James Rose, 20yrs old

Click here to go to the 'Commissioned Published Articles' section.

My time at sixth form college was good. Academically, I was fine and left with two Bs and one C at A-Level. I had assistants in college who helped me get around the campus and took notes for me. The support there was brilliant because they listened to me to tailor it to my needs. Since I started mainstream education, making friends has not been easy due to people’s negative perceptions of what they call “disability”. I joined the Student Committee, and this did help me get into the social scene a bit more. I was then elected to represent the students on the college's board of governors. It was the year when the governors had to approve the building plans for their new Arts complex. As the Student Governor, I took the opportunity to advise the college on how they could make it completely wheelchair accessible.

When it came to choose my university, I chose to go to University College Falmouth because it is wheelchair accessible and the course appealed to me. The people at Falmouth are very keen to accommodate my needs – they listen to me, which is more than I can say about my social services! The transition from college proved to be a difficult one because social services did not provide the right type of support despite advice from me and my parents. I nearly left because of the stressed this caused me. Apart from that, I enjoyed myself and finished off with a 2:1 for my first year.

The Disability Students’ Allowance from my LEA bought me a brand new desktop computer amongst other equipment for me to use in conjunction with course. This has helped me no end! It even pays for my internet connection in my room at university.

Overall, the educational establishments I’ve been to have, generally, done as much as they can to accommodate my needs. Most problems I encountered arose from very poor understanding and bureaucracy at local authority level.