In Canada, 75% of students with disabilities abandon their postsecondary education and 27% of disabilities identified at the postsecondary level in Québec relate to learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder.
With an increasing number of these students entering Québec’s postsecondary institutions, measures must be put in place that will allow them to overcome the barriers caused by their learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder and lessen the impact on their education while fostering the development of their true potential.
What are the needs of Québec students with learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder?
What are the needs of Québec students with learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder (ÉTA) with regard to learning strategies and upgrading their mathematics and French skills, and how can online tools help these students to overcome their difficulties during their first year of college or university? A recent study has provided a better understanding of the needs of ÉTA students for learning strategies that enhance listening and reading abilities, spoken and written communication, and the management of attention, concentration and memorization. The study also examined the institutional marketing mechanisms for reaching and motivating students to consult services or online tools that support student persistence, as well as the self-regulation strategies used or not used by postsecondary students in seeking help.
The study’s impacts included the creation of a number of free online resources: a support system for educational persistence adapted for ÉTA (SAMI-Perseverance); tools for detecting dyslexia, dyscalculia and attention deficit disorder in French-speaking college and university students; interactive multimedia tools to enhance learning strategies and mathematics skills; a knowledge base on the issue of student abandonment and persistence (BC-Persévérance); and finally, (8) a set of ergonomic guidelines for the development of online support tools for enhancing persistence in postsecondary education based on the preferences of students with or without learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder.
Main researcher
Louise Sauvé, Université TÉLUQ
Deposit of the research report: July 2012