Equal Access Units for Persons with Disabilities and Students with Special Educational Needs in Public Universities - Greece

According to Article 209 of the Greek Law 4957/2022, all public higher education institutions in Greece are required to establish “Equal Access Units for Persons with Disabilities and Persons with Special Educational Needs” (hereinafter referred to as ‘Equal Access Unit”).

The Unit's mission is to ensure the full participation of the members of the university community with disabilities and special educational needs in all educational, research and administrative activities carried out by the universities.

Specifically, some of the responsibilities of the “Equal Access Unit” include:

• The implementation of the “Equal Access Plan for Persons with Disabilities and Persons with Special Educational Needs”, provided for in Article 226 of Law 4957/2022. The Plan includes the measures the University intends to implement in order to:
  • Improve the accessibility of its buildings.
  • Facilitate the access of persons with disabilities and persons with special educational needs to the educational process and other educational activities.
  • Improve digital accessibility.
  • Promote the inclusion of persons with disabilities and persons with special educational needs in the labour market.
  • Facilitate the equal participation of the aforementioned persons in academic life.
• Supporting the “Committee for Equal Access for Persons with Disabilities and Persons with Special Educational Needs” in carrying out its tasks. According to Article 220 of Law 4957/2022, this Committee, which is made up of 9 members -including the Head of the “Equal Access Unit”, members of the teaching and research personnel who are either persons with disabilities or have experience in disability/accessibility issues, and students with disabilities- is an advisory body. Its role is to make recommendations to the relevant bodies of the university on developing and implementing equal access policies for persons with disabilities and those with special educational needs.
• Monitoring national and European legislation and policies, as well as the national strategy on the rights of persons with disabilities.
• Supporting access to the educational process by providing appropriate accessible literature and educational material, and interpretation services.
• Implementing alternative examination methods for students with disabilities and students with special educational needs, according to their needs and educational potential.  
• Providing individual assistive information technologies.
• Providing accessible transport services to persons with reduced mobility.
• Maintaining statistics on disability and the accessibility of the University’s infrastructure and services. 

These are some examples of Universities that have already established “Equal Access Units”

• International Hellenic University.
• University of Macedonia.   
• University of Ioannina.
• University of Patras.    
• National and Kapodistrian University of Athens.
• Athens School of Fine Arts.
• University of Aegean.

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