A fully accessible college dorm opening this week is believed to be the most user-friendly in the country for students with physical disabilities, offering the tools to transition to independence.
Dorm rooms at the new facility at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign come complete with lifts for residents to get in and out of bed and use the bathroom, not to mention a pager system to call for assistance any time. Light switches and thermostats are reachable from a wheelchair and roll-in showers make life a little easier with built-in seats.
But what’s truly innovative, university officials say, is that rooms for 17 students with disabilities are on the first floor of a dorm that will house hundreds of other students. Traditionally, students with disabilities lived separately from their typically developing peers.
Aside from the accessibility of their new digs, students with disabilities who live in the dorm will also learn how to hire and work with personal assistants to ease their transition to life after college. In the meantime, they’ll get about five hours daily with one of the personal assistants from the dorm program who will all be fellow university students, reports the Chicago Tribune. To read more click here.
