This project is a love letter to the disabled Smithies, past and present. You deserve to have your stories told, honored, and preserved.
Did you know that Sophia Smith, founder of Smith College, was Deaf? I bet you didn’t. Most people don’t.
Why is the history of disability and disabled students at Smith College overlooked? Why is it erased? Why is it inaccessible? Where in our institution’s history were/are students with disabilities making themselves and their needs known? How did Smith College meet the needs and support the dreams of students with disabilities? How did the College fail students with disabilities? What did Smith do? Where are we hiding, or where is our history being hidden from us?
I began this project in the fall of 2023 after struggling at Smith to find evidence of disabled students at Smith in the archives. I was driven by the need to find this hidden history and show my friends, my peers, my community members, and my school. I found partial answers in the delicate papers in thin folders in heavy boxes in stacks in a building in an institution that radiates academic superiority in a school that is deeply inaccessible. I looked in folders labeled with scrawling handwriting titled “General Accessibility,” “Handicap Services,” “Services for the Differently Abled,” “Special Needs Services,” and “Services for the Disabled.” I poured over the contents of each folder looking, searching, asking: Where are we being hidden? Where are we present? Why is disability made invisible?
The history of accessibility is inaccessible. My goal is to make the history of disability services at Smith more accessible to everyone, but especially to the disabled students at Smith. If you don’t know your history, how can you change the future?
This research project has taken me in multiple directions over the last two years, and now I seek to add to the archives.
To build a bridge between the past and present, I conducted an oral history interview with ej seibert ‘08, Director of the Accessibility Resource Center.
ej seibert
biographical note: ej seibert (they/them) is the Director of the Accessibility Resource Center at Smith College, as well as a poet, writer, and activist whose work touches on belonging, inclusion, and disability justice. Seibert attended Smith College from 2003 to 2008, and was involved in track and field, residential life, and the American Sign Language Club. Seibert graduated from Smith with a BA in English. After getting a Master’s of Social Work from Westfield State, Seibert worked in community mental health before returning to Smith to work as the Director of the Accessibility Resource Center (ARC, formerly the Office of Disability Services, or ODS) in 2022.
interview abstract: In this interview, ej seibert reflects on their experiences at Smith College as a student (2003-2008), their journey with accessibility and accommodations, and touches on the disability community at Smith during their time as a student and as the director of ARC. They discuss the changes they have initiated and witnessed during their time as the Director of the Accessibility Resource Center (ARC) since 2022. This interview fills an archival gap left by the lack of preservation of student stories and administrative accountability on issues of accessibility.
Watch clips of our interview and click on the text below to expand and read the transcript.
“Disability justice in an educational context is about envisioning a better world for everybody and a place where… all of the different ways of learning and teaching are honored, and …where anyone who wants to show up to learn and teach has the opportunity to do that.“
Seibert, EJ, interview by Sarah Mitrani, transcript of video recording, March 12, 2025, p. 19.
Question: “What does disability justice mean to you in an educational context?”
SEIBERT: “Yeah, that’s a big question. I love that question. I mean, I think about universal design, but it’s not just universal design. It’s really, it’s a foundational restructuring of the systems that we’ve been handed. It’s being able to say, this was, this is actually wrong from the start, with everyone’s best intentions, this educational system– and I don’t just mean Smith, but like education as a broader system– it was just wrong from the start. And we can say that from the disability justice angle, as much as we can say it from a decolonial angle, as much as we can say from an anti-racist angle, as much as we can say it, right, with all of the lenses. And I think disability justice to me is able to hold each of our part in that. And then it’s not just saying, hey, this was wrong from the start, it was set up, it’s exclusive, we want something that’s inclusive, is then to make the jump into here’s how we envision that, and here’s not just how we envision that theoretically, but here’s how we actually move the action forward on that. So I think disability justice in an educational context is about envisioning a better world for everybody and a place where, like all of the different ways of learning and teaching are honored, and a place where anyone who wants to show up to learn and teach has the opportunity to do that.“
“In terms of the biggest challenge or barrier… is just inertia… and then with an inertia… we’ve been heading in this direction for so long and everyone’s kind of used to heading this direction, so it feels like work to… make some accessibility updates, even if eventually it would lighten the load.“
Seibert, EJ, interview by Sarah Mitrani, transcript of video recording, March 12, 2025, p. 17.
Question: “What do you think is the biggest challenge to making Smith more accessible, like whether that’s physical, academic, or social environment, what’s been the most resistant to accessibility improvements?“
SEIBERT: “Mmm, that’s a great question. I mean my first, like, impulse to respond is inertia. Like I actually, right, and I think that some of the changes we most need, like there’s a challenge with physical and mobility improvements because the campus, some of the structures are really old. So it’s a lot to update old structures, right. Where there are certain things that can’t be updated. Like we can mitigate mold in a basement, but we can’t actually rebuild the entire building. And so some of those challenges are there, but I, I, you know, I think in terms of the biggest challenge or barrier, I think is just inertia. Right. And then with an inertia, it’s like we’re well, we’ve been heading in this direction for so long and everyone’s kind of used to heading this direction so it feels like work to try to change course or make some accessibility updates, even if eventually it would lighten the load. Right, like if we implement universal design and that’s like not just kind of like encouraged, but actually really required in many ways. That would actually– eventually not in the initial change– but it would eventually lighten the load for instructors in addition to students and students, whether or not they have identified disabilities. Right. And that feels like a heavy lift to people because everyone’s so at the edge of capacity, right, and feels overburdened for understandable reasons. So I think that inertia is the biggest barrier, you know.”
“Students bring a different level of disability pride, a different level of willingness and capacity to engage conversations about access needs.“
Seibert, EJ, interview by Sarah Mitrani, transcript of video recording, March 12, 2025, p. 18.
Question: “Getting into comparing your experience as a student and as an administrator. So looking at Smith from both of these perspectives, you’ve talked a little bit about some of the most significant changes that you’ve seen, like dining or having more staff, but is there a meaningful difference in the way that the college approaches disability support? Is there a mindset shift, a culture shift?”
SEIBERT: “Yeah, yeah, I think there is a different openness. I think students I think that first of all comes from students, right? When I was a student, you know, the first time my girlfriend said, Go to disability services, I was like, I don’t need that, and I don’t want to be seen going in there, right? The internalized ableism was so deep. And I think part of that was the time, right? Like, so that in the early 2000s was not a time when people were very open about access needs… And so I think part of it, the culture, the larger culture we all swim in has shifted some, and like that’s unfortunately because also struggles are so widespread like, and this was true before the pandemic. I mean, having worked at UMass, I can say mental health needs spiked around 2016… Yeah, there are some changes in this country around 2016 that were particularly right, like, impacted folks around mental health. And, and then the pandemic just kind of made it even worse. But so we’re now seeing more folks being open about needs sometimes just because they have to be. Which then, although it doesn’t break open a conversation for others. And so I think that larger context has shifted. And students bring a different level of disability pride, a different level of willingness and capacity to engage conversations about access needs. And then I think that follows with, like the rest of the structure… I remember this moment it was maybe in the first month of President Sarah starting, and she knocked on our office door one morning and she said, I can’t believe I haven’t met you all yet. You do some of the most important work on this campus. Right? And it was like, okay, like, we have real support and people who understand the value of this work. And that makes a difference, too, right? And, and I don’t think, like in all the conversations I’ve been in, I haven’t really run into folks who are like, We don’t want accessibility here. I run into a lot of folks who are like, We don’t know how to do this, or we don’t feel like we have time. Can you help us out with this? Right. And when we then have people in the structure of Smith, in the institution of Smith, from the President on down saying this is important, it then helps to make space for those conversations to deepen. So I do think it feels really different here.”
“Students are the driving force.”
Seibert, EJ, interview by Sarah Mitrani, transcript of video recording, March 12, 2025, p. 19.
Question: What do you think the student role in changing Smith is?
SEIBERT: I think, Smith’s capacity to really engage what change means has shifted.
MITRANI: Yeah. Can you expand a little bit more on what you think the student role in that is?
SEIBERT: Oh, huge. Yeah. I mean students are the driving force. Right. And I think that, there are times where, you know, I could say or someone else could say, hey, we need this. And then we have like 500 students saying that sometimes way more eloquently than we do. And also like in numbers. Right? And really like showing this is actually important. That’s actually often what moves things forward. Right, like the student role in our ARC strategic planning process is so key, which is part of why we have the ongoing student advisory group. Right. It’s so that we can collaborate because often students, first of all, like current students tell us what the exact needs are. I can make guesses. And sometimes those guesses are really accurate, and other times they may, like, have 20 years ago me informing my guess about what’s needed, and that’s not helpful, right? So having current students inform us of like exactly what is your experience, that’s really helpful. And then again, like having numbers and having, having that energy, it’s like, is so often what actually moves things forward.
“Welcome.”
Seibert, EJ, interview by Sarah Mitrani, transcript of video recording, March 12, 2025, p. 21.
Question: “If you could say one thing to a student who just arrived to Smith and was either aware of their access needs or is just starting to become aware, what would you say to them?”
SEIBERT: “Oh, welcome. Yeah. Welcome. And like, when it feels possible, and it won’t always feel possible, have patience with yourself in the process. Right. Like I think that that kind of like self-compassion and other compassion and, it can be really hard in those moments because there’s so much of like coming up against a barrier feels personal and, and like cuts into our energy and cuts into our feelings of self-worth and cuts into all these things, but I think that that patience, when we can have that patience to know, like, okay, if I come at something with patience and some curiosity, sometimes that will help open a door.”
Guiding Questions
Take a second to share your thoughts on this project and interview below. Here are a few questions to think about:
- What was your knowledge, understanding, or awareness of the history of accessibility, disability, and the students and administrators who led the changes?
- Why do you think this history is not widely known?
- From watching these clips and/or reading the transcript, what are the significant changes ej seibert identified, and what is the student role?
- What is the value and importance of documenting and preserving the narratives and experiences of current Smith students and administrators?
Further Research
In fall 2023, I wrote a seminar paper and recorded a podcast documenting the development of Smith’s disability policy and accessibility efforts from 1973 to 1994.
Listen to the podcast here (Google Drive link).
For more resources about the history of accessibility at Smith, check out my shared google drive of the documents* I scanned during the first phase of this research. The documents come from the College Archives, specifically the collections: Office of the Dean of the College Records, Office of the Class Deans records, Office of the President Thomas Corwin Mendenhall Files, Office of the Provost/Dean of the Faculty records, and Student publications and student publications records.
*Many of the documents I tried to access were restricted, and many I felt that I could not, in good conscience, post online without receiving consent.
Secondary Sources
Hanscom, Elizabeth D., and Helen French Greene. Sophia Smith and the Beginnings of Smith College. 1926.
This is the book that started this whole project for me. When I learned that Sophia Smith became Deaf over the course of her life, I was surprised, but I was even more shocked that it took until my junior year to learn this. This book discusses how Sophia Smith’s life and identity led to the founding of Smith College. I find it interesting because it highlights how she truly felt disabled by her Deafness, and I believe that it had an influence on her desire to found a college
Madaus, Joseph W. “The History of Disability Services in Higher Education.” New Directions for Higher Education, no. 154, 2011, pp. 5–15. https://doi.org/10.1002/he.429.
In this article, Madaus goes into the history of disabled students and the services provided to them in higher education from the early 1800s to 2011. It provides helpful context to the first disabled students in college and gives a good overview of the development of disability policy. In order to understand Smith’s disability policy and accessibility developments, one must place it in a broader context; Madaus sets the context and defines it as a constant and difficult struggle, which aligns with Smith’s journey.
Patterson, Lindsey. “Points of Access: Rehabilitation Centers, Summer Camps, and Student Life in the Making of Disability Activism, 1960-1973.” Journal of Social History, vol. 46, no. 2, 2012, pp. 473–99. https://doi.org/10.1093/jsh/shs099.
Patterson’s article provides a fantastic historical perspective on how disabled people came together to organize for disability justice. Her description of how disabled college students in the late 1950s and 1960s, specifically at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, University of California Berkeley, and the State University of New York, organized to advocate for disability justice. She argues that universities were some of the first places other than specific summer camps for disabled people, where people with similar experiences of exclusion, discrimination, and denied access connected and challenged their universities to accommodate them. Her discussion of how they began developing networks of activism that spread beyond their colleges is highly relevant to my research.
Pelka, Fred. “Institutions, Part 1.” What We Have Done: An Oral History of the Disability Rights Movement, University of Massachusetts Press, 2012, pp. 48–60. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt5vk2js.7.
This is just one chapter I have read, but Pelka’s book documents the ugly and painful details of the conditions and cruelty experienced by disabled people before the civil rights movement. His work using oral histories of prominent advocates is helpful because I conducted an oral history and am using it to tell a larger narrative. The ways that Pelka integrates the oral histories is an intriguing strategy, especially given the popular history aspects and democratic nature of of oral histories.
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