>> From the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.
[ Pause ]
>> Well, good afternoon everybody and welcome to the African
and Middle East Division.   I'm Mary-Jane Deeb.
I'm the chief of that division.
And, I'm delighted to host you today for a program organized
by Laverne Page, Africa specialist in this division and the Library
of Congress Organization of Employees with Disabilities.
In a few moments we will also have Kirk Rascoe, Director of the Office
of Opportunity, Inclusiveness and Compliance,
who will be making remarks in recognition
of National Disability Employment Awareness Month.
But now, a few words about this division.
As many of you already know, it is made up of three sections,
the African, the Near East and the Hebraic section.
We are responsible for materials from 78 different countries,
in the Near East, Central Asia, the Caucasus, the entire continent
of Africa, North and Sub-Sahara.
And our Hebraic and Judaic collections come
from all over the world.
We also serve these materials to patrons here in our reading room
and organize programs, exhibits, conferences, and other activities
that highlight these collections, and that inform our patrons
about the countries and the cultures these publications come from.
Our presentation today is a case in point.
We have with us Dr. Buhle Mbambo-Thata, the Executive Director
of Library Services at the University of South Africa,
who will speak about the subject
that we have not discussed in this forum before.
Namely, on disability awareness in South Africa
and the lessons we can learn from the services provided
by the University of South Africa which is headquartered in Pretoria.
South Africa is a rich and complex country
about which we had learning more everyday.
Last year, the Africa and Middle East Divisions Africa Section
in partnership with the Poetry and Literature Center
and the African Society of the National Summit
on Africa launched a new series called "Conversations
with African Poets and Writers."
The series consist of a set of live webcast interviews with established
and emerging poets, short story writers, novelists, and playwrights
from the African continent and the African Diaspora.
Programs include readings and moderated discussions led by staff
in the African section of the library's division.
Last week, we had a writer and poet from South Africa, [inaudible],
who read to us from one of his works in Xhosa,
one of the 11 official languages of South Africa.
And in April we hosted a program and a series featuring the Poet Laureate
of South Africa, Keorapetse Kgositsile.
So, we always want to learn more and to have the experts,
the specialists come and inform us
and let us know what is happening in South Africa.
So now let me pass the microphone to Kirk Rascoe who joins me
in welcoming Dr. Mbambo-Thata to the Library of Congress.
So, Kirk, please come.   Thank you.
[ Pause ]   >> Thank you Mary.
Hold the applause down to a manageable roar.
[laughter] Thank you Dr. Mbambo-Thata.
She's the only one.
Welcome to the United States, welcome to the nation's capitol,
Washington, D.C, and welcome to the Library of Congress.
I am the director of Opportunity, Inclusiveness and Compliance
for the Library of Congress, and I was reminded
by Miss D. Is it Miss D or Doctor?   >> Dr. D.
>> Dr. D. Okay, the doctor has announced
that I was a relative new cumber like an electron spun off of an atom
in a nanosecond, and I've been here for four months.
But I also remind her that in time everything is relative,
as Einstein said.
So, even the oldest structure, there's something older
and even the youngest one, there's always something younger.
So, with that in mind, I wanted to welcome you to the library
and just let you know that here
at the library we have a workforce of about 3500 employees.
As of April 2012, we took a survey, and we found that 246, almost 250,
self identified as having a disability.
The largest group of those who self identified of having a disability,
namely 63 individuals, did not wish
to officially disclose their disability.
So, whatever strides we have made in this country, in this city,
in this institution, individuals still are not entirely comfortable
with disclosing their disability.
We also have had recent changes to the law
which had broaden the definition of disable.
So that individuals with conditions such as diabetes, epilepsy,
arthritis, are now included within that definition.
And I know from just anecdotal experience that some individuals
with hidden disabilities will prefer that they remain hidden.
Having said that, the library does value diversity and we seek
to leverage the diversity that we have
in our workforce, easier said than done.
And one of the reasons it's easier said than done is
that diversity means different things to different people.
But here, we seek to use diversity to enhance our core values
such as service, stewardship, excellence, and collaboration.
So, in that regard it is important that the library supervisors,
managers, librarians, the custodians, are of national culture
and heritage demonstrate behavior and values
that promote inclusiveness, including the inclusiveness
of individuals with disabilities.
Sometimes it's hard to do that when you don't know whether
or not a person has a disability, but that underscores the need
for mutual respect in our nation's valued institutions.
But we have identified inclusiveness here at the library as one
of the core competencies for our managers.
So, I just am not going to take up the whole program.
I could go and on and on about the Library of Congress.
I've never been here in this [inaudible] room before.
I think it's beautiful.
I look forward to hearing your presentation because one
of the things that we've learned from Amanda Donaldson
who is sitting behind you.   She is the president, Amanda?
>> Vice chair.
>> Vice chair of our Organization of Employees with Disabilities is
that culture affects the way in which disabilities are perceived
and interacted with in society.
And I don't know about in South Africa but there are--
America's made up of different cultures similar to yours.
And in some of those cultures,
individuals with disabilities were segregated for a long period
of time, hidden away so that no one could see them,
not spoken of and not spoken to.
We've had individuals with disabilities to tell us,
for instance, an individual who is blind say that,
when he goes to the store someone who's sighted,
they will give his change to the sighted person.
They will talk to the sighted person.
And the same thing happens with individuals
who have hearing impairments.
So, culture affects the way we interact.
But, the good news is, we're in a position
to affect the changes in our culture.
And I think the ADA, the Americans with Disabilities Act,
has gone a long way towards changing the cultural expectations
and cultural norms that we engage when we engage
with individuals with disabilities.
The other good news is, the young people of today grew
up in an inclusive environment, because parents, caretakers,
and other stakeholders fought for full inclusion
for school children some 20 years ago.
So we have an entire generation of young people
who don't understand what the big deal is in including people
with disabilities and it's the older people like myself
who have the difficulty,
simply because we have not been acculturated to include,
to accept and to respect.
So, having said all that I want to thank you for having me.
I'm going to welcome you to the library and I look forward
to hearing your presentation.   Thank you very much.
[ Applause ]   >> Hello. My name is Laverne Page.
I'm an area specialist in the African and Middle Eastern Division
and I work with Southern African countries and I would
like to add my welcome to you for coming today, to today's lecture
in the African and Middle Eastern Division in recognition
of National Disability Employment Awareness Month.
We are pleased to have someone with us today who is knowledgeable
about disability awareness in one
of the regions covered by this division.
And as Mary-Jane said, we've never had a speaker before to talk
about this and therefore, Dr. Mbambo-Thata's talk,
her lecture will be enlightening for us.
Before I introduce her, I would like acknowledge
and to thank our cosponsor, the Library of Congress Organization
of Employees with Disabilities.
This is a staff organization that started in 2007
as a brown bag lunch group.
Employees met to discuss and to address issues
of common concern relating to disability and accessibility.
Since 2009 OED functions
as a recognized LC staff organization with over 130 members.
They meet during their lunch break and not only provide strength,
cohesion and social welfare for each other but also bring that strength
and cohesion to the library itself.
Their mission is to assist those with present and future disabilities
to have a clearinghouse for information
on workplace accommodations, universal design, programs
and services at the Library of Congress.
So I'd like to acknowledge the OED executive board and I know
that the chair is not here today but the Vice Chair Amanda Donaldson is
and you want to-- well, we know who you are.
And now, on to the good part.   I would like to introduce you
to our speaker Dr. Mbambo-Thata, Dr. Buhle Mbambo-Thata.
I just learned how to pronounce it correctly this morning.
She is the executive director of Library Services at the University
of South Africa, commonly called UNISA.
Prior to that, she served as university librarian
at the University of Zimbabwe in Harare, Zimbabwe,
a country to the north of South Africa as many of you know.
In addition to her role at UNISA, Dr. Mbambo-Thata is active in IFLA,
that's the International Federation
of Library Associations and Institutions.
She is currently a member
of the IFLA governing board having previously served
in numerous other IFLA structures.
She is a member of the Strategic Advisory Network
of the Global Libraries Program of the Bill
and Melinda Gates Foundation.
She has previously served on various committee affiliations including the
Library Network of the Association of Commonwealth Libraries,
the E-Knowledge Society for Women in Southern African
of which she was chairperson, the advisory committees
of EIFL Found.net, the Gender in Africa Information Network
and the Access to Learning Award of the Bill
and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Her research interests are women and ICT, ICT applications in libraries
and library services for mobile devices and so,
now, Dr. Buhle Mbambo-Thata.   [ Applause ]
>> Thank you.   It is so generous of you.
[ Pause ]   >> Colleagues good morning.
I'd like to acknowledge Mary-Jane Deeb, the Chief Librarian
of the African and Middle Eastern Division and the cosponsor
of this event and Kirk Rascoe from the Opportunity, Inclusiveness
and Compliance and deputy president of the organization
Great appreciation to Laverne Page who after many years of conversation
and meeting her and knowing her at IFLA, we finally agreed on this.
I'll-- I'm not disappearing, I'm just making sure I've got my cards,
agreed that next time I'm in L.A. to come and share what we do at UNISA
around delivering services largely
to students living with disabilities.
For us in South Africa with the post-apartheid
or the apartheid history, after 1994,
the country focused a great deal on inclusiveness because of many,
many years of exclusiveness.
And so you'll find that the philosophy
of inclusiveness permeated many sectors, many professions,
but in education, it was even greatest because education was seen
as a tool that would build the future generation
in more inclusivity.
And so there was a greater focus within the education sector
to build programs for inclusion and in my university,
we've taken that in a great deal.
The outline of my presentation is typical that, you know,
I took a little bit about of our context but our background,
it will be largely what it is our national context,
what informs what we do and then I'll talk about the vision
and the mission of my university, and then spend a little bit of time
or most of my time talking about the services that we offer
to students with disabilities.
I don't know about here but in South Africa people that live
with disabilities have made a statement known to all of us
that it's nothing for us without us.
And saying that we shouldn't be speaking only our behalf
but rather we should repeat what they have said.
And so in terms of defining what services
and defining what interventions, the cue is taken
from people living with disabilities.
And in our context too I was going
through the list last night wondering
if I should put this slide indicating what is defined
as disabilities and, but I'll need 17 slides to do
that because the list has increased.
It's gone beyond hearing impaired and sight impaired and people
in wheelchairs but includes diabetes as well, high blood pressure,
diseases that impair your full development.
So chronic, many chronic diseases in there
and so it's become less obvious to recognize who is disabled
and the notion of identifying
and responding becomes a little more challenging.
In my country, as you know, we have 11 official languages
but outside the 11 official languages,
there's about five other nationalities,
minorities that are not included in those 15 languages.
And so the cultures of those smaller communities are not
One of the main languages spoken in South Africa is isiZulu
and a dialect of that or relate--
I shouldn't say dialect because that sounds like Zulu is the supreme,
but other related languages, Nguni family, Swati and isiNdebele.
And the word for people with disabilities is isilima
but that word itself says there is something wrong with you.
And because you are defined like that, you then are looked down on
and one of the things that government has sought a great deal
to do is to put in place legislation and government interventions
that will provide a legal instrument
within which then cultural practices can be subsumed.
Two years ago when government was reshuffled
at a ministry called Women, Children and People
with Disabilities was created.
And it was felt that it's important to have a full department that looks
at issues of people living with disabilities
but putting together the issues that have to do with women and children.
This is almost really putting a department to look at groups
that have been disadvantaged.
And those three were lumped together and being led
by a very able minister, Minister Thande.
And in that a group that was called previously a pressure group called
the Office on the Status of Disabled Persons or SDP was then subsumed
and that became a department of the ministry other
than it just being a pressure group.
And that group then advises the minister on terms
that are appropriate for use in the different languages.
So that is a cultural inclusion and the derogatory terms
like isilima are then replaced and the easy word for people living
with disabilities in Zulu is isiqhwala [phonetic]
and that word is itself a word
that does not demean a person living with disabilities.
But the commonly used one was isilima because it,
as we say in sociology, people generally like to exclude
because then if you exclude maybe you'll have more resources
for your group.
But the word isiqhwala is seldom used but it described the same kind
of person and so this department is focusing on definition of terms
that are inclusive and that ensure inclusion
in all the different languages.
Within the higher education sector we have a committee
of vice chancellors who meet
around a body called Higher Education South Africa.
And in that group there is a group for people that are living
with disabilities, High Education Disability Services Association
that is affiliated with HESA to ensure
that in higher education people living
with disabilities have a voice.
And that is important again because in South Africa we see education
as a critical vehicle for undoing the imbalances of the past,
opening up opportunities of the people and enabling people to move
from poverty to livelihoods that are better.
And so the government established two very important legal instruments
and one of them is the Employment Equity and Transformation Act.
I think if you're not living in South Africa it's difficult
to understand but if you've been reading our history you'll
understand why it's so important for us to legislate
because we believe the best way of undoing the evils of apartheid is
to undo the legislation that supported and strengthened apartheid
and put in place legislations that promote inclusion.
But it is also critical
that following those legislations there are instruments for monitoring
and reporting so that you don't just end
up with a legislation that nobody obeys.
And so the Employment Equity
and Transformation Act makes it mandatory for institutions
to report annually on stat--
and give a monitoring report that indicates what people
of a certain race are appointed at what level.
How many people living
with disabilities are appointed at what level?
How many males and females are appointed at what level?
And the government believes strongly that it is its responsibility
to monitor what organizations do so that the act is put into being
and is not left to the goodwill of CEOs just to write the plan.
Writing the plan itself is not sufficient, it is monitored
and it is reported and there is a penalty for noncompliance.
And so in many institutions in higher education the monitoring
of the act sits with the principal's office,
with the vice chancellor's office, and he becomes
or so she becomes the accountable officer
and if there isn't compliance to the targets that is set
or to the national targets, the vice chancellor is then held liable.
And in the private sector,
the CEO is then held liable and there is a penalty.
It is fact though to say that there are some organizations
in the private sector that will budget for the penalty.
And we find it sad that there are people in this day and age
who are still willing to continue discrimination and pay their way
through and pay their penalty for noncompliance.
But in higher education and in my university in particular,
the vice chancellors say to us the day he has
to pay a fine heads will roll.
And so which means people like myself
who head departments have a responsibility to ensure
that in our department we are compliant.
And we don't bring the university to disrepute and for me it's a lot more
than just the statistics.
It's really ensuring that the whole of humanity and the diversity
of humanity enriches our work.
So in addition to the Employment Equity and Transformation Act,
in higher education, I now keep talking about higher education
because that's the area where I work
and where I can speak with confidence.
In higher education, the education white paper which is the instrument
that indicates, gives guidance to universities in higher education
and schools as well, it is stated again very clearly that inclusivity
in schools, in buildings, in services is mandatory.
And again, education institutions are monitored for compliance
to the education white paper, and there's a penalty for noncompliance.
It almost sounds like a police state but it is not.
There is a responsibility of ensuring that your democracy works
and that in ensuring that in order to affect redress those that stand
in the way of redress are made to pay.
Within the institution, because there is a national instrument,
national guideline, universities make it an effort to comply
but my university makes an effort to go beyond just complying
and I will talk about it just a little bit.
Those beautiful bright lights, my university, the University
of South Africa, it's sits on one of the five hills around Pretoria
and we say that it's a gateway into Pretoria because as you're coming
in from the airport it's the first structure
that you see on your right.
And it is the only dedicated distance learning university.
Our mission is to be the African university in service to humanity
and we often say that it's this great vision, rather our vision,
is this great vision that makes us come up the hill every morning.
We're working towards being the African university in service
to humanity and we take our African mandate very seriously.
Over the years, the institution has developed what we called a
social mandate.
Access to our university is not limited
to certain strict academic qualifications
that use general instruments that the minister gives
that you must have passed high school in order to go
to university, and we comply to that.
But if you did not pass well high school and you'd like to go
to university, we provide access to higher education
by providing an access program that will enable you
to earn certain credits and then go into university.
So we see our open-- our mandate is increasing access
to higher education, particularly
for previously disadvantaged groups of people.
We are secondly committed
to delivering high quality education whatever people are.
And so we don't just provide access to higher education but we ensure
that it is high quality, and because our country is such a big country,
the open and distance learning mode that we use seeks
to bring the education to you for you don't have to leave work.
If you're a woman who has got children,
you can bring up your children as well as work on your degree.
If you are a person living with disabilities and are housebound
and can't get out, you can study and we'll bring the materials to you.
Thirdly, we seek to remove barriers due to distance, technology,
isolation and disability by bringing education to you.
And fourthly, to utilize all means possible to deliver knowledge,
regardless of where you are, regardless of your technology,
regardless of your space.
And this is very important for us because as you know,
There's a first world, high tech, and a whole range to a fourth world
with no electricity, no running water, no running sewage.
The University of South Africa seeks to provide education
In compliance with the government instruments, but also because of
that vision as well as the social mandate that we have set
for ourselves, we've included in our strategic plan but annually
in our institutional operational plan, we include in goal 5,
create an enabling environment for persons living with disability.
And these may be students but also including staff.
We've also crafted an employment equity and transformation plan
which seeks to support the university's commitment to diversity
We have often said that history roped us in South Africa
by judging people and their abilities based
on what they look like.
And the commitment of all the post-apartheid governments has been
to reverse that.
That people's abilities are more than whether they sit
on a wheelchair, whether they are tall, or whether they are short,
or whether they have one eye or none at all.
But their abilities are deeper than what you see of them.
And in our employment equity and transformation plan,
we seek to enhance humanity regardless
of what the person looks like, black, white, yellow, short, eyes,
Important thing, you are a human being,
what can you bring to the table.
And, the vice chancellor's office monitors the performance
of each department against that.
And so, each department must produce an employment equity report
at the end of each year and say what its targets are
and how far they've gone against that.
And relating specifically to people living with disabilities,
universities established an advocacy and resource center for students
with disabilities which does two things mainly, and the first one is
to support students at registration.
And so at the point of entry we are able to include those students
and help them with registration by setting up a separate office.
And the advantage of that is it helps us to identify at entry point
who is and who is not disabled.
And so we can then tailor services accordingly.
And so this center then establishes a database from the beginning
of the year of how many students have entered university or are
within university that are living with disabilities
or what kind of disabilities.
And secondly, this center has an advocacy and training role
and the training is not only limited for students but also for stuff.
For example, it gives us lessons in sign language, those programs
on disability awareness and help the university really respond
in an equitable manner to people living with disabilities.
And even within this university--
the university, as colleagues will remind us,
And so this great big university that I keep talking
about has many students and I was saying to Mary just now
that for many students
with disabilities we've become a university of choice
and I'll come back to that just now.
We have, as you can see we've had a steady growth over the years
and this statistics is from the January enrollments were 290 and as
of the enrollments of June, our numbers have gone up to 371,000.
And the reason we grow is not because we like to be big.
The reason we grow is because we'll provide access
to high education to anybody who wants it.
And so, some will say, some of the people
that we have should not be university material.
Who says, who says who's not university material?
You work your way up and your circumstances don't determine
where you end up and so at UNISA we open that and because we do,
because we have these many numbers there is indeed proof
that there is a need for reaching people wherever they are.
Our students all over the world, the bulk of them are in South Africa,
26,000 on the continent is a lot of people, that's a full university.
The rest of the world, we reach people.
I met somebody the other day who said they were living in California
and they are our student.
And those were not provided information
of where they stay [inaudible], it could have been an area,
it could be that they were between places but is a small number.
And so our students are really in a global village.
The vice chancellor that I served under when I first got
to UNISA 5 years ago said to us that the-- let's just go back,
said to us that each department has a responsibility to ensure
that it is aligned with all key instruments of the university.
And especially those instruments for which he must account to government.
And he was a tough a man.
He is a lawyer and an Anglican priest, an ordained Anglican priest.
And I said to him once, you're a difficult person to please
because you only answer to God and the law.
[laughter] But he's an established human rights activist.
He was the chairperson of our human rights board for many years
and very committed issues of human rights and say,
this is how we're going to do it and if
as an executive director you fail, you fail in this, you know that--
let me receive you resignation
because you're not taking us forward as a university.
And so the library and any other department
for that matter has made sure that we support the programs that seek
to bring transformation to the university and in line
with our presentation today,
programs that support our disabilities.
On the library side,
we have established the library disability forum
which is a watch dog for our clients with disabilities.
And we established it so that the staff had a place
where they can get together
and discuss what services should we be offering.
What are the experiences that they're having?
How should we be responding to the changing needs of our clients?
What are some of the things
that we should be doing and doing differently?
And so, a library disability forum was established.
We've toyed around with employing staff that are dedicated
to serving students with disability and--
but a month ago, we shoved that idea because we felt that all staff
that work in the library must have the skills to deal
with students with disabilities.
So just not a few selected people but that all of us can respond
to the needs of the students because it is not always
that only Anna will be in the library, or Anna will be
in the library when a student walks in.
But all of us as library staff must be able to respond
to the student need, whatever it is.   So we are working with--
we have worked over the years with the program of awareness
but we're turning that now into skills, getting lessons
in sign language, getting lessons in maneuvering wheelchairs,
getting lessons in working with equipment, different types
of equipment, and for those that, other disabilities
that are not physical like diabetes we've made a link between the health
and safety part of the library which includes having Red Cross
and first aid on each floor together with this forum for disability
so that should someone collapse and their machine says or the chain
on their arm says they are diabetic, we know who to call,
to attend before the ambulance arrives.
We also offer such a number of services to the-- to our students.
The first one is the sign language interpretation
that we are all learning.
I must tell you it's harder than learning French.
But we're working on it because we're committed to learning.
But because our skills are not yet perfected, we can use the services
of ARCSWiD, the center, the resource center
for students with disabilities.
Entry to the university is free for students but if you're bringing
in a partner, there is a charge.   You get a day pass to come in.
But we've waived that pass or day pass
for people accompanying people with disabilities.
You know, your guide, your family member who comes
in with you to assist you.   We waived a charge for that.
We also don't allow pets in the library.
They're part of your equipment and they are allowed in.
And regardless of what disability you have ranging from those
that we can see and those that we can not easily recognize,
once you're listed as being disabled,
you get an extended loan period for your loaning materials,
because that means there's something
that inhibits your actual learning process
and therefore we give you more time to use resources.
We've got specialized services for staff that are on wheelchairs
and I will show you a picture of how we [inaudible] in the new building
as you're busy renovating our old building.
Within the library, we also keep wheelchairs
because they can be temporary physical disability.
If you're diabetic and your sugar has dropped, you'll need help.
And so we keep wheelchairs for those sorts of temporary disabilities.
And then a special parking close to the library, close to the ramp,
for staff as well as for students.
We've increased in our e-Collections because we find
that it's a lot easier to translate those into languages that people
with disabilities use and we try and use as much of the mobile technology
so that again, because we are a distance learning institution
that the persons don't come to the library for interventions.
And I'll speak specifically
about the technologies we have invested in.
In addition to the lessons that we get from ARCSWiD on sign language,
we've also invested in SignGenius which is a set
of video clips to learn sign languages.
And for us in South Africa, it's a challenge
because of our many languages.
And so we, unfortunately, at the stage that's translating
from English and Afrikaans.
But most people work with those two languages 'cause those are the
languages of the marketplace.
And we all are working at learning the sign language.
We've also invested in something called EasyConverter.
But in addition to all those things that it can do,
converts to printed text, converts text to MP3,
DAISY, Braille and large print.
We've also invested in paying for that
because while there are exceptions in the copyright law in the country
for services for people with disability,
we have a challenge of numbers.
We have over 1500 students that are sight impaired.
And because of the many translations that we do
into those different languages, the rights organizations decided
that we would have to pay for some
of the conversions because it's too much.
But we're negotiating with them, that it should really--
volume should not be the issue.
If there is exceptions allowed for education, volume should not matter.
It's human beings for whom we need to provide the service and do need
to translate that text into MP3, into DAISY,
into Braille in order that they may learn.
We've also invested in several Dolphin Pens and we loan this
out to students and try to ensure that it's our centers.
Students can work with this Dolphin Pen so that then again,
they are able to download software that they need to use
into a Dolphin-enabled PC.
It's a huge investment for us as a library but again, because our IOP,
our organizational operational plan has committed itself
to providing a service and creating an environment for people
with disabilities to learn, we have to fund that commitment.
A number of other instruments we have invested in,
the Merlin Desktop Magnifier is for people who are partially sighted
and it enlarges the page that you can read.
The book reader that you see is in audio.
It will read and then it will be in audio but also can translate it
if you get another software into Braille as well.
We recently had an audit and one of the things
that were being audited was our services for students
with disabilities and Murphy's law, that morning,
the scanner didn't work [laughs].
Fortunately the student vouched for us that it always works [laughs].
A number of other technologies that we have invested in
and as you can see, a lot of them are mobile because we loan them
out to the students and they can use them at their homes and the book,
BookCourier, the audio book player and we buy a lot of audio books.
And the ones if we don't buy that are only available in print,
the tools convert them to audio so that then it can be played back,
the BookSense and the ClassMate player.
I think earlier that for many of us, students with disabilities,
we've become a university of choice and that is because of this sort
of services that we bring.
Firstly, if we have many complications that
or you have disability that makes you embarrassed to be out in public
and there are many forms, you know, maybe severe deformity.
Maybe you've had chemo and you've lost all your hair
and you don't really want to go out out there,
because we bring the service to you and this, we've become a university
that enables you to learn whatever your condition is.
For many students who are on wheelchairs where it's difficult
to get around a university, it is a lot easier to learn from home,
and so we've become a university of choice.
But then what goes with that responsibility is being able
to invest in this sort of technologies that enable people
to learn by converting what is largely printed text
into formats that can be used.
If iPAL scans prints and converts it to text, or sends it to Braille
or displays it for the blind and the deaf blind.
This is a very recent acquisition but it works faster than any
of our other technologies and is loved
by our younger readers because it is fast.
But its only disadvantage is that only one person can use it at a time
and we can't keep there the text.
But we are working on a way of ensuring
that the student can take their bit but if it is the course that is,
that they are doing and there are other students
with similar disabilities, we can take from that conversion
and keep the file for other students with similar disabilities.
But we're not scanning the same document over and over again
but can make it then available to other readers
that have similar disabilities.
You've probably all seen this ZoomText keyboard
that is with raised keypads.
Again, it makes it easier for people that are living, that are hearing--
sight impaired to work with because the keyboard, the keypad is raised
and it is large and bright and that.   And this is my favorite picture
of our favorite student Sheppard [phonetic].
He is in the library everyday in the morning and is doing a master's.
And he sits there at his desk.
He's our greatest ambassador for the services that we bring
and we've often said to Sheppard,
you know we can bring these things to you at home.
But Sheppard comes to us because he doesn't have electricity at home.
And he's overcome, he's totally blind.
He's doing his master's and he says,
if it wasn't this technology he wouldn't be where he is.
And it's one of my favorite pictures and for me it says,
gives me a reason to get up the hill every morning.
Again, that's a workstation with a raised keypad.
What I also wanted to show was that the workstations--
we've invested in workstations that allow not only for students
with disabilities like that but also workstations
that allow for wheelchairs.
So most of our disability workstations are huge
and you can wheel in a wheelchair and work comfortably.
This is what I said earlier that we ordinarily give people 30 days
to borrow books but for people living with disabilities,
it's 42 days and we can extend it depending on where you're located,
what your circumstances are
because you require the service and then new building.
We're working on a new building.
We're busy getting our 8 floors to get services, more services
and you'll see that the bottom picture shows a wheelchair
and we're having a lot more room spaces that are going
to be wheelchair-friendly and much more accessible to readers
and they'll be at level 2.
So it's easy to go from the car parking lot into this work area.
And we're really excited that we could have this service expanded
in the new building that we're having.
Our library is committed to inclusiveness.
As you can see in this recent celebration
on library week developed at your library that even with students
that are living with disabilities, we are really committed to ensuring
that human development is possible within our library.
And in conclusion, University of South Africa is committed
to bringing knowledge and creating knowledge
for all communities regardless
of physical condition or your disability.
Inclusion is central to UNISA services not only in order to comply
to the government instruments
but our vision compels us that we do that.
Ensuring equal access to learning content regardless of your ability
or disability and we invest in those gadgets that I've talked
about in order to ensure that you get access to learning content.
Our social mandated demands of each one of us who works at UNISA
and our vision compels us to do it.
I thank you very much for your attention and for this opportunity.
[ Applause ]   >> Thank you so much.
>> Thank you.   >> Thank you so much.
Perhaps, there are some questions that you'd like to ask.
And so why don't I just leave you.   >> All right.
Thank you.   If you'll pardon me, I'll say yes
because I don't know your names please.
Eve.
>> I have a kind of two-part question and a lot
of this [inaudible] I'm a former teacher.
And I was a given a class of Special Ed students
without the knowledge they were Special Ed
which is you know [inaudible] instead they're diagnosed
with learning disabilities at different levels
but then they're not addressed in their educational plan.
And I wanted to find out 'cause the university has some things in place
where students who have those learning disabilities
that may not be [inaudible].
Do they have to be in place to assist those students
in diagnosing those disabilities?
And then the second part of my question is about polio,
the resurgence of polio which I think is worldwide phenomenon
and that you know, previously had been addressed
and now they're seeing more people coming up with polio and all
of those very limiting disabilities that come along with polio and is
that something that is happening in South Africa and [inaudible].
>> Okay, yes.   [Inaudible Remark] Oh, all right.
Let me repeat the question.
The first one was about a disability diagnosis.
Does the university have a mechanism for diagnosing?
And the second one is about resurgence of polio
and to what extent we're experiencing that in South Africa.
Usually, the disabilities, learning disabilities are diagnosed
in high school and primary school.
By the time they come to university, they are labeled
or they've been diagnosed.
And so, and I use labeled because some students were labeled.
[Inaudible Remark] Yes.
ADD or whatever and then respond but some students have been diagnosed.
And so a report, I've got this challenge
and the university simply responds to the diagnosis.
We don't do a test but we have, the ARCSWiD helps us
if there is a student who's failing to cope
to help them to get diagnosed.
So the university doesn't provide a diagnosis.
What ARCSWiD also does is to help the university staff,
train university staff to respond.   How do you respond to ADD students?
How do you respond to this?
And so they provide a training for the staff in order to learn how
to respond 'cause it's difficult.
Polio, there is a resurgence all over the world and four years ago,
even before that, the minister
of health Nkosazana Zuma had a very aggressive approach
to the vaccinations and vaccinated people below a certain age.
So we haven't seen any increase in disabilities within South Africa due
to polio because of the very aggressive intervention
of vaccinations against polio.
But indeed there's a resurgence on the continent.
There was another-- I'm going lengthwise,
I mean this way wise-- clockwise-- clockwise?
>> [Inaudible] center of disability services and the university
or are there other people like you in other areas of this,
the university are on the same [inaudible].
>> The university has established ARCSWiD.
We call it ARCSWiD which is the center
for students living with disabilities.
And theoretically, there should be a lot of us
like me doing different things in different parts.
But because of the nature of our university, between registration
and exams, what most students have is the library.
The interaction with their supervisors are largely online
or by post or on the phone.
But the library is the reality of most students
and so I always joke about, yeah, okay, well register as many
as we can and between the exams
and registration I get all 370,000 of them.
So we've had to be active because we then must deal with these,
registered 1600 students living with disabilities.
What is the college of law only it is with 50.
And college of human sciences deals with 25 and the college of--
and we deal with the bulk of them.
So we have to need to be active and ARCSWiD says
if only all departments were like us.
But it's not because we want to be good.
It's because we have no option but to do this in order
to provide a learning content to all our students.
Yeah. But all-- all departments must comply to goal number 5
which is creating an atmosphere for students living with disability,
learning [inaudible] for students living with disabilities.
So there's a mandatory requirement for everybody to be like that.
We've just stand a little bit more because we must, they are here,
they're in our doorstep, yeah.   And you, Peggy [phonetic].
>> Again, thank you very much for your very, very important
and very interesting presentation.
I wanted to ask since you're identifying new forms
of disabilities [inaudible] as you were saying,
is there is a research part of the university
that is creating let's say new technology.
You've shown us very interesting items that [inaudible]
with some audio and others.
As the disabilities [inaudible] do you have within the library
or within the university a research department
that is creating technology that is using the people's own statements
of what they need as you were saying earlier.
You need to have people's input that is work
on developing new technologies to assist disabled people.
>> Thank you for that question.
It's really something that we ought to be doing.
But we are not doing that.   We're buying the technology.
[Inaudible Remark] Yes, we buy the technology because it's easier.
But the center for-- ARCSWiD, the center for students living
with disabilities helps us to identify the technologies
and helps us to keep track of what new, of what is new,
what has been researched elsewhere, what has been--
precisely because it keeps emerging.
There are some people who are focusing on research and discovering
and doing this and at this stage,
what we are doing is buying from them.
It's a lot easier and a lot quicker for us, yeah, yeah.
But the scanning of the horizon is done for us
by the disability center, yeah.   I hope that helps.
Yes, vice-president.   [ Inaudible Remark ]
Yeah, I think a person like Sheppard is
so determined he will make you pay whoever you are.
He's so determined to go forward.
But the government has put aside a better scheme for people
that are disabled and different tiers of that, I mean disadvantaged
and different tiers of disadvantaged get certain portions
of government support.
The university also gives scholarship to assist students
that are deserving like Sheppard and many kinds of assistance.
I think the university's commitment is expressed
in so many different ways.
We had recently a colleague who had a condition
that ate away their psychomotor system and they lost ability
to use their hands and eyes within three years, you know,
from an able man to all that was left was voice.
And when he retired, the university lets him take the equipment he was
using to continue using.
So we follow through with our investment.
It cost us money but there are some prices we're willing to pay
because we are committed to the vision
and the government is also very committed and it must be seen
to put its money toward instruments so students with disability is
like Sheppard get assistance from the university.
>> I'm just wondering during the era of apartheid,
was the university open to all races or was it restricted at that time?
You said you're a distance learning university,
people didn't have a physical presence anyway,
so I'm just wondering if there was segregation at that time?
>> The university provided education for people across races
but black people didn't come to graduation.
It provided opportunity for learning for people that were
on Robben Island, so a lot of people who were in detention
in Robben Island like Nelson Mandela got their degrees from UNISA.
But the black people would not come for graduation ceremonies.
When things were relaxed a little bit in the '90s, they would come
to separate graduations to the extent that after 1994,
there was a special graduation ceremony for people who had been
on Robben Island and a series of graduation ceremonies for people
in Robben Island and for people who had caught their degrees from UNISA
but had not walked across the platform in graduation.
Again, our attempt to redress.
It is sad-- it is our sad history that we continue--
we did provide education to people
but would not let them celebrate their success through a graduation.
And during apartheid days, again,
the entrance requirement was stricter.
It wasn't as open as it is now.
The entrance requirements were stricter.
They still had lots of people registering
because the fees were slightly lower,
many black people could afford the fees, but with the knowledge
that you will not celebrate your success with graduation.
>> Thank you.
Thank you very much for the [inaudible].
[applause] I would just like to add something.
Because we are here at the Library of Congress
and because we are always increasing the knowledge base here,
the publications that we have, we have material here at the library
on disabilities in South Africa.
We have texts related to law, relating to laws.
We-- I noticed the use of terms inclusiveness as opposed
to maybe crippled and it's interesting looking
at the subject headings.
And so for researchers who have an interest
in this subject, come to the library.
We have material on it as well as going to South African libraries
for additional information.
But thank you very much for coming today.
Thank you, and thank you Dr. Buhle Mbambo-Thata for coming.
[Applause]
>> This has been a presentation of the Library of Congress.