- Vitorian Noelia Da Costa Reviirrigation, with cerebral palsy, needs an assistant at the university to go to the bathroom, take off the shelter or put the computer on the table. However, the UPV/EHU denies him his collaboration on the grounds that the graduate master’s degree he is pursuing is not official. On the contrary, the faculty that teaches it says that the master's degree is official. Meanwhile, Da Costa’s mother spends four hours in the faculty hall “waiting for them to call her for help.”
Specifically, the 26-year-old vitorian has spastic tetraparesis, a condition that affects the arms and legs. He moves in a wheelchair and in his academic career he has always accompanied an assistant (called Technical Specialist of Educational Support). Even when he was admitted to the Social Work Studies degree four years ago, he requested it in the care service for people with disabilities at the UPV/EHU, and although they answered yes, he only started the course: “They told me they didn’t have anyone on the job exchange and as my colleagues would help me go to the bathroom, I didn’t know anyone and I experienced an uncomfortable situation, which went on for weeks, until I sent a letter to the deanship and denounced the situation on social media. I got a helper two days away.”
After four years, the Master's degree in Human Services Management and Innovation has been completed. Again ask for help, but claiming that the master's degree is not official, they reject him and encourage him to give up graduate education, as he tells us. “I am being denied the right to pursue these studies simply because I need help, I can’t believe it.” Da Costa is on stone and has already come to the Ararteko.
Has the matter been clarified: the master's degree is official or not? And even if it's not official, shouldn't help be guaranteed to the pupil who needs it?
If you ask the UPV/EHU, it is not official but "its own title" [the UPV/EHU distinguishes between official title and its own title; official master's degrees offer the possibility of doing a PhD, among others]. I decided to continue my studies and long ago I attended the service for people with disabilities, and once enrolled and nine days before the beginning of the course, I was told that the postgraduate program chosen by me is not considered an official title, I do not have a companion. I do not understand how graduate education is not official when offered by the UPV/EHU, does it offer something that is not official? In addition, the offer does not say that it is not official, do those who are studying it know that in the words of the UPV/EHU it is not an official qualification? And all of this means that if I do an official master's degree in medicine or architecture, I have help, but if I do this master's degree related to my studies, don't I have help? It doesn't make sense.
I find it hard to believe that it is not official. Moreover, according to the dean of the school in which I study the master's degree is official. It is a master's degree taught by the UPV/EHU and I am a student of the UPV/EHU. In other words, even if it was not official, rights must be guaranteed, it is not enough argument. If the regulation is to be amended, it should be amended to ensure equal opportunities for people with functional diversity.
They think they have a regulation in which they say they do not have to support studies that are not official, but that same regulation says that people with special needs have to guarantee their rights throughout the period of stay in the university and I continue to be a student of the UPV/EHU [“The object of this regulation is to regulate the actions of attention to students with disabilities in the UPV-EHU have special education needs.
"The regulation says that people with special needs must be guaranteed their rights throughout the period of university stay and I am still a student at the UPV/EHU"
Have you been denied the aid and have you not been given other alternatives?
I've been encouraged to give up graduate school. I think they thought I would give up following, but it has not been so and they too have been surprised. Somehow, I've been filled with access to these studies, it's discriminatory. “For these support needs go to the associations.” I've also had to hear that, it's terrible. You're a public institution, and if you make an offer for students, it's for everyone or it's not legitimate. If it really is an offer for everyone, put aid and guarantees, because everyone has different needs.
I've also been told that when people with functional diversity have finished their careers, they don't follow their studies, as if it were an argument. And even if so, why not open the door to anyone who wants to continue learning? Now I am suffering from this situation, but in the future it may be another person with functional diversity. I do not know if I am finally going to get help, but if it is going to make the journey easier for the people behind me, I will be happy.
And now what?
At present my mother comes with me to graduate school, to Vitoria and to Leioa [part of the master's degree is there], and in college she sits in the hallway waiting for me to call her for help. I have not resigned from graduate school and I am pleased with it, because it would be to go against my principles and to give the UPV/EHU a reason, and I would like to show that the UPV/EHU is not right on this issue. Once the administrative procedure has been completed, an appeal for replenishment has been lodged against the UPV/EHU decision and is pending resolution. At the same time, we have made the case available to the Ararteko. As I've been taught, you have to fight to make dreams.
The UPV/EHU says it is an inclusive university.
It's a typical speech, but it doesn't match reality. As a public organization, and if you say that your services are for everyone, try to do so, because inclusion begins by offering equal opportunities to those who have functional diversity.
In any case, I would like to stress that I denounce what the UPV/EHU does as an institution, but that I have had the support of my faculty and have done what is in your hands to help me.
"People with functional diversity are constantly being asked to show that we can do it, because before we do it we conclude that we cannot do it."
“You have to fight to achieve dreams,” he says. Have you had to fight a lot in life?
I have great dependency on my core tasks and day-to-day is not easy, but fortunately I have a good company and a strong environment and great family protection. And although it's hard and painful, it's possible to be happy with cerebral palsy. My philosophy is, “What can I do to move forward in this situation?” Despite the progress that has been made, functional diversity (or disability, I do not care to use one or the other) is still not recognised in society.
Specifically in education, I have often heard things like “you can’t”, “but how you’re going to do that!”, but I’ve always advanced, overcoming obstacles and not overcoming me. I also had to listen to him at the high school so I wouldn't show up for the selectivity, because I would drop the note from the high school. In society, people with functional diversity are constantly being asked to show that we can do it, because before we do it we conclude that we cannot do it, but why do I have to be constantly demonstrating what I have chosen or what I can do? Even if you do not tell me, I am aware of my limits, but I like the challenges and I want to try myself. And I can say, for the time being, that cerebral palsy has not been an obstacle in getting dreams in my life.