Accommodation Request Process
The Office of Accessibility Resources works with all Cherry Hill Seminary students with disabilities and diagnosed conditions to identify reasonable accommodations that allow equal and equitable access to programs and services. The accommodations process is collaborative. The main contact for accommodations and accessibility questions/concerns is the Student Services Coordinator. Follow the steps below to request academic accommodations:
Step 1: Complete the Accommodation Form
Complete and submit this form. Guidelines for documentation can be found on our Accessibility Resources webpage. Please upload documentation to your Accommodation Form and/or send documentation as a PDF or Word attachment to OAR@Cherry Hill Seminary.org.
A Note on Documentation: Even if you are concerned about not having the “correct” documentation, we still encourage you to complete the Accommodation Form. We can still have a meeting with you to discuss your request, and if we find that we still need documentation after the meeting, we can talk about it at that time.
If you are already registered with us and have existing accommodations but need to request additional ones, please contact us as soon as possible to discuss your needs.
Step 2: Communication from Accessibility Resources Staff
After you submit, you will receive an automated message from Accommodate thanking you for setting up an account. If there is any additional information needed, Accessibility Resources staff will communicate with you. We will also reach out to set up an interactive meeting with the student. Please allow 10 to 15 business days for this process, depending on the time of year.
Step 3: Documentation Review
Your Accommodation Form and any documentation submitted is reviewed. The purpose of the review is to:
- establish a disability
- understand how the disability may impact the student
- make informed decisions about accommodations
Step 4: Meet with an Accessibility Resources Staff Member (if needed)If necessary, following the documentation review, a staff member will email you with a prompt to set up an appointment to discuss accommodations. At the appointment, you will discuss:
- your experiences with your disability or diagnosed condition
- how your diagnosed disability or condition impacts your academics, including but not limited to: classes, written assignments, research, and fieldwork.
- potential accommodations you might find helpful to mitigate educational barriers
Accessibility Resources will ask you some questions regarding your experiences to better understand and support your request for accommodations.
Step 5: Receive Official Accommodation Letter
- Your official accommodation letter will be sent to you by email
Step 6: Faculty Notification and Conversation
- You are responsible for sending your official accommodation letter to instructor(s) after you receive it
- Schedule an appointment to meet with instructor(s) to discuss implementation of accommodations
- If you need any support discussing accommodations with your instructor(s), please contact Accessibility Resources
Documenting a Disability
Students with disabilities who are seeking accommodations at Cherry Hill Seminary University must register with the Accessibility Resources Office with *this form.
In order to provide a clear and equitable process for requesting accommodations, Cherry Hill Seminary has adopted the following documentation guidelines. Students are encouraged to refer professional evaluators to these guidelines before submission of documentation for an accommodation request.
Documentation Guidelines
- A qualified professional must conduct the evaluation. Documentation should be obtained from a licensed medical or mental health professional who is not a relative of the student requesting accommodations.
- Up-to-date documentation. Documentation should be current, typically within the last five years, with some variability based on the condition. More recent documentation may be requested for conditions where symptoms vary over time, such as some anxiety based-conditions or medical conditions with fluctuating symptoms over time.
- Required elements of documentation:
- Presented on letterhead. Should include contact information as part of the letterhead to aid in follow up as needed.
- Diagnosis. Please include date diagnosed and most recent evaluation.
- List of procedures or tests used to determine diagnosis. These will vary by disorder but might include medical evaluations, clinical interview, cognitive tests, achievement tests, academic fluency tests and/or rating scales. If standardized testing is administered, please include subtest, scale and total scores from all tests administered as well as an interpretation of the results.
- Functional Impact of the diagnosis. Common major life activities that might be impacted in an academic environment by a disability diagnosis include seeing, hearing, learning, reading, concentrating, thinking, and communicating.
- Anticipated duration of functional impact. Is this a condition for which follow up is needed to determine functional impact after a set time period? (6 months? 1 year?) Or is functional impact anticipated for the duration of studies at Cherry Hill Seminary?
- Recommended accommodations in an academic environment. Including how those accommodations would reduce the functional impact of the disability diagnosis.
- Known history of use of accommodations in academic environments.
How do I submit my documentation?
Uploaded as a .pdf file. This is the preferred method. The student may attach documentation to the Accommodation form, or email it to OAR@cherryhillseminary.org.
Need Help?
Please feel free to contact our office with any questions about the above guidelines.
If you had accommodations in a prior school but do not have current or complete documentation, submit the documentation that you have, and we may be able to grant provisional accommodations to allow time to obtain comprehensive and updated documentation.
Rights and Responsibilities of Seminary and Students
The following enumeration of rights and responsibilities is intended to provide a general overview of the respective roles of the Seminary and the student. It is not intended to be a complete or exclusive list.
Cherry Hill Seminary:
- Has the right to identify and establish the abilities, skills, and knowledge necessary for success in its programs and to evaluate applicants and students on this basis;
- Has the right to identify and establish the abilities, skills and knowledge that are fundamental to academic programs and courses and to evaluate each student’s performance against these standards. Fundamental program and course standards are not subject to modifications;
- Has the right to request and receive documentation that supports requests for reasonable accommodations for individuals with a disability;
- Has the right to select from among effective reasonable accommodations for individuals with a disability;
- Has the right to refuse an unreasonable accommodation or one that imposes an undue hardship on the Seminary;
- Has the right and the responsibility to engage in an interactive dialogue process to identify appropriate reasonable accommodations;
- Has the responsibility to evaluate applicants based solely on their abilities. If an evaluation method or criterion unfairly discriminates against an individual with a disability, the Seminary may seek reasonable alternatives;
- Has the responsibility to ensure that its programs are accessible and usable;
- Has the responsibility to adjust or substitute any academic requirement that illegally discriminates against a student with a disability and that is not essential to the integrity of the student’s academic program;
- Has the responsibility to identify for students the procedures for requesting an accommodation. If a request for accommodation is denied, Cherry Hill Seminary has the responsibility to inform the individual of his or her right to appeal the decision and the procedures for initiating an appeal.
- Has the responsibility to educate and provide consultation to Seminary faculty and staff on general disability matters.
Rights and Responsibilities of Individuals with Disabilities
The following enumeration of rights and responsibilities is intended to provide a general overview of the respective roles of the Seminary and the student. It is not intended to be a complete or exclusive list.
Qualified Individuals with Disabilities:
- Have the right to an opportunity to participate meaningfully in and benefit from programs offered at Cherry Hill Seminary. This includes access that is comparable to that provided to any student;
- Have the right to confidentiality and the right to choose to whom information about their disability will be disclosed (except in the case of a health or safety emergency, as permitted by law);
- Have the right to an opportunity to learn. In order to ensure this, they have a right to reasonable accommodations;
- Have the right to access published information regarding procedures for requesting accommodations;
- Have the right to be informed of procedures for initiating an appeal of a decision regarding accommodations;
- Have the right and the responsibility to engage in an interactive process to identify appropriate reasonable accommodations related to their disability;
- Have the same responsibility as all students to meet and maintain the institution’s academic standards;
- Have the responsibility to inform the appropriate Seminary personnel (Accessibility Resources staff members) of the disability and to advocate for their own individual needs and to seek information, counsel, and assistance as necessary to be effective self-advocates;
- Have the responsibility to self-disclose a disability and to demonstrate and document how their disability substantially limits their ability to benefit from a particular delivery system, instructional method, or evaluation criterion when they make a request for accommodations. Students requesting accommodations must provide documentation of need from an appropriate professional, such as a psychologist, learning disabilities specialist, or medical doctor (when the disability is health related), dated within the four years prior to enrollment at Cherry Hill Seminary;
- Have the responsibility to follow published procedures for making accommodation requests and to do so in a timely fashion;
- Have the responsibility of promptly informing Accessibility Resources of any difficulty in receiving the approved accommodation(s).
- Have the responsibility to follow published procedures for filing an appeal.
