In 2020, Accesibility (the UoL disability support service) was shut due to Covid-19 and took with it the only adjustable study spaces on campus. Disabled students were told they can use the library spaces to study but without any adequate adjustments. This made it almost impossible to make use of the library facilities. 

When returning to campus in summer of 2021, nothing was done to help disabled students return. Accesibility was still shut and the new Percy Gee building had no adjustable spaces. I was looking for a quiet space, with an individual door, a window with a blind or adjustable lighting and a desk top computer to finish my post graduate dissertation. If you have any sensory or processing conditions such as ADHD, Autism, Dyslexia ect, open plan bright, noisy environments can be incredibly difficult to work in. 

I wasn't asking for the world, but no such space exists, on the entire University of Leicester campus.

Further education institutions have a legal right to provide resonable adjustments such as 'accessible rooms and venues, such as having a quiet space'. I would argue this comes under resonable.

Disabled students pay the same amount of tuition fees. We put in the same amount of work into our degrees and we are not afforded any spaces where we are able to focus freely. Even those without these conditions could benefit from quiet individual rooms where they can study away from their homes.

Covid-19 changed the way we all work and study but these issues were here long before the pandemic. The new Percy Gee building was in development years before 2020 and no consideration was taken as to how disabled students would be able to study in this new multi-million pound investment.

Enough is enough. Disabled students deserve to be listened to. We deserve space.