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Breakout 1A
9:00 am - 9:50 am Central Time
Unlocking Ability: Accessibility Considerations for College Correctional Education Programs
Presented by
Jenifer Montag - Director, Disability Services Marion Technical College, in Marion, Ohio
Session Description:
Second Chance Pell Grants from the U.S. Department of Education will be open to all incarcerated individuals to seek out their college education. Maruschak, et al., (2021) identified 38% of all incarcerated persons have a disability. College disability service providers may soon see an increase in disabled students needing accessibility in the highly constrained correctional facility (prison) setting. Providing accommodations on the general college campus is difficult; facilitating access in the prison setting is complicated, but not impossible. Learn about the barriers to providing accommodations in the prison setting and strategies you can use to implement critical access to incarcerated students. ​
Speaker Bio:
As the director of disability services at Marion Technical College, in Marion, Ohio, Jenifer Montag, Ed.D., has over 20 years of experience in postsecondary disability service provision at a variety of institutions. She completed her dissertation (Facilitating Equal Access for Disabled Students Who Are Incarcerated) in 2022 at Northern Illinois University. Prior to Marion Tech, she was not familiar with college correctional education programs, much less the needs of disabled students who are incarcerated. Her focus is now on ensuring equal and equitable access to the critical educational opportunity programs to include those who are disabled and incarcerated.