There are 150 students who qualify for note-taking services through Accessibility Services. The department, however, only has 125 note takers to fill an estimated 500 classes.
"There is a lot of demand for that service," said Gary Haug, interim director of the department. "It is very difficult to recruit and find students whose schedules match up."
He said another hurdle note-takers face is the requirements of the job.
"They also have to have background in the subject matter of the course," he said.
Accessibility Services is designed to aid disabled students.
The department has a budget of $950,000, but Haug said the program could always use more money - especially for more technology.
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He said the department has four computers with software that aids people with disabilities, including screen readers and dictation programs.
"Certainly maintaining and upgrading the technology would be good for the future," he said.
For blind students, textbooks and course materials can be transcribed to braille or scanned into a computer and converted to MP3 format, Haug said.
"It can be a time-consuming task," he said. "We converted in excess of 140 sets of material."
Haug said only one student needed books converted to braille this semester.
The difficulty of converting documents to braille is not just time consumption, he said.
"There are the physical aspects of it, like breaking the spines off of the books to scan it," he said. "But then we have to make sure the quality is high."
Haug said the department has 15 to 20 proofreaders to ensure computers scan the material correctly.
For deaf students, sign language interpreters are available for use during lectures and exams, he said.
Associate professor Phyllis Wilcox has been at the University for more than 20 years. She is deaf. She said before the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, it was difficult to get help for deaf or hard-of-hearing students.
"To get an interpreter, we used to have to go to the president of the University," she said. "There was no place where we could get help."
She said Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Services, which is a part of Accessibility Services, was established 15 years ago to help with these problems.
"Once it was established, it's evolved into a wonderful institute," Wilcox said, adding that about 30 sign language interpreters are on call who can assist in anything from seeing a show at Popejoy to meeting with professors.
Erin Wilkinson, a deaf student, said her greatest challenge has been getting audio recordings of her class sessions transcribed.
"I record my classes and turn in my tapes to be scripted so I can read what people are saying exactly," she said in an e-mail. "This is suitable for advanced courses like my graduate courses. The Accessibility Services hasn't been as prompt as they have promised, but they are trying to make amends."
The former director of Accessibility Services was Juan Candelaria. He resigned from the position last October, and Haug stepped in as interim director.
Haug said all changes made to the program since he began have been positive, but he doesn't claim it's perfect.
"We have more to accomplish and more work to better deliver services," he said.
He said the department tried to utilize winter break to get a head start on textbook transcription.
"We tried to get out in front of that and had some success, but we can still make improvements," Haug said.
About six students per week enter the office with concerns about service, he said, but no students have dropped classes this semester because of inaccessibility as far as he knew.
Wilcox said she is happy with the work Haug and others have done with the program in the last few months.
"The department makes such a difference in a disabled person's life," she said. "They don't have to fight to get their needs met anymore. They can just focus on their education."
