Abstract:
ThePurposeofthisstudywastoinvestigateacademicchallengesandsupport
provisionofstudentswithvisualimpairmentsinhighereducationinstitutionat
Haramaya University.The researcherused explanatorysequentialmixed
methoddesign.ThestudywascarriedoutinHaramayaUniversityatthethree
collegesincludingcollegeofSocialSciencesandHumanities,Law,andCollege
ofEducationandBehavioralSciencethatstudentswithvisualimpairmentjoin
in. The targetpopulation was 116 respondents who included head of
department,lecturers,expertsofspecialneedseducation,learnerswithvisual
impairmentsandsightedlearners.A samplesizeof72respondentswas
obtainedthroughtheuseofpurposivesampling,simplerandom samplingand
availablesampling.Questionnaires,interview andobservationguideswere
usedtocollectdata.Datacollectedwasanalyzedusingdescriptivestatistics.
Findingsshowthataround80%ofrespondentsconfirmedthatthemethodof
teaching wasnotflexible,becauseoflackoftraining teachersonSNE.
Learningresourceswerenotwellequippedinlab,libraryaswellasclassesto
meettheneedsofstudentswithvisualimpairment.TheUniversityshould
promotinglecturerstrainingandprovidingsupporttostudentswithVI
