Decoding DEI: 'It doesn't define you'
For Tarry Palmer, vision impairment is no obstacle to higher education
Sporting a mobility cane, 50-year-old junior Tarry Palmer makes his way across Central Michigan University’s campus, a moment he said he never would have imagined five years ago.
Palmer was born in Detroit, where he lived for six months before his family moved to California. He spent the next 19 years living and attending school there.
He said he had planned on enrolling in college after he graduated high school in 1991; however, his aspirations were abruptly diverted two months later with the passing of his father, changing his life forever.
“He was a single father raising my sister and I,” he said. “So, instead of going to college right after high school, I had to start working two jobs, you know, moving from place to place and even being homeless for a bit.”
Seeking a fresh start, Palmer had gotten in contact with his mother and moved to Canada.
Adapting to a new life
During his time there, he said he struggled with adapting to his new life and dealt with many mental health challenges.
On Aug. 28, 1996, at 22 years old, Palmer overdosed on drugs. After waking up from an 18-hour coma, he realized he had completely lost his vision.
“Over the next month or so, I started getting a little bit of vision back to where I could see shadows, and then it got to where I could start seeing images and people’s faces a little bit more,” he said. “After about a year, it’s pretty much stayed.”
He said after the incident, he could no longer see things in his peripheral.
Palmer describes his current vision as though looking through a pair of foggy binoculars.
He said he has since learned to adapt to his vision; however, it had taken him a while to adjust.
“When you lose one of your senses, especially your vision, you have to learn to do everything all over again,” he said. “Learning to eat, knocking over your drink at the dinner table was common at first, and even learning to walk again without peripheral vision.”
Palmer said he still struggles with navigating certain things placed on lower and higher levels, such as stairs, tree branches and cracks in the pavement.
“Things that everybody normally sees without even thinking about it, it has to be something that I’m consciously trying to navigate around,” he said.
In 2020 Palmer hit a turning point. With the pandemic, he left his job at a telecommunications company and moved to Taylor, Michigan, to live with his sister.
There, he attended online classes at Southern New Hampshire University; however, he said the online format just wasn’t for him. He decided to apply to CMU. Within a few weeks he was accepted and moved to Mount Pleasant.
Palmer said he wanted to attend CMU for its museum studies program, which he said no other university in the state had. The price of tuition had also enticed him to choose CMU over other universities.
However, he said his main determining factor was accessibility within the community.
Accessibility and
advocacy
Before he moved, Palmer said he thought he could rely on ridesharing companies such as Uber to help him get to classes from his off-campus house, but was surprised to find that wasn’t the case.
“I rely heavily on public transportation, so before I ended up making the move, I did look into the city transportation that was available,” he said.
Instead, he’s had to rely solely on public transportation, which includes I-Ride, Isabella County’s busing transit agency. However, he said I-Ride hasn’t always been reliable due to its staffing shortages.
Rick Collins, the executive director of I-Ride, said the company has been short-staffed since the pandemic.
“When COVID hit, we had an extreme decrease in need for services,” he said. “So, we ended up losing probably about 18% of our workforce at that time.”
Before the pandemic, Collins said they had over 80 drivers; now it’s down to about 60. Collins said the company hasn’t been able to recover, due to the current labor market.
While Collins said the shortage hasn’t impacted their scheduled routes, it has impacted requested rides outside of the routes -- the service Palmer said he relies on to get to and from classes and to navigate Mount Pleasant.
“I’ve been stranded downtown a couple of times for a couple of hours just because they didn’t have any availability,” Palmer said. “There’s a lot of school programs as well that I’d love to do or go to, but, unfortunately, I’m unable to because of the unreliability.”
Palmer said he’s also had to miss a couple of classes due to the unavailability of drivers.
Because of this, Palmer said he’s made the decision to transfer to North Carolina State in the fall, where he said public transportation is more reliable.
Despite these difficulties, Palmer said he hasn’t had many other issues with accommodations and accessibility on campus.
While he said he doesn’t utilize the student disability services on campus due to his own stubbornness, he hasn’t had people deny him accommodations.
According to a 2022 Student Climate Survey Report done by CMU, 51.3% of the respondents said they had previously utilized the student disability services. About 65% of the respondents said they were satisfied with the office’s services; however, 21% of students said that the campus did not meet their physical accessibility needs.
While Palmer said he didn’t have many complaints when it came to campus accessibility, he said he’s struggled with the electric scooters around campus; it’s hard for him to judge how fast they’re moving. Another issue he’s had is with students walking around campus on their phone instead of paying attention to their surroundings.
Despite his decision to transfer, Palmer said he’s glad for his opportunity to attend college and urges others like him to do the same.
“Believe in yourself,” he said. “It (a disability) doesn’t define you. If nothing else, it makes you stronger, makes you work harder. Don’t use excuses, just go and do it.”
