Mark Coppin, director of Disability Services, is featured in the July issue of Disability Compliance for Higher Education.
In the article by contributing editor Gary A Enos, Coppin describes the steps his office has taken to meet students’ needs during the pandemic. The story is titled “A Brief Conversation With Mark Coppin: Support students, faculty members during pandemic.”
Coppin was asked what his department’s most significant change as a result of COVID-19. He responded, “We had to consider a lot of our accommodations, especially in the area of proctoring exams. We are not able now to proctor any exams in our department, and we typically proctor 1,000 to 1,200 in a semester. Instructors had to come up with alternate ways for students to take exams, such as untimed exams that do not require accommodations.”
Among other questions, he was asked what new disability-related needs emerged during the crisis. “For students with anxiety, this has been extremely stressful,” Coppin said. “Now they’re not in an environment they’re used to. They may not have good internet access. There is fear of the unknown happening in the world around them. We have been reaching out to all students on a weekly basis, whether they have a disability or not. We have done the same with faculty, making sure they refer to us any students who are having problems.”
Disability Compliance for Higher Education is published monthly by Wiley Periodicals LLC, Hoboken, New Jersey.
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