Whilst I'll put my hand up and say I had liked getting a free laptop (allbeit not a Mac) from DSA when it may not strictly be needed, I do worry about the changes being proposed. In particular the following, and will try not to repeat too much what others have already quite rightly said:
1. DSA will not generally be funding software which could help disabled students in
addition to computer insurance/warranties.
2. DSA not going to some restrict technology aids (depending if human help is also provided for the same task) and completely stop funding consumables. Ths is going to leave some disabled students in significant disadvantage than currently, especially if their uni/college don't provide a set amount of consumables (e.g. 1000 free sheets for printing).
3. DSA not funding "support workers" (they come in different names) for many students will put the focus much more on the unis. This may be good in order to give unis the kick up the backside but I worry that for quite a lot of students it may not be so advantagous as the unis' support workers may be more inclined to be trained by their employers on the more "common" (in a nice way) disabilities and difficulties that the unis are presented with. Leading to inequality and possible siginificant disadvantages for disabled students with different/invisible/complex disabilities and difficulties. I could be wrong on this!
The unis could also home on their support workers and dissuade them providing "non-core" support that disabled students in the past may have recieved and benefited from (e.g. library help, emotional support etc).
4. I did kind of thought some unis may be using under-hand tactics for providing disabled accomedation but some of the replies by other posters have really suprised me. In a way it might be good for unis to stop using some of these tactics (i.e. another poster said about "standard" disabled accomodation) and provide reasonably adapted accomodation for students based on their individual needs but I don't think this going to happen across the bar; unless for some more complex (saying this in a nice way again) cases. But of course one person's reasonable is another's unreasonable. In some ways unis need to step up to actively applying the Public Sector Equality Duty and Human Rights Act 1998 in (what I would think but is not always legally the case) of their public functions (i.e. in this case, disabled student accomodation).
Whilst HM's Gov may continue providing for the costs of disabled accomodation for such students in the private and third rented sectors (suprise, suprise - woops political opinion coming through), this is not always practical nor the best option for students as they may want to be near the uni campus where the student buzz is and not a few or further miles away.
The cinic in me is also thinking that this will also put extra strain as per usual on social services, NHS etc. Some disabled students may want to persue things like Disabled Facilities Grant (DFG) for getting accomodation adapted to their individual needs, even if this is for their time as an uni student and (again not legal opinon) but prehaps changes being brought in the Care Bill may help with this (i.e. provision being put in for another council to start the process of providing support when one person wants to leave their current location and come and live in the [new] council's area...allbeit for the amount of time I do not think has been stipulated. Though I do know for DFG currently in England that you are expected to live in the property for next five years, don't know if this applies to those renting but may do.
Disabled students who are care leavers may be able to use to persuade their council to use their legal functions to help in the affected areas.
Anyway side tracking, what I trying to say here is that there may be ways to mitigate the blows of the reduction in the support of DSA however as per usual the disabled student will need to be good at advocating for their needs with the different authorities and will need to be emotionally resilient at times; both of which are easier said than done.
5. Restricting access to DSA for students with a disability under the Equality Act 2010 definition. Some students with Dyslexia, Dyscalculia or more invisible or noticeable difficulties may inevitably slip through the cracks in the newly proposed DSA system.
Generally I'm not a huge fan of DSA not because it does help a lot of students with disabilities and difficulties but I feel it's rigidness (i.e. funding costs caps etc) do not really help disabled students with more intensive needs. Anywho, I do call in the favour of keeping it as it is.
technoo.