Stony Brook University’s Student Accessibility Support Center (SASC) reopened on Monday, Oct. 21, after being closed due to scheduled renovations that began on Aug. 1.
SASC works collaboratively with students, faculty and staff to coordinate reasonable accommodations and ensure equal access to education, residential life and campus communities.
“The SASC has grown significantly in both the number of registered students and the staff supporting them. This growth provided an opportunity to optimize and restructure our office space,” Marisa Bisiani, the associate vice president of Student Health, Wellness and Prevention Services, said.
SASC now has a welcoming lobby area where staff can greet students as they enter, along with additional counseling spaces to better serve students.
“Additionally, we are enhancing our sensory room, and we’re making modifications to the testing center in the [Stony Brook] Union to increase space and testing capacity,” Bisiani said.
Stony Brook has an additional sensory room in the lower level of the Tabler Community Center, which opened Sept. 18. The sensory room is a place for students to relax and relieve stress, and is open seven days a week.
At the beginning of the renovation, SASC brought on new staff including a testing coordinator, a flexibility accommodation specialist, a counselor for graduate students and a counselor for professional schools.
“The renovation has enabled all staff to work collaboratively in the same office, ensuring a more cohesive approach to support and programming,” Ashley Conrad, the director of SASC, said.
During the renovation period, staff were temporarily relocated to various campus locations but services remained uninterrupted. The testing center continued to operate, and the newly opened sensory room at Tabler Center provided students with an opportunity to decompress.
Reopening SASC was crucial for students on campus because of the vital support and services it provides, such as services for students with disabilities.
“SASC is an essential service provided to Stony Brook students. We work together with students, faculty and staff to ensure students with disabilities have equal access to everything Stony Brook has to offer, helping remove physical, instructional and attitudinal barriers so our students can thrive,” Conrad said.
“The SASC has been really important during my education so far,” Brionna Garcia, a senior majoring in history, said. “I’m really glad they reopened their office, it’s nice to have a comfortable space to go get the services you need.”
While the sensory room in the Tabler Community Center remains open, the sensory room in the SASC will be reopening later in the fall semester.
