Any uni staff - would you laugh at this request?

[homesickness]

I’m returning to uni in about 4 weeks - first time fave to face in two and a half years . Part of that involves clinical placement and obviously lectures too . Uni is inner city, half the buildings have like 17 floors - I have dyspraxia, horrendous vertigo at heights and causes panic attacks .

My GP has suggested I ask politely if my classes could be arranged to be on lower floors only, as I’d feel more comfortable and more able to engage, and turn up to class, and tackle fear of heights at my own pace .

I feel ridiculous even asking, but uni have asked me what adjustments I feel would help me - this would ... I’m already asking them though for a ‘quieter’ placement (ie not based in a huge hospital) and I’m worried that I will come across as me being demanding and fussy if I ask for both .

Would you laugh at a student asking for these things? GP said use the vertigo excuse and leave the fear of heights out of it in case they think I’m being a bit daft ... I genuinely don’t know if should ask - I know the lecturers well (going into third year) but don’t want to embarrass myself any more than I already have after being sent home two years ago very unwell !!

I'm sure everyone has got a first draft timetable by now, but in this situation, we'd just swap, even during term time. It's only two days since student numbers were (kind of) confirmed. If there's something very special about rooms for your course, that's one thing, but otherwise I really wouldn't assume rooms are fixed at all.

I'd be polite enough not to laugh, but I'd be amused at the naivete required to believe that this is either possible or reasonable. Classrooms get assigned based on capacity, suitability for particular subjects (e.g., lab equipment), and cleaning schedules during covid (they try to avoid situations where 50 people leave and then 50 more immediately enter). There's unlikely to be enough flexibility left over after all of that to put all of a particular student's classes on the lowest floors. A more realistic request would be for specific seating and maybe some kind of partition or room divider that could be arranged to ensure you couldn't see out the window.

In general it absolutely is a reasonable request, just maybe a little late in the day for this year. But a straight room swap is easier than a timing swap so I suspect it would be doable for most classes, just probably not all.

don't use the word "vertigo" unless you actually mean you have vertigo - which it doesn't not sound like you do have

You need to register with Disability Services and request it through them. Teaching and admin staff probably won't have the ability to make these changes.

Timetabling and room allocation is a whole job in itself at my university and it would require a lot of rejigging as other classes would need to be relocated to accommodate you so it certainly wouldn't be in place for the first few weeks if they did agree to accommodate you.

I also second applying for disabled students allowance. If you have a diagnosis this should be easy to get, although it does take several weeks/months to come through.

This could well pay for a support worker to accompany you if you would find this helpful.

@homesickness

Not all all

I used to work for a university and Any students with a disability the student services team used to carry out risk assessments for them and make "reasonable adjustments" as would accommodation providers

Get in touch with them both and explain the situation and hopefully they'll be able to help you

Ideally people put this on their application forms so it can be factored into timetabling but I'm sure they will do what they can to help

I’ve sent an email through but also spoke to well-being team this morning - who said they have zero clue if Uni is actually returning to anything close to normal and said, ‘If I were you I’d prepare for face to face but remember there’s a chance you’ll be entirely online again!!’

Thanks - this thread has helped a lot 😊

How will you ensure that your future jobs/appointments aren't on high floors once you've qualified? Many hospitals are based in high rises so not sure how you're going to avoid it, unless you're limiting yourself to non-hospital settings?

Exactly this - contact the Disability Team at the University and if you have evidence of GP’s suggestion this would come under reasonable adjustments.

KidneyBeans

You can ask but it's very likely teaching room allocations will have been done already and depending on your course some specialist teaching spaces (clinical skills, labs etc) can't be moved.

Regardless it's worth talking to them to ensure staff are aware. The uni should have a disability support team