When Nikhita Steward-Trivedi searched for academic programs this summer, the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Accelerated Learning Program (ALP) caught their eye.
Steward-Trivedi —who has Goltz syndrome, causing vision and mobility impairments — saw the three-week summer intensive as an opportunity to pursue their career goals and a place where it would be easier to receive accommodations for their disability, in their mother Lina Steward-Trivedi’s view.
But on June 28, just two days before the program began, program administrators told Steward-Trivedi they were unenrolled because ALP lacked time to review and plan accommodations.
In the weeks since, the 14-year-old has demonstrated on campus by holding sit-ins and marches to call for changes in how the university handles accommodations.
The Daily Cardinal asked Steward Trivedi, who goes by ‘Kitty’ and uses gender neutral pronouns, how this experience made them feel about UW-Madison’s treatment of people with disabilities.
“They don't,” they said. “[To them] we’re objects.”
‘Everything was fine until it was too late to reach out’
Since Kitty became eligible earlier this year, they have received support from Wisconsin’s Department of Workforce Development Division of Vocational Rehabilitation (DVR), which helps people with disabilities join the workforce.
For an academic program that aligned with Kitty’s career goals of becoming an artist, it would be easier for the DVR to “play more of a hands-on role,” Lina told the Cardinal. DVR agreed to pay the program’s tuition and coordinate accommodations.
Before they applied to the program, Lina had been in contact with ALP coordinators regarding Kitty’s needs, including Katie Effertz, associate director of operations and residential programs at UW-Madison, who assured her the program could accommodate Kitty.
“They said yes to pretty much everything,” Lina said.
On the advice of her DVR counselor, Lina visited the McBurney Disability Resource Center to figure out how to begin the process of obtaining accommodations.
Lina said McBurney told her they don’t support high school students directly, but they support university programs by request.
“If the program identifies they need help, then they'll step in and offer support, guidance and technical assistance,” Lina said it was explained to her. “That never happened though because whatever the disconnect was within [ALP], seemingly, everything was fine until days before the check in, and at that point, it was too late to reach out to McBurney.”
This disconnect concerned the lack of an aide in the classroom, which Kitty required to assist her with notetaking and other tasks.
DVR had said from the beginning they would fund an aide, and Lina reached out to program staff inquiring if the university had aides available.
Lina met with ALP Program Manager Jamison Wendlandt June 19, where he indicated the university could grant the majority of the requested accommodations, such as extra time and priority seating, but not personal attendants, which he said the university doesn’t provide.
Up to that point, Kitty’s DVR caseworker had assumed the university would provide in-house aides, but after it became apparent it couldn’t, Lina said they went “full speed” to find an agency that could provide an aide.
Then on June 26, Lina said they found an agency in Sun Prairie that committed to providing an aide, and the next day DVR sent Lina a proposed schedule for the first two weeks of the program. The proposed schedule, which employed a rotating cast of aides, did not cover the last week of the program, which Lina said DVR lacked.
But when Lina visited campus to meet Effertz the same day, she said the university could not accommodate Kitty and they suggested they commute instead of participating in the residential aspect of the program.
Lina declined that option. In emails viewed by the Cardinal, Lina wrote Associate Dean of Continuing Studies Aphra Mednick on June 26 asking why the program potentially cut Kitty “after all the accommodations needed have already been funded or committed by DVR.”
Mednick told Lina on June 27 accommodations required time to plan for, and the university received the request too late.
After Lina responded by listing the accommodations Wendlandt had agreed to, Mednick replied on June 28, acknowledging that while the DVR had confirmed they could provide a classroom aide, “they did not have a person identified for providing this work as of this morning.”
Mednick continued by saying the DVR wasn’t aware of the time it would take for a DVR worker to comply with UW-Madison and UW System policies in order to host a minor on campus.
She also brought up accommodations during the residential portion of the program, which she said the DVR and ALP both couldn’t provide, though Lina previously communicated to the university that Kitty only required an aide in the classroom, not in the dorms.
“With the delay in receiving complete information about Nikita's needs, the university has not had adequate time to review, determine, and plan reasonable accommodations and will not be able to do so in time for this program,” Mednick.
Mednick suggested it was possible for Kitty to participate in ALP in the future but said at that time, UW-Madison was unenrolling Kitty.
Lina disputed multiple aspects of Mednick’s termination email. She said that morning Mednick had held a Zoom meeting with the DVR team, who told her of the proposed schedule and the identified aides, as well as the fact an aide in the dorm wasn’t necessary.
“They didn't want to find a way to make it work,” Lina said. “From how it was relayed to me, the university was just trying to shut [Kitty] down.”
UW-Madison spokesperson Kelly Tyrell told the Cardinal the university took “significant steps to work with the [Steward-Trivedi’s] over the past three months” and said some information that had been shared about the situation was inaccurate or misleading.
“UW-Madison did not deny any accommodation to support the student in classroom and residential settings,” Tyrell said. “The family did not complete required documentation on time, so the university did not have adequate time to review, determine, or plan for a reasonable accommodation.”
Tyrell also said Kitty was offered additional options to participate in ALP before the program began, including an option to commute, which was declined. After Kitty was unenrolled, an option to participate in the final week of the program or a fall program was also declined, she said.
“Ensuring all students, including K-12 students, have access to campus programming is extremely important to UW-Madison,” Tyrell said. “Hosting youth on campus requires significant due diligence on our part to ensure that we are meeting all of the university and state requirements to meet the safety and well-being of participants, including those who require accommodations or have additional needs.”
Tyrell didn’t respond when asked what UW-Madison and UW System policies concerning hosting minors in dorms Mednick cited were, or why it would be an issue if Kitty only required an aide in the classroom.
An hour there and back, Kitty demonstrates on campus
Kitty still showed up on campus at the start of the program despite their unenrollment from ALP. For much of July, Kitty has been outside the building her class would have been holding signs reading ‘Disability Teens Matter,’ and ‘UW Expelled Me because I have a Disability.”
Lina highlighted the class they were supposed to take — Art, Advertising and Activism — and said she was incorporating its principles into their protests.
“She can't do art and activism in the classroom, but we could do it here,” Lina said. She said the commute to campus took an hour each way, but they were willing to do it to spread awareness of disability rights.
“Things need to change,” Kitty said. “The whole thing just needs to change.”
Protests inspire community, draws support from campus members
Early in Lina and Kitty’s protest, they visited the UW-Madison Disability Cultural Center (DCC), a space on campus that uplifts disabled students and provides community space. There they met UW-Madison students who connected with Kitty’s experiences and joined their protest.
“I remembered [Kitty] was very emotional the first time we went to the DCC,” Lina said. “She was thanking everybody for validating her as a person.”
Some of these students then formed the UW-Madison Disabled Students Union (DSU) on July 2, a student organization committed to advocating for disabled students on campus. A DSU spokesperson said they and their friends had been considering starting an organization like the DSU for a while, but Kitty’s story and activism was the catalyst.
They remembered meeting Kitty and Lina and sharing “similar experiences with our own undergrad accommodations.”
Before forming a community at UW-Madison, DSU members said they considered dropping out of UW-Madison because they felt alone navigating rigid and ableist learning environments and were “constantly having to be forced to be activists.”
“At UW, I've just always had to justify my existence on campus and justify that I can be here as a disabled student,” they said.
McBurney does not go far enough to support disabled students, the spokesperson said.
“Of course, they do a lot to help students, and I'm really, really grateful for the people that work there,” the spokesperson said. “It is a legal compliance center that is kind of more suited to protect — at least from the students’ perspective — the university and sticks very strictly to the ADA laws, which are not very Disability Justice oriented.”
Disabled students are often tasked with communicating and negotiating their accommodations directly with UW-Madison faculty themselves, which the spokesperson called an “unfair power imbalance.”
The spokesperson also said disabled students are left without accommodations in the absence of a third party such as McBurney, to help in negotiations with faculty. They recalled instances where emails to McBurney staff members and faculty for additional support were not addressed in time during an academic semester.
“When accommodations are denied even though it's technically not allowed, it's really difficult in the student's position to advocate for yourself,” the spokesperson said.
In order to help change this system, the spokesperson said the DSU wants to work on workshops for faculty on disabilities and advocate for more support for McBurney students.
The need for a disabled representation in ALP persists
In addition to the DSU, Kitty has also received support from the Blk Pwr Coalition, Students for Justice in Palestine and the ACLU Student Alliance, which called Kitty’s removal from the program “a reflection of the ableism on the UW campus.”
Lina said their protests have garnered much support, though it hasn’t gone without trouble.
Mednick ordered Kitty and Lina to cease interaction with ALP students, faculty and staff within campus buildings while summer programs are in session, calling their actions “disruptive” and in violation of university and UW System policies, according to an email shared with the Cardinal.
Additionally, Lina said Kitty’s friend in the program received instructions from ALP staff to not engage with the protest.
Mednick didn’t return a request for comment. Tyrell said Lina was an “unauthorized adult in program spaces,” so she was asked not to engage with youth participants. She declined to comment when asked if ALP staff told program participants not to engage with the protest.
To Lina, the Steward-Trivedi’s interactions with program administrators demonstrated the necessity of having a disabled student in the program. She criticized the system in which administrators — who she said aren’t aware of students' needs — decide what accommodations they receive.
“UW Madison needs to allow families with K-12 students enrolled in UW Madison programs to access support from the UW McBurney Disability Resource Center to avoid what happened to Kitty from happening to another child with a disability,” Lina said.
This isn’t an issue isolated to Kitty, but one that affects people with disabilities across the board, Lina said.
Gavin Escott is the campus news editor for the Daily Cardinal. He has covered protests, breaking news and written in-depth on Wisconsin politics and higher education. He is the former producer of the Cardinal Call podcast. Follow him on X at @gav_escott.
Noe Goldhaber is the college news editor and former copy chief for The Daily Cardinal. She is a Statistics and Journalism major and has specialized on a wide range of campus topics including protests, campus labor, student housing, free speech and campus administration. She has done data analysis and visualization for the Cardinal on a number of stories. Follow her on Twitter at @noegoldhaber.
