new methodology: we need to videotape the interview, because it’s so much about the signing and you need to go visual if you want to interpret the data really well. This is just an example. Since there were people with disabilities on our team, we were very good at problem-solving, because we were so used to solving everyday problems. I’m talking about research projects, but I think it is adaptable to studying, teaching, and learning”, the Professor of the Bochum University of Applied Science claims.
Miglė Janušauskaitė, Prof. Jonas Ruškus, Prof. Theresia Degener, Assoc. Prof. Vilma Bijeikienė. Photo by Jonas Petronis
The system is both for people with and without disabilities
During her conversation with VMU representatives, Prof. Degener also discussed the more sensitive matters, such as the cases when disability prevents people from working or studying at the university. Sometimes these people simply have to be rejected. “It should be possible to reject a disabled person. If that person is not able to perform the most fundamental tasks of the study program, then he or she will not be eligible. That’s part of our system, it is in force for both people with and without disabilities”, the expert explains.
Prof. Theresia Degener visited Vytautas Magnus University on 22 August. During her visit, she met with the VMU Vice-Rector for Communication Assoc. Prof. Vilma Bijeikienė, Vice-Rector for Studies Dr. Simona Pilkienė, Professor of VMU Dept. of Social Work Dr. Jonas Ruškus, Director of Student Affairs Department Mantas Simanavičius, and Chief Coordinator of Disability Affairs Miglė Janušauskaitė.
VMU is the first higher education institution in Lithuania which started providing reasonable accommodation for students with disabilities. Today VMU is known as a socially responsible university which is guided by the human rights model of disability and which is implementing the “University of Inclusive Opportunities” Disability Policy. This policy aims to ensure a culture of equality and non-discrimination at the university by providing reasonable accommodations and by increasing accessibility of studies environment.
