UCOD Meeting Notes (October 14, 2025)

UCLA Committee on Disability / UCOD Meeting Notes (October 14, 2025)

UCOD Meeting Notes (October 14, 2025)

UCOD Meeting
October 14, 2025 / 2PM / Zoom

Attendees

Voting Members:
Yasamin Bolourian, Fang-I Chu, Christine Craib, Michael Garafola, Cate Gvon, Travis Lee, Carolanne Link (Proxy for Caitlin Solone), Quinn O’Connor, Grace Overman, Sylvia Page, Aryan Pandey, Harold Pimentel, Emilia Podesta, Sal Santa Ana, Nicholas Shinghal

Absent:
Sanaz Nabati, Alexa Vaughn

Guests:
Constance, Roxas Haze, Yonit Kovnator, Jennifer Miyaki, Ariella Morrison, Omar Newland, Spencer Scruggs, K. Supriya, Brooke Wilkinson

Agenda

1. Intros (MG, 8 mins)

2. Disability Pride Week Event updates (Everyone)

a. Full schedule for DPW events

b. DCP instagram will post daily stories tagging units involved in programming.

i. Social media tags to add: @uclabnc and @dsuucla

c. DPW Launch Party:

i. Distributed noodles with programming fliers in Bruin Plaza along with club and departmental information and swag, despite the rain.

ii. Ralina Joseph was not able to attend but will try to attend a later UCOD meeting.

d. Sensory hour for HIRE job fair

i. No Zoom option

ii. Sensory hour will be offered for four other job fairs.

e. CAE Open House

i. Will have food and beverages

ii. Staff will be displaying tools and assistive tech

iii. Sneak peaks of MyCAE

f. Wheelchair basketball was canceled due to leak at Wooden

i. Para-badminton is in the works as a collaboration with the Sports and Society Lab.

g. Drop-in zinemaking workshop

i. Materials for print and digital zines will be provided and zines by disabled creators will be featured.

h. Disability Studies student welcome

i. Wednesday, October 15th from 2pm-4pm on the first floor of Murphy Hall in the small courtyard.

i. Disability allyship training

i. Overview of disability culture and general tips.

ii. Registration required. Contact Travis if there are any issues with registration.

j. CEILS talk: Supporting Neurodivergent Students: Evidence and Strategies for STEM Faculty (& TAs) with Dr. Yasamin Bolourian

i. Content will be useful for non-STEM contexts as well.

k. Keynote: Meet a Paralympian: Sam McIntosh

i. This talk will be hybrid.

ii. Sam is a four-time Paralympian from Australia and will talk about what he hopes to see in the Olympic Village for LA 28.

l. Disabled authors pop-up book display

i. Mixture of fiction and non-fiction. Books are available to check out from the display.

m. “Special” screening.

i. Anyone is welcome to join via Zoom. Email Fang-I for registration.

3. Update on digital accessibility goals

a. Update to ADA goes into effect in April 2026.

b. Digital accessibility of public website project has funding for another year.

c. Governance structure for UC-wide digital accessibility has been announced.

d. DCP is working with DTS, TLC, and others to improve accessibility of content in the LMS.

e. All UCLA websites are already enrolled in SiteImprove. For public websites, contact DCP, including for new websites as early as possible. For internal or LMS content, there may need to be involvement from other departments.

4. November meeting: Change or cancel?

a. Committee votes to meet in November.

b. Committee votes to meet on November 18th from 2pm-3:30pm.

5. Discussion about public presence of UCOD (All)

a. Office of Inclusive Excellence is anticipating a website overhaul.

b. Suggestion to have more schedule information and instructions on how interested people can join UCOD meetings.

6. Department updates and open forum (All)

a. RFQ has been submitted for an architectural firm to produce an ADA transition plan. A company has been selected. They will reach out to community members for input in later stages.

b. Concern expressed about UCSHIP lack of coverage for in-home healthcare. There are UCLA representatives on the UC-wide committee who can be contacted about raising this issue.

c. UCOP is funding a research grant Travis proposed for exploring accessibility of VR/XR learning environments. Travis will post student positions in Handshake and he will send them to UCOD for distribution. Lab and IRB process right now. Experiment will run from January 2026-June 2026.

d. DCP funding is still waiting to be confirmed. Once confirmed, more student opportunities will be posted-will only be available to undergraduates.

e. School of Music conference on Theorizing Trauma and Disability in the Arts.

f. UDAN and DSU are having a virtual escape room on Thursday from 6pm-7pm.

g. Concern expressed about the cost of accessible student housing at UCLA.

h. UCLA Tarjan Center Forum in Neurodevelopmental Disabilities