Last semester, disabled students had a 90% student graduation increase and the Disabled Students Programs & Services at Long Beach City College is to thank for the sudden increase.
DSPS works with teachers and staff to make sure that the proper accommodations are met so that students with disabilities are able to learn to their fullest extent and gain the most from LBCC.
Maria Ek-Ewell, the DSPS Director and someone who has worked with DSPS extensively, is happy with the increase of DSPS students graduating, but throughout her time here, Ek-Ewell was unhappy with the difference in student graduation rates.
“Our DSPS students were not graduating at the same rate as our non-DSPS students,” Ek-Ewell said.
Ek-Ewell suggested that the increase could be traced back to the hard work and dedication of the faculty, staff and student workers.
According to Ek-Ewell, a majority of the 90% increase was also due to the unexpected and sudden increase of enrollment in the DSPS program.
DSPS currently has 2,492 students, according to Ek-Ewell, and have expectations that their graduation numbers will continue to grow.
DSPS once only had six students graduate, and Ek-Ewell ensured that the numbers will never be that low again.
“That hurt our feelings at DSPS because we felt like we should have had more than six handicap students graduating,” Ek-Ewell said.
“We’ve made the proper adjustments to make sure that the graduation numbers for handicap students will never be that low again.”
DSPS is currently working to keep those numbers of DSPS students going up by doing a lot of outreach to students to ensure that students are getting every bit of information as possible and having the proper accommodations.
“It’s really a multi-prong approach of really wrapping the student in a support blanket that helps them give all the things they need,” Superintendent-President Reagan Romali said.
DSPS Counselor and Learning Disability Specialist, Veronica Njoku, reaffirmed that the faculty are the foundation of DSPS.
“It took me by surprise that there was a large increase, but I felt this year there was going to be an increase,” Njoku said.
Rogelio Diaz, a current DSPS student, is planning on joining that 90% increase after discovering he wants to become a cybersecurity networker.
“It’s pretty awesome because people like me, people with disabilities, are achieving something great by graduating,” Diaz said.
The DSPS office at LAC is located at A-1134 and the PCC office is located at GG-107, their hours are from Monday – Thursday 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. and 8 a.m. to 12 p.m every Friday.