My first post......I feel there is a dis-agreement between the Data
protection act (1998) and SENDA in this case. I took advice from a barrister
at an academic registrars conference recently on a similar subject.

He stated that if a specific student asked for no provisions to be in place,
although the university knew of the disability and offered advice/provisions
in terms of teaching or exams, then under the (superseding) Data Protection
Act, you could not provide information on a persons condition/disability to
any other person (even within an institution). Therefore, if a student asks
for no information disclosure, then the institution is exempt and does NOT
have to provide any special arrangements (during or after an exam).

Matt

----------------------------
Matt Evans
SEAC Examinations Officer
Room 7.29
James Clerk Maxwell Building
57 Waterloo Road
London
SE1 8WA

Tel: +44 (0) 20 7848 3390
Fax: +44 (0) 20 7848 3379
----------------------------
----- Original Message -----
From: "Smith, Tony" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, July 05, 2002 2:19 PM
Subject: Re: Advice needed


I suspect that you would find that your policy is going to be illegal for
next academic year when the Disability Discrimination Act comes into force.
You may wish to contact the Disability Rights Commission for guidance (see
http://www.drc-gb.org/drc/default.asp ).

Tony

-----Original Message-----
From: Val Harrington [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 05 July 2002 13:49
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Advice needed


We state that we cannot make retrospective decisions when
awarding grades so if the university was unaware at the time of the
exam that a student  had dyslexia this rule would apply and
mitigating circumstances would not be considered.  However if it is
clear that there are problems with understanding a paper (for
whatever reason) increasingly our tutors are calling in students for
a viva voce, occasionally we have recommended  this instead of a
written paper.

About half our dyslexic students who've  requested support in
exams now use a word processor.

Gillian



On 5 Jul 2002, at 12:23, Elaine Shillcock wrote:

Date sent:              Fri, 5 Jul 2002 12:23:27 +0100
Send reply to:          "Discussion list for disabled students and their
support staff."              <[log in to unmask]>
From:                   Elaine Shillcock <[log in to unmask]>
Subject:                Advice needed
To:                     [log in to unmask]

Can anybody offer any advice about this problem in relation to
SENDA?

A student with dyslexia has writing difficulties which result in his
writing becoming illegible under time pressure.  The student doesn't
tell anybody that he has dyslexia, but when his examination scripts
are marked, they are illegible.  The department is advised to contact
the student and to ask him to come into the University to transcribe
his papers so that they can be marked.  At this point, the student
declares he has dyslexia and produces an ed. psych report.
Allowances
are made, the student's papers are transcribed etc.

However, the student doesn't want any adaptations or other
considerations (including extra time in future exams).  Would the
University,  having offered the student extra time in any future
exams
(which he has refused to take) be expected to still go to quite a lot
of trouble after the examination periods to get the student to return
and have his papers transcribed, or would it be reasonable to say to
the student that unless he uses extra time, which may alleviate his
difficulty, that this would not be an option?

There would be no hesitation in offering the services of a scribe, or
having papers transcribed if they were still illegible after extra
time had been used.

Thanks in advance

Elaine
Disabilities Adviser
University of Luton
Park Square
Luton
LU1 3JU
t: 01582 489342
f: 01582 489349