Daily experiences of a visually impaired undergraduate student in Science and his inclusive reality

Abstract

Social and scholar inclusion process is still one of the major difficulties faced by people with special educational needs (SEN). At Brazilian federal universities, the entry of people with disability is possible based on a set of measures, provided for in legislation, that ensure not only access, but also full participation and learning conditions for all students. The objective of this study was to identify the real conditions of inclusion of a visually impaired student from a higher education course at a federal university, checking if the undergraduate student faced accessibility barriers and identifying the factors that guaranteed the student's permanence in the course. For this purpose, an open questionnaire and a qualitative approach was used as methodology, in which six types of accessibility were considered: attitudinal, architectural, communicational, instrumental, methodological and programmatic accessibility. The procedure was a semi-structured interview followed by an analysis of the collected contents. The results showed that it is necessary to invest in teacher training and planning actions to raise awareness about inclusive education with the academic community, in order to create permanence conditions for students with SEN in order to successfully complete their graduation.