Rights & Responsibilities

Students with disabilities/impairments at Emmanuel College have the right to:

• Access courses, programs, services and facilities offered through the College;
• An opportunity to learn and to receive reasonable accommodations and/or auxiliary aids and services;
• Appropriate confidentiality of all information regarding their disabilities/impairments;
• Academic information, reasonably available in accessible formats.

Students with disabilities/impairments at Emmanuel College have the responsibility to:

• Meet qualifications and maintain institutional standards for courses, programs, services and facilities;
• Identify as an individual with a disability/impairment when an accommodation is needed and to seek information, counsel, and assistance as necessary;
• Demonstrate and/or document (from an appropriate professional) how the disability/impairment limits their participation in courses, programs, services and facilities;
• Follow published procedures for obtaining reasonable accommodations and/or auxiliary aids and services.

Emmanuel College has the right to:

• Identify and establish essential functions, abilities, skills, knowledge, and standards for courses, programs, services, facilities for students, and to evaluate and determine reasonable accommodations on this basis;
• Request and receive, through the Disability Support Services office, current and appropriate documentation that supports requests for accommodations and/or auxiliary aids and services;
• Deny a request for accommodations and/or auxiliary aids and services if the documentation demonstrates that the request is not warranted or if the individual fails to provide appropriate documentation;
• Select among similarly effective accommodations and/or auxiliary aids and services;
• Refuse an unreasonable accommodation and/or auxiliary aid or service that creates an undue burden for the College or imposes a fundamental alteration on a program or activity of the College.

Emmanuel College has the responsibility to:

• Provide academic information to students with disabilities/impairments in accessible formats upon request unless to do so would constitute an undue burden for the College; ensure that courses, programs, services, and facilities for students, when viewed in their entirety, are available and usable in integrated and appropriate settings;
• Evaluate students and applications on their abilities and not their disabilities/impairments;
• Provide or arrange reasonable accommodations and/or auxiliary aids and services for students with disabilities/impairments in courses, programs, services and facilities;
• Maintain appropriate confidentiality of records and communication.

Students with disabilities/impairments are ensured that written records will be kept confidential and made available only to those with a legitimate interest in them. The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) of 1974 protect the confidentiality of student medical and disability/impairment records. Disability/impairment-related information is kept by the college or university in separate files with access limited to appropriate personnel. FERPA protects a student's record from being shared (without the student's permission) with faculty, administrators, other students, the press, or anyone without a legitimate reason for seeing the record. (HEATH Resource Center).

A note for faculty: Disability/impairment-related documentation should be submitted only to the Student Accessibility and Accommodations office. If a student provides you with personal records or documentation, refer him/her to the SAA office. Any information about a disability/impairment should be kept confidential and not shared with other faculty or staff.