Dowling seventh floor. Through the double doors. Down the hallway. Final door on the left. Here you will find the humble office of the StAAR Center, tucked away amid the offices of administrators and student services. But don’t be fooled by its size. This modest office coordinates academic support for every Tufts student with a learning disability—perhaps even you.
Over the past few years, there has been a nation-wide increase in learning accommodation requests in higher education. In 2018, The Wall Street Journal reported that, in the eight years prior, accommodation requests for the PSAT and SAT rose by 171%. In the 2022-23 school year, the number of students aged 3-21 who received special education under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act was 7.5 million, or 15% of all public school students. The Chronicle of Higher Education stated that the accommodation centers at universities have had to expand their staff and resources, yet they remain overwhelmed across the board. At small, private institutions, they added, it is common for one staff member to work with up to 500 individuals requiring support. Some students choose not to register with their school’s center due to this resource constraint. Others have no choice but to brave the system. In 2022, The National Center for Educational Statistics reported that only about one-third of students with a disability reported it to their institution’s accommodation center. At the same time, professors have cited having to readjust their workload to support students that aren’t getting enough help from accommodation centers.
One educator affected by this is Ichiro Takayoshi, an associate professor of American literature at Tufts University. He theorized about this increase in demand, suggesting that “this uptick of students requesting accommodations, and therefore putting stress on something like the StAAR [Center], is at least partially a result of some major dislocation that these students had to go through during the pandemic.”
Associate Dean of Student Accessibility and Academic Resources Kirsten Behling confirmed this stated rise in accommodations, telling The Tufts Tribune that the number of undergraduate students, AS&E graduate students, and Fletcher graduate students using StAAR Center support has increased from 875 in 2019 to more than 1,200 today, though it should be noted that the overall student population increased roughly 13% in this time.
The growth in number of students with accommodations has been coupled with many departments adapting course assignments in response to the proliferation of AI. Humanities classes, in particular, have increasingly replaced at-home essays for in-class assignments, which tend to require more work on the part of the StARR Center to offer accommodations. Takayoshi emphasized his recent difficulties helping students who need extra-time accommodations for testing, describing that professors like himself often cannot feasibly proctor extended exams with their packed schedules. “I wouldn’t be surprised if [the StARR Center is] struggling with this capacity issue, this transition among professors like me from essays to in-class exams has been an exacerbating factor,” he remarked.
Some believe that beyond the increase in overall number of students with accommodations, the variety of accommodation types has grown as well. Takayoshi describes accommodation categories as becoming more “bespoke” when compared to before the COVID-19 pandemic. Reflecting on his own classroom environment, he expressed that “Before the pandemic, I had the sense that, when I’m teaching a class, I’m teaching a class. I’m not teaching a class of 15 different students with 15 different needs.” Takayoshi believes a shift to more personalized accommodations would naturally demand more resources from the StARR Center.
Students have expressed mixed experiences with professors’ acceptance of their accommodations. Kai Markley, a sophomore at Tufts with accommodations granting him reduced distraction testing rooms and typed notes, relayed his experiences with the StAAR Center. On his first day of classes, freshman year, he had one professor who expressed complaints about the accommodation that allowed Kai to forgo handwritten notes. He recalled the professor saying, “My policy supersedes the StAAR Center.” Outside of that, Kai expressed that his interactions with professors have been generally positive, despite understanding that “it is a whole extra job on them” to make accommodations. “It’s a lot of work, but they’re willing to do it.”
However, some professors feel this work is unfairly placed upon them as the StAAR Center struggles to respond to the uptick in resource demand. One Tufts professor anonymously expressed having increased difficulties in attending to student needs this semester. He attributes this difficulty to a change in procedure, requiring students to email their professors to receive an accommodation, instead of directly addressing the StAAR Center to book exam dates and rooms. He expressed that the new accommodation format was not properly communicated to professors, which required them to learn the new procedure as the semester progressed.
Chloe (‘27), though, maintains that her policy accommodation has stayed the same, and that there are varied degrees of student-professor coordination. Behling described the expectation for students, telling the Tribune that “It is up to the student to make arrangements with their professors to utilize their exam accommodations.”
The strain has also been felt by students. Jehan Antia, a senior, believes the current system places an unnecessary burden on both students and professors. “In my high school, it would just come up on your file or transcript so any teacher already knew,” which he preferred to the current Tufts policy of “downloading and emailing it to your professors.” Ultimately, he lamented, “I wish there was a way in the StAAR Center portal to check ‘Send this to my professor.’”
Beyond communication, students have also reported facing challenges while making arrangements to implement their accommodations. Markley recalled that “During finals last semester, I remember there were just literally not enough computers for all of us who had computer exams, and they emailed me asking, ‘Do you actually need a computer for this exam, or can you handwrite it?’ And I was like ‘No, I do in fact need it.’” Antia expressed that he stopped using his accommodations for Attention Deficit Disorder last semester due to similar logistical challenges. “I had scheduled my exam well in advance and then I got an email the week of the exam that it had been canceled. So I was a little bit perplexed by that,” he told us. Another student, who preferred to remain anonymous due to an ongoing relationship with the StARR Center, struggled to get accommodations in the first place. “For three semesters straight I tried to get my accommodations and [the StAAR Center] made my clinician fill out the same form out over three times,” she described. “The onboarding process was months and months long because they would never follow up.” While the center aims to provide support for students requiring particular attention, these accounts raise concerns that, when ill-deployed, the center’s efforts may become an added burden. Overall, Markley believes that the StAAR Center is doing the best that they can given that “there just aren’t enough of them working there for the amount of students that they need to help.”
Behling attributes the lack of test room availability to spacing changes at the university level. She stated that “StAAR provides support by reserving all conference room spaces in Dowling or working with the registrar to secure classroom space. Last spring, we had access to spaces in Lane and Eaton. This fall, those spaces are being used as classrooms, thus reducing our capacity.” The growing demand for accommodations has caused a clear strain on the StAAR Center and professors, affecting students’ access and support.
In the wake of growing accommodation requests across higher education—whether from increased diagnosis of learning disabilities, the lingering effects of the pandemic, or other catalysts––institutions like Tufts are faced with intensified pressure from all stakeholders involved. Without adequate staffing, sufficient testing spaces, and comprehensive communication, the very system designed to alleviate these burdens can become a barrier in itself. For Tufts to uphold its commitment to ensuring all students have access to the full promise of their education regardless of need, solving this dilemma may be key.
Photo by Morgan Zhang