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Conference Agenda

Overview and details of the sessions of this conference. Please select a date or location to show only sessions at that day or location. Please select a single session for detailed view (with abstracts and downloads if available).

Please note that all times are shown in the time zone of the conference. The current conference time is: 24th Aug 2026, 06:27:08am America, Santiago

Daily Overview

Session

61E: Women in STEM
Location: Room 03: Manquehue

Presentation 1

8:00am - 8:12am

Listening to Engineering Students with Disabilities: Qualitative Insights Towards Academic Equity and Inclusivity in the Era of Digital Transformation

Sanja Candrlic¹, Sandra Nuzdic², Patrizia Poscic¹

1: Faculty of Informatics and Digital Technologies, University of Rijeka 64218323816, Croatia; 2: University of Rijeka, University Counselling Centre, Academic Accommodations Counselling, Croatia

Ensuring equitable participation of students with disabilities in engineering education remains a persistent challenge despite extensive inclusion frameworks and expanding support services. This study provides qualitative insights into domain-specific barriers these students face during their studies and early employment, and examines their readiness to adopt artificial-intelligence–based tools within an academic accommodation process. Thirteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with current and recently graduated engineering students with disabilities, representing diverse mobility, sensory, cognitive, and communication profiles. Reflexive thematic analysis revealed dominant barriers in both study and work contexts. While students expressed a strong preference for human counselling, they also recognized the value of AI tools for selected tasks. Findings highlight the continuing implementation gap between formal inclusion policies and everyday practice, and suggest that combining human support with carefully targeted AI solutions offers a feasible pathway toward more equitable, efficient, and individualized accommodation processes in engineering education.