Support for Students:
UTS provides support for students with disabilities, medical conditions, or mental health challenges. Register with Accessibility Services to receive reasonable adjustments for learning, assessments, exams, and placements.
Services include:
- Personalized Support: Work with an Accessibility Consultants to develop individualized Access Plans.
- Reasonable Adjustments: Modifications to support academic participation.
- Resource Provision: Tools and strategies to enhance learning experiences.
Contact Information:
- Phone: +61 2 9514 1177
- Email: Accessibility@uts.edu.au
Academic Liaison Officer (ALO)
Academic Liaison Officers (ALOs) are faculty members who seek to support student-carers, pregnant students and students with disabilities or access requirements (including medical conditions, mental health, and learning needs). On behalf of the Faculty, consulting as with Faculty staff, the ALO addresses requests for reasonable accommodations for students registered with the Accessibility Service. They also address reasonable accommodations for student-carers and pregnant students, who register directly with the ALO preferable early in semester.
Contact information
- Law faculty ALO: Maree Murray
- ALO- Law email: ALOLaw@uts.edu.au
Research and Advocacy:
UTS Disability Research Network
The Disability Research Network (DRN) is a UTS initiative that brings together researchers, students, and community members to advance disability-related research. The network promotes inclusive and accessible research practices across various disciplines, aiming to drive social change and improve outcomes for people with disabilities.
Key Focus Areas:
- Interdisciplinary Research – Connecting experts from different fields to explore disability-related issues.
- Inclusive Practices – Ensuring research is conducted with, rather than just about, people with disabilities.
- Social Impact – Driving policy and practice changes that enhance accessibility and inclusion.
Keep up with their upcoming events!
Expertise at UTS:
Dr Linda Steele
Law Health Justice Research Centre, Faculty of Law
Dr. Linda Steele is a socio-legal researcher specializing in disability, gender, law, and justice. Her work critically examines how legal systems interact with issues such as violence, segregation, and inequality. She has over a decade of experience, including working as a solicitor at the Intellectual Disability Rights Service. In 2023, she was the recipient of the NSW Women Lawyers Achievement Award for Legal Academic of the Year. Linda regularly collaborates with Disabled People’s Organisations including Women with Disabilities Australia and People with Disability Australia.
Her research focuses on:
- Criminal justice and forensic mental health law
- Sterilisation and menstrual suppression
- Restrictive practices and institutionalisation
Contact information: Linda.Steele@uts.edu.au
Opportunities for Law Students
Law students interested in disability rights, criminal justice, and legal reform can engage with Dr. Steele’s work through:
- Accessing her publications and research profile at UTS
- Reading key studies, such as:
- Truth commissions on disability institutions: towards a disability truth and repair framework
- Redressing Human Rights Violations in Long Term Care
- Women and Gendered Dementia Dynamics in the Australian Aged Care Royal Commission
- The Human Rights of Women and Girls with Disabilities: Sterilization and Other Coercive Responses to Menstruation
- Law and Disability ‘Supported’ Employment in Australia: The Case for Ending Segregation, Discrimination, Exploitation and Violence of People with Disability at Work
- Explore Linda’s research website Truth Justice Repair
- Truth Justice Repair is a program of research led by Linda which investigates injustices related to institutionalisation and disability-specific and older age-specific injustices.
- Core question: How do we reckon with and repair injustices against disabled people and older people?