Ndlovu Sibonokuhle, Walton Elizabeth
Wits School of Education, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa.
Gender, Race and Identity Studies, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.
Afr J Disabil. 2016 Feb 24;5(1):150. doi: 10.4102/ajod.v5i1.150. eCollection 2016.
Persons with disabilities continue to be excluded from professions in South Africa despite legislation on non-discrimination and equity.
We sought to identify both the opportunities and obstacles that students with disabilities face in professional degrees.
Selected texts from the South African and international literature were analysed and synthesised.
Students with disabilities are afforded opportunities to graduate into professions through the current climate of transformation, inclusion and disability policies, various support structures and funding. These opportunities are mitigated by obstacles at both the higher education site and at the workplace. At university, they may experience difficulties in accessing the curriculum, disability units may be limited in the support they can offer, policies may not be implemented, funding is found to be inadequate and the built environment may be inaccessible. Fieldwork poses additional obstacles in terms of public transport which is not accessible to students with disabilities; a lack of higher education support extended to the field sites, and buildings not designed for access by people with disabilities. At both sites, students are impacted by negative attitudes and continued assumptions that disability results from individual deficit, rather than exclusionary practices and pressures.
It is in the uniqueness of professional preparation, with its high demands of both theory and practice that poses particular obstacles for students with disabilities. We argue for the development of self-advocacy for students with disabilities, ongoing institutional and societal transformation and further research into the experiences of students with disabilities studying for professional degrees.
尽管有关于非歧视和平等的立法，但南非的残疾人仍然被排除在职业领域之外。
我们试图确定残疾学生在攻读专业学位时面临的机遇和障碍。
对南非和国际文献中的选定文本进行分析和综合。
通过当前的转型、包容和残疾政策氛围、各种支持结构和资金，残疾学生有机会毕业并进入职业领域。然而，高等教育机构和工作场所的障碍削弱了这些机会。在大学里，他们在获取课程方面可能会遇到困难，残疾事务部门提供的支持可能有限，政策可能无法实施，资金被认为不足，建筑环境可能无法进入。实地考察在公共交通方面带来了额外的障碍，残疾学生无法使用公共交通；高等教育机构对实地考察地点的支持不足，而且建筑物没有设计供残疾人使用。在这两个场所，学生都受到负面态度以及持续存在的观念的影响，即认为残疾是由个人缺陷导致的，而不是排斥性做法和压力造成的。
正是专业培养的独特性，因其对理论和实践的高要求，给残疾学生带来了特别的障碍。我们主张为残疾学生发展自我倡导能力，持续进行机构和社会转型，并进一步研究攻读专业学位的残疾学生的经历。
