Students with disabilities often face obstacles in learning, and some feel Ohio State should do more to assist them.’President Gee and the Board of Trustees should make a statement that disability is the priority issue. They should not put this issue under the carpet,’ said Belinda Spinosi, a senior majoring in bioethics and organizer of Students for Disability Awareness.As of July 18, 1,421 Ohio State students registered as disabled, said Lois Burke, a counselor of the Office for Disability Services. Nearly 45 percent of them had learning disabilities, 16 percent had physical and mobility disabilities, and 12 percent had attention deficit (hyperactivity) disorder, she said. Spinosi has attention deficit disorder, which makes her extremely sensitive to noises when she needs concentration, she said.’Once somebody makes a noise with his pencil during the test hour, I will be totally distracted,’ she said. Disability Services accommodates students like Spinosi with a quiet room to take tests. ‘Disabled people have been stigmatized, because they look different or they ask for things people feel uncomfortable in dealing with,’ Spinosi said. ‘People put them into the group people don’t understand. But people should know they are the same as anyone else.’A disabled person has a legitimate right to have supplements and accommodations from school, said Aris Rosh, a junior majoring in Yiddish and American minority studies. Faculty members need to read the handbook on how to deal with disabled students, Rosh said. ‘It is a simple instruction, but they (faculty) often skip it. So misunderstandings frequently occur at the beginning of the quarter,’ she said.Rosh has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and auditory processing deficit, which makes it difficult for her to take notes during the class. Her anthropology instructor once refused her request to make a copy of the transparent sheet used in the class, she said. Students whose disabilities are not visible are often misunderstood by faculty members, said Brenda Brueggemann, assistant professor of English and comparative studies. Brueggemann has a substantial hearing loss from birth. Faculty members should be aware of difficulties of those students, Brueggemann said. ‘They need to be educated,’ she said. Faculty members should include some statements about disabled students in the syllabi or express welcome to them in the first class, and should know that group work can be embarrassing to a student with a learning disability, said Tanya Kunze, a counselor of the Office for Disability Services. ‘Good communication is the key,’ she said.