disability awareness: on inclusion & academic support

A2: What's going on everybody, this is A2. My intention as a host is to shine light on topics that I feel don't get a lot of airtime. Last recorded conversation, we learned from Taleah in how she taps into her extroverted personality as a form of empathy with introverts—it's a novel idea that extroverts and introverts can coexist, but a conversation well worth having, which you should definitely check out if you're interested in communication in general.

This next conversation you'll hear is with a lady who I have a ton of respect for and have had the pleasure of working under for many years. Debbie is a lady who has seen me go through many changes. Her service is to my alma mater’s academic support center, working closely with students who have limitations to learning, namely disabilities. As a sibling of a child with limitations of her own, I've always been thankful to have been associated with the passion Debbie puts into her work. Here's our conversation.

Debbie: My name is Debbie Forshee-Sweeney. I'm the director of the Teaching Learning Center at Union College, and we provide accessibility and accommodation support for students with disabilities along with academic support to all students on campus. Whether that's through academic coaching or tutoring, we are just helping students find resources directly related to academics. Which, let's be real, when you're in college, everything is related to academics and affects your performance. We're here to support students in their journey to help them reach their goals, whatever those may be.

A2: Awesome. So how long have you been in this particular role—not necessarily just the Teaching Learning Center, but with academic support in general?

Debbie: Well, being at Union in the Teaching Learning Center, this is really my first role in this specific position. I've done a lot of things before this job, but I've been at Union since 2001. Eeks, that's a long time!

A2: That is a very long time! I think the first thing that comes to mind when I think of academic support is that there is only a certain amount of individuals who are truly built for it in order for it to be effective. For the sake of the audience listening, what was the driving force behind taking on a job such as this? Is there a particular moment in time, or a person in your life that drove you here?

I ask because if someone is going to do this successfully as you have—and thankfully, I've had the opportunity to work with you for almost six years—you learn quickly that there's this really strong passion that comes from being here. It's not just a job or income; it's looking at the outcome of things.

From TLC Student to Director

A2: What brought you into this role?

Debbie: Yeah, that's a long story, so I'll try to make it brief. I graduated from Union College with a degree in social work, and while I was here, I was actually a TLC student myself. If it wasn't for the TLC, I don't know where I'd be. God always has a way of working things out, but in my mind, I'm guessing I may have never gone to college or thought I was capable of it without that support. The TLC is what allowed that to happen. I found out I could be a very successful learner, and I owe a lot of that to the people who were here at the time.

I graduated and went on to do many things. Later, I wanted to take advantage of Union's guaranteed education program. Things were getting to a point in my previous career where I needed a change, so I looked into becoming an art teacher, because when I got my social work degree, I also minored in art. When I came back to pursue that, the director at the time—who had also been here when I was a student—said, "Hey, you would be a great academic coach. Would you be interested in doing that?" I said, "Yeah, I'd love to." She hired me, and the rest is history. She was an amazing mentor to me. When an opportunity arose for her to move on, she put my name in for the director position. They promoted me, and I've been here ever since.

I'm passionate about the TLC for many reasons, heavily rooted in what the staff did for me when I was a student. When students come in here now, I get their struggles on so many levels, both personally and professionally.

A2: Is that personal connection centered on the unique struggle of balancing academia within the broader landscape of college life?

Debbie: Exactly. You're balancing school, potentially working your way through college, maintaining relationships, and—if you're a student with a disability—trying to navigate the acceptance and understanding of your diagnosis. You're learning how to self-advocate, fighting to get where you need to be, and trying to remain independent while embracing the fact that accommodations are actually what make you independent. When students come in here having those kinds of struggles, the conversation for me looks different than it might for others because I've experienced it firsthand.

The Power of Diagnosis and Acceptance

A2: I want to talk more about disability accommodations specifically. I have a sister who was in special education and required accommodations throughout her schooling. A major reason I enjoyed working with you for six years is because we both immediately understood how vital this service is. For you personally, going through your schooling, did you have to overcome a specific disability, or was it something a close friend or family member went through?

Debbie: I would say both. Most of my K-12 experience was in a private school environment where nobody recognized learning differences; we just didn't have that information back then. The frustration for me was that I was never even diagnosed until I came to Union. It was the people at the TLC who looked at my work and said, "Hey, this is probably what's going on."

Discovering that made a huge difference in my life. Suddenly I realized, Oh my gosh, I'm not stupid. I'm actually really smart and extremely capable. I just didn't understand what I needed to do in order to learn. It gave me the opportunity to gain new strategies, techniques, and accommodations. My first semester utilizing them in college, I earned a 4.0 GPA—something that had never happened in K-12, I can tell you that right now.

> Debbie: "You get this title or label, and what are you supposed to do with it? It’s not like you didn't have the disability before, but now it’s validated. Once you move past denial or grieving into acceptance, you can make good decisions and do great things for yourself."

>

A2: That is incredibly powerful, and I completely agree. I've seen many people outside of my family go through that exact same realization process. How do you guide a student to that stage of acceptance? When people find out about a diagnosis later in life—which can often be delayed due to the culture or environment they grew up in—it can make them feel "less than normal." How do you work through that conversation?

Debbie: That's a really good question. I'd like to say there's a magic formula or a cookie-cutter answer that works for every single person, but there isn't.

A big part of it is simply taking the time to get to know the person and providing an atmosphere where they feel like having a disability is no big deal. When they see that I don't treat it as a massive, overwhelming flaw, they start feeling comfortable enough to share. A lot of it comes down to relationship building. I can usually sense when a student is ready for that conversation and when they aren't. If they aren't ready to accept help, pushing them prematurely can actually be harmful. It's about being acutely aware of where that person is at that exact moment. They have to know that it is a safe place to talk, which ties directly into confidentiality.

Creating Safe Environments Through Confidentiality

A2: Absolutely. I know firsthand how serious you are about confidentiality.

Debbie: Yes! Every single person who works here knows I'm practically overkill on it. But in order for students to go through the process of diagnosis and acceptance, they have to trust that every single employee in this department embraces total privacy.

A2: Prior to working with you at the TLC, I spent three years working in accounting. To an extent, I already understood confidentiality because I handled financial information that wasn't accessible to anyone else. Coming to the TLC, I realized it was the exact same concept, just dealing with people's lives and personal situations rather than numbers.

It reminds me of a conversation we had right before we started recording. I recently started teaching piano over the past six months, and my biggest revelation has been the importance of truly listening to your students. Every student is different. If they feel like their time, energy, and attention aren't valued, they aren't going to respond to what you're trying to teach them. Part of it is just listening.

With people with disabilities specifically, I've seen firsthand how people react to my sister. Far too often, people don't take the time to listen and comprehend the vastness of a situation because they are too busy jumping to preconceived conclusions.

Debbie: Oh, I totally know what you mean. I see it happen all the time. When I first came back here to work, many of my former teachers were still on staff. They already knew about my background, but many others didn't. I'll just disclose it here: I have a learning disability and Attention Deficit Disorder—specifically the inattentive type versus the hyperactive type, though I have a little hyperactivity. If you met me, you'd probably be surprised because I'm generally pretty laid back.

During my first few years as director, I was really cautious about disclosing that to students or visiting families. Sometimes, once you disclose a disability, you can see a physical shift in people's posture. They look at you differently. It's not always out of ill intent; often, they just don't understand.

What I have are "hidden disabilities." If you saw me at a coffee house, you wouldn't automatically look at me and think, Oh, she has a learning disability or ADD. People make assumptions based on visual appearance, and when you introduce that extra layer of diagnostic information, their perception shifts.

Shifting Campus Culture and Overcoming Stigma

A2: Since you've been at the TLC since 2001, how have you seen the campus reaction evolve regarding disability awareness and accommodations? How have the student body and the faculty embraced these changes over the years?

Debbie: When I graduated from Union back in 1994, there was a major cultural shift happening regarding learning disability awareness. More representation was appearing in media and research, and landmark legislation like the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Section 504 were becoming highly relevant.

But anything new takes time for people to accept. Decades ago, a professor who had never encountered neurodivergence might have had an attitude of, "I don't believe this is a real thing."

A2: I've noticed that's a very strong attitude, especially within certain minority cultures. The conversation around disability is often brushed aside as something that "couldn't happen to my family," or it gets completely dismissed.

Debbie: Right! Back then, learning differences were frequently minimized as, "You're just lazy, you're not trying, you just need to pay attention." People would tell me, "Just sound the word out." Well, I would sound it out if I could accurately interpret the sounds of the letters!

It has been a massive journey from then to now. There is so much more acceptance today. If my office sends out an accommodation letter to a professor now, they usually just say, "Okay, great." We don't disclose the specific nature of the disability to faculty, and over the last five years especially, I've noticed a significant decline in professors questioning why a specific student receives an accommodation.

That progress comes from repetitive education by our staff. You don't necessarily have to have someone in your personal life with a disability to understand it; you just have to be open to learning.

A2: Exactly. It's about being open to getting it. For a long time, I wasn't open to processing how my sister's disability affected my own life and our relationship as siblings. But once I took the time to see things for what they truly were, I recognized that a lot of societal responses do more harm than good.

People with disabilities have legal rights, but a lot of people operate in ignorance because they view anyone outside of the "normal" spectrum as lacking certain privileges. It comes down to human dignity. There's a great responsibility for educators, parents, and friends to dig deeper and understand how to best accommodate the individual.

Debbie: Well, first of all, nobody is "normal." What even is normal? Please! There is nothing about a single person on this Earth that is normal. We might share common tendencies within a larger population, but normal doesn't exist.

Secondly, don't let this go to your ego, but I've been listening to your podcast, sir! What's fascinating to me is that I know several of the colleagues you've interviewed. I usually keep to myself and stay isolated in my office, so I only know these people superficially from campus meetings. But listening to your interviews with my own colleagues, I found myself thinking, Oh my goodness, I had no idea! That's exactly like me, I've had that same experience. It's crazy that I can sit in a meeting with someone for years and know nothing about their internal world. Until you start talking to people and learning about them as individuals, you just don't know.

People with disabilities are exactly like everybody else—they have diverse tastes in movies, books, and social environments. They just happen to have this one extra structural thing they have to navigate in their lives. We love to box people into categories, and while our brains do that to process information, we shouldn't let stereotypes dismiss who a person is.

The Nuance of One-on-One Impact

A2: I appreciate you making that observation, because taking the time to remove your pride and truly understand someone on a deep level is exactly how I approach my relationships with my piano students and their parents. It has only been half a year, but the impact is incredible. One of my students recently told me, "I don't ever want you to stop working here." Having those real conversations beyond just the curriculum is a feeling I can't even put into words.

Debbie: It fills your heart and your soul, doesn't it? I hear similar things from students telling me I'm not allowed to retire! But on the flip side, I try not to take too much personal ownership of that praise. The success belongs to the student because they were the one willing to come in, put in the effort, and be open to learning. My role is simply to provide the options and opportunities; what they choose to do with them is up to them.

A2: Looking at the TLC on a larger scale, has the department been able to expand its voice or advocacy into the wider local community?

Debbie: Honestly, our community outreach has been limited. Decades ago, the TLC transitioned into a program explicitly designed for students with learning disabilities and physical accommodations. When I became director, the college asked us to also take on students who were accepted on a probationary status or facing academic probation. Suddenly, our doors opened to the entire student body. Because of that heavy on-campus demand, our broader community impact usually happens through intimate, one-on-one opportunities rather than large-scale public initiatives.

A2: And that makes perfect sense. A service this personal is always going to be most successful when executed on a personal, individualized level. I wouldn't have nearly the same impact on my music students if I taught them in a massive corporate setting versus one-on-one.

Debbie: It's still amazing to me how many people don't realize their rights. Even on our own campus, I will occasionally meet a junior who says, "I wish I would have known about you guys earlier." It blows my mind because we do presentations at every single first-year orientation!

Word of mouth is actually our biggest referral source—students telling their friends, "Hey, I go to the TLC and it really helps, you should go." Yet, the stigma of asking for help remains very real. On our end-of-semester evaluations, we consistently see comments like, "Asking for help was so difficult," or "I wish people didn't think poorly of me for coming here." Even after all these years, that stigma is present.

Responsibility, Truth, and Accountability

A2: It definitely starts with the one-on-ones and grows organically through those personal recommendations. I think the biggest issue is that while people want to better themselves, we often invest our energy into the wrong things. We look for quick fixes to satisfy us, but they leave us emptier in the long run.

Debbie: Human nature is so funny like that. We're talking about classic avoidance behavior. That circles right back to what we discussed at the beginning: acceptance. True acceptance is a massive part of overcoming that avoidance in any area of life.

A2: I think about this constantly within the context of social media. It can be a highly effective professional networking tool, but it's a double-edged sword. People spend hours comparing their "behind-the-scenes" reality to someone else's polished "highlight reel." It does so much psychological damage that when a viable opportunity for self-improvement comes along—like the academic support resources at the TLC—people feel too worthless to reach out. They've filled their lives with things that leave them empty.

In this information age, we have the tools to find help much more efficiently than generations past, yet we somehow make the process so much harder than it needs to be.

Debbie: It's funny you say that, because with or without social media, this exact human thread remains consistent across generations. To make myself sound old: decades ago, older generations were saying the exact same things about "those darn kids out cruising the streets late at night, wasting gas, and doing nothing productive."

The cultural vehicle changes—today it's social media, years ago it was cruising, and before that, it was something else. But the underlying behavioral pattern is identical. You're much more articulate than I am, AJ—what's the word? The venue changes, but the human essence stays the same.

A2: Exactly, the vehicle is different, both literally and figuratively. We spend too much time on things that offer zero long-term fulfillment, ignoring the deeper internal issues that need addressing.

The core ethos of this podcast is to "unpack" things—to dig beneath the surface. A lot of people avoid doing that because the truth isn't always attractive; it can be incredibly uncomfortable. One of my favorite authors wrote that the truth will set you free, but it doesn't make the truth hurt any less, nor does it absolve you of the ongoing responsibility that the truth requires. Responsibility is the key word there. The truth demands accountability, and not everyone is ready to answer that call when it comes to their own life.

Debbie: That was beautifully said. Every single one of us is guilty of that avoidance at times; it's fundamentally human. That's why when professors ask me, "Do you think this specific student is going to make it?" I honestly have to tell them I don't know.

I'm often guilty of staying on the fence, but I stay on the fence because human behavior is inherently unpredictable. You can't gamble on human nature. We might have data metrics that show consistency, but we are all beautifully unique, navigating our limitations and arriving at acceptance in entirely different ways.

Look at what you've done today—you've made me sit here and think deeply about all of this macro stuff! It's crazy how a simple conversation can open up all of these avenues.

A2:[Laughs] That's exactly why you're a guest on this podcast, Debbie. Unpacking the deep stuff is exactly what we do.