Japanese Students with Disabilities’ Accounts on Reasonable Accomodation and Support: An Exploratory Qualitative Study

Abstract

The Act for Eliminating Discrimination Against Persons with Disabilities took effect in April 2016. Consequentially, an urgent obligation of higher education institutions is the creation of an environment for supporting students with disabilities. Nevertheless, one finds no report regarding how students with disabilities actually feel about what has hitherto constituted "reasonable accommodation" which has been made available during their schooling. The present study therefore aims to gather, in an exploratory manner, the viewpoints of students with disabilities concerning support. The seven (7) persons who participated in this study were interviewed for an exploratory survey so as to ascertain the perspectives of students with disabilities regarding support. The results obtained enabled us to clarify factors for student determiners regarding the contents of support, the kinds of content students sought in support, and the roles expected to be fulfilled by a university support office.