Joshua Ceballos/Assistant Entertainment Director
Being engaged and developing interpersonal relationships with staff from the Disability Resources Center is one of the most important things for students with disabilities when they reach university according to Hemal Parekh.
Martha Wong, assistant director at the DRC, believes that the number of students registered with their office is not truly indicative of the amount of students who could benefit from their services.
“Many students may choose not to register due to the fear of being stigmatised or because they want to do it independently without any support,” says Wong.
Wong says that many students suffer from what she calls “invisible disabilities,” or impairments that are not easily seen. These disabilities may be mental and psychological ones and are not as obvious as a physical impairments, such as autism or some form of learning disability.
One of these students is Parekh, public administration junior. He suffers from a vision impairment, but according to him, it has never been a significant struggle in his life.
“Fortunately, aside from the fact that I needed larger print and so forth… I was fortunate enough not to face so many struggles because I had the biggest component in life for me: the people that I had around me,” said Parekh. “I’ve always been very fortunate to have fantastic people around me.”
Parekh came to FIU after attending Miami Dade College and when he got here, he made sure to register and get in touch with the DRC.
Parekh is a believer in experiences and he feels that one’s experiences are not useful if they are not put into practice or shared with others. This advice, he believes, pertains not only to people with disabilities, but to all individuals.
“Everyone needs to have a solid social structure… to be actively engaged with them, and not only to seek help from people but to help people as well,” said Parekh.
When it comes to students helping fellow Panthers who suffer from disabilities, Parekh and Wong of the DRC share the opinion that it involves companionship and an understanding that we are not so different.
“It’s important that people with disabilities can be segmented to an extent with regards to maybe a few accommodations they might need…but aside from that, we’re all humans at the end of the day,” said Parekh.
He explained, “the biggest way that any of the fellow FIU students can help people with disabilities is collaborating with them and serving as mentors to them. Not only with regards to education, but with regards to life as well.”
For more hands on activities to help schoolmates in need, students can attend the DRC Blue Panthers meeting.
“What the Blue Panthers does is we go through different activities that help them improve their social skills. Because we have very intelligent students who have great GPAs and are very smart, but sometimes we need a little push on how to walk up to a girl and ask her to walk out with you, or how to walk up to a friend and make friends,” Wong said.
The DRC is open to all students who feel that they may have some disability or impairment, or need help and support during university, and they highly suggest that students come in to register if they feel it is necessary.
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