Office of Student Life

Disability Services

Graduate/Professional Students

Welcome Graduate, Professional and prospective Grad/Prof students!  Student Life Disability Services (SLDS) is proud to serve you and would like to assist in making your advanced academic endeavors as smooth as possible. We know that being in graduate and professional school is very different than being an undergraduate.  1 in 8 graduate students at Ohio State are registered with our office. Since each student and their program requirements are unique, we can work to tailor your accommodation needs to the graduate environment by working with you and your faculty/program staff from the beginning of your journey through to your graduate or professional examinations and defense processes. 

SLDS has an assigned access specialist for each college and we work directly with liaisions in each professional school. We invite you to connect with us to ensure that accommodations unique to your graduate academic coursework, clinical, laboratory, and field work experiences are in place for when you choose to use them. 

Click the links below to navigate this page:

Confidentiality

REGISTRATION AND SERVICES ARE CONFIDENTIAL. Receiving SLDS services in NO way impacts your graduate funding or appointments. At no point is personal medical information shared with other faculty or staff. Your registration status is only shared with faculty/staff on a need-to-know basis. 

Services Offered

SLDS provides a range of support services to students, based on the impacts of their qualifying conditions:

  1. Exam Accommodations including professional, doctoral exams, and defenses
  2. Notetaking Support (e.g., use of personal notetaking technology/apps; access to lecture slides in advance)
  3. Attendance and Deadline Modifications (e.g. flexibility with number of excused absences; deadline extensions)
  4. Assistive Technology (e.g., text-to-speech software; screen-reading technology)
  5. Accessible Media (e.g., digital textbooks, captioned videos)
  6. Sign Language Interpreting / Transcribing
  7. Accommodations Consultation and Advocacy
  8. On-Campus Housing/Dining Accommodations 
  9. Disability Parking / Adaptive Transportation
  10. Other Services (e.g., lab assistants; course substitutions)

Visit our Student Accommodations page to learn more about these support services.

Grad/Prof Frequently Asked Questions

  •  If I register with SLDS, will you tell my faculty/advisor? As a student, you decide which, if any, of your faculty or program administration are notified of your registration status by requesting individual course letters to be sent to them via our website.
  •  Will my faculty/college find out my disability or condition?   We never share specific conditions without your advanced request and permission.  Communications from our office will only verify that you are affiliated with SLDS.
  •  I don’t have tests in grad school, why should I register? We can work with you to determine if other accommodations may be appropriate for your courses, labs, practicals, internships and even during the doctoral exam, and dissertation defense experiences.
  •  I really want to try grad school without registering. Can I do it later if I decide I need to? You can start the registration process anytime during your academic career. However, it may be advantageous to register with us to learn about our services and options and to have this in place in case you start encountering barriers since accommodations cannot be put into place retroactively.
  •  I have a Graduate Teaching/Research Assistantship appointment. Can you help with accommodations for this job? Since these roles are tied to your student status, we can work with you, in consultation with the Office of Human Resources, to assist you in requesting accommodations in these settings.
  •  Do you require health insurance or payment to use your services?   Our services are covered as part of your tuition.  Personal use technologies may not be covered.
  •  Do you provide career assistance? Our office has an embedded career vocational counselor fully dedicated to helping individuals with disabilities obtain internships, part-time, and post-graduation employment. They also can advise students on the choices around workplace disability disclosure. 

 Eligibility for Services

In order to receive services, students must provide documentation of a qualifying condition. Some qualifying conditions include (but are not limited to):

  • Mental health conditions (e.g. anxiety, depression, bipolar, PTSD)
  • ADD/ADHD
  • Chronic health conditions (e.g. tinnitus, cancer, diabetes, Crohn's Disease, epilepsy)
  • Learning disabilities (e.g. dyscalculia, dyslexia)
  • Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)
  • Temporary injuries (e.g. broken arm/leg, concussion, surgery recovery)
  • Sensory disabilities (e.g. Blind/low vision; D/deaf or Hard of Hearing)
  • Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)
  • Mobility conditions (e.g. Cerebral Palsy, paraplegia, quadriplegia)
  • Pregnancy-related medical complications

 

 

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