Dear UBC community members,
During this National AccessAbility Week (May 25 – 31), I am pleased to provide an update on UBC’s efforts to support our obligations under the 2021 Accessible BC Act, which require the establishment of an accessibility committee, an accessibility plan and a tool to receive feedback on barriers to accessibility from the campus disability community.
The Accessibility Committee and the Accessibility Planning Team, established in 2023, have been diligently working to progress not only our legislated obligations to meet emerging accessibility standards but also our aspirations towards broader intersectional disability equity, inclusion and justice goals aligned with UBC’s Strategic Equity & Anti-Racism (StEAR) Framework.
These efforts are described in the Report on UBC’s Accessibility Plan.
During this time, the Equity & Inclusion Office (EIO) has also launched a feedback mechanism for the UBC disability community, located within a newly developed online Accessibility Hub. The hub will continue to expand as more accessibility, as well as disability equity, inclusion and justice resources are created and/or curated, and as the site builds links to the network of campus services and supports available for UBC’s diverse disability community.
Currently, an Action Plan is being developed to identify what UBC is doing well and where there are opportunities to improve compliance with new standards and to progress commitments to aspirational goals beyond compliance measures. The EIO has hired a strategist and seconded a project manager to support and sustain accessibility planning, implementation and evaluation work.
As well, the Accessibility Committee, with the guidance of EIO staff and support of a newly hired graduate administrative assistant, is designing a campus consultation process to engage disabled students, faculty and staff to inform the Action Plan. The purpose of the engagement process is to identify persistent barriers to meeting accessibility obligations and ideas for aspirational disability equity, inclusion and justice goals. The aim is to launch the campus engagement in the fall of 2025 and to also report back to the community with an update on the Action Plan.
Finally, we are launching another call for volunteers to serve on the Accessibility Committee. Members of the UBC disability community are invited to apply to fill a number vacancies. Please review the call for applications and, if you have questions, please email accessibility.committee@ubc.ca.
Dr. Arig al Shaibah
Associate Vice-President, Equity and Inclusion