Submission: UCLA fails to support necessary mental health needs

The Office for Students with Disabilities is supposed to help students suffering from physical and mental ailments beyond their control. A disabled student is supposed to register with the office as soon as they start school at UCLA to receive accommodations necessary for them to cope with the quick-paced quarter system. But what happens if she doesn’t register until, say, the end of her freshman year?

What if she didn’t know the major depressive disorder, generalized anxiety disorder and panic disorder she was diagnosed with before high school counted as a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 until after she has been set behind so far that she can no longer dig herself out of the hole she found herself in?

The administrators at OSD will do everything in their power to help her, but their power is limited. Although professors have an obligation to accept the suggestions of OSD, other academic administrators are not met with the same standard of compliance. The student will learn the process of accommodations and proctored testing, but if they only have one quarter left until they are dismissed and they haven’t been familiarized with the procedure during their first year of college, the path they see is covered with fog and uncertainty. The student will be dismissed despite the disability they have been trying to overcome.

Despite the fact that the on-campus Counseling and Psychological Services has limited student visits of six visits per academic year, despite the letters from OSD, psychologists and psychiatrists, and despite the evidence that she is disabled and in need of assistance, the College of Letters and Science will not reverse their dismissal decision. It will send the student to UCLA Extension, which can be more costly depending on the courses taken. Financial aid cannot help and the Economic Crisis Response team will send her away because she is no longer a student at UCLA. The dismissal letter reads “Once a Bruin, always a Bruin” and instructs them to call back once the student is ready to proceed with classes.

I am ready to be enrolled full time as a student at UCLA. I finally found an outside therapist in Westwood, a major I can see myself in and I have finally found a stable regimen of medication to keep me sane.

It is of no use. The committee in charge of my dismissal appeal decided that despite all of the evidence to support my mental health stability, I must prove my academic worth elsewhere before being re-admitted. I had to ask my mother to give up her savings in order to continue with my education on campus through UCLA Extension.

The academic institution at UCLA has failed me – I feel as if I have failed my family and myself.

Mental disabilities are very real and yet not visible to the eye. We that bear these disorders are not seen at face value, but as another file with poor academic standing. I can only imagine the number of students that have come to UCLA expecting a bright future only to be pushed away for the effect of their mental disabilities.

I am one person. This is an anecdotal essay. I have experienced a large amount of pain since I became a student in such a large campus. I have sought out help from wherever I can turn, but in the end I am but another statistic.

I’ve stood in many lines in the early morning trying to see an academic counselor. Many times, I have had to come back for a different same-day appointment or to beg them to give me an appointment in advance. Students here do not have one counselor that understands their circumstances – the school has too many students to ensure their success.

UCLA Academic and Budget statistics from 2006 show that around 70 percent of freshman students graduated within four years and 91 percent within six years – these statistics are from before the most recent recession and before the never-ending rise in tuition.

I would like to see newer statistics for the entering freshman students to see before they set their eyes on UCLA. I would like all of the extra students that have been accepted into the UC system for the upcoming 2016-2017 academic year to understand where they have decided to enroll is very much reaching capacity and that the academic counselors can barely handle the needs of the students already enrolled. Many students have found the need to transfer to a community college to move on with their education, as I was advised to do. I never felt that I fit in here at UCLA, being an introvert with suicidal thoughts on a campus with smiles and sun. I walk my path of shame alone and away from UCLA, until I can prove my worth of belonging here once more.

Ramirez is a former UCLA student and a current UCLA Extension student.

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2 Comments

  1. First, please identify the specific provision in the California constitution that entitles a person to attend UCLA. Next, please show us where in what laws or university regulations it is stated that a student is not allowed to walk into the disabilities office and ask the question, “is my disability covered?”

    The university should not go out of its way to accommodate a former student who is incapable to performing day-to-day responsibilities as an adult. You have the responsibility to seek whatever attention and resources necessary to help yourself absorb here at UCLA. The administration here doesn’t owe you any more than it owes other disabled students.

    I myself registered with the OSD here at UCLA after three years of study. I also didn’t even think my disability was covered. But when I discovered that it was, in fact, a disability that could be addressed here, I didn’t demand an apology from the administration and expect them to get down on their knees begging me for forgiveness that I didn’t come in sooner. I said to myself, “Oh well, it sucks I didn’t come in sooner,” then I moved on. That’s how you address disappointment as an adult. Plus stop with the entitlement.

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