Disability stories often follow the familiar script: a person with a disability appears, faces a challenge and then rises above it in a way that is meant to warm hearts. We praise the courage, circulate the quote and call it empowering. When the applause settles, the question lingers of who benefits from this story and what purpose it actually serves.

At an institution like USC, where ambition and public image often walk side by side, it can feel easier to admire a person who survives a barrier than to question why the barrier exists in the first place.

Celebration becomes a substitute for access and admiration becomes a distraction from responsibility. These patterns are common across many college campuses, but they feel especially sharp here because USC has both the influence and the talent to choose a different direction.

The message, intentional or not, is that value rests in perseverance. It suggests that belonging is something earned through toughness, instead of something we receive because we are students who deserve equal participation.

This leads to a softer version of exclusion dressed as admiration.

When a student with a disability is framed as inspiring, even with good intentions, attention shifts toward personal grit and away from structural barriers. People often regard the story as uplifting, but rarely do they stop to ask why the campus still contains inaccessible classrooms, confusing accommodation procedures or limited pathways for true leadership.

Inspiration becomes a way to avoid discomfort. It allows everyone to feel good about themselves without doing the work necessary to give students with disabilities actual influence.

If USC wants to build an environment where students with disabilities belong, it must move beyond the survival narrative. Currently, accommodations are still treated like personal favors instead of access rights, and planning for accessibility usually begins only after someone reports a problem.

USC has taken early steps that show what progress could look like. Recent accessibility audits, scattered faculty trainings and occasional listening sessions suggest that USC knows change is needed. Intent, however, does not equal impact. Students with disabilities are still waiting for consistent practices that treat them as partners in shaping campus policy.

USC needs to trade sentimental comfort for a genuine partnership. The first step lies in demanding that people let go of the belief that disability is a source of inspiration and understand that disability is simply a natural part of the community.

When disability is treated as ordinary, students with disabilities are recognized for their impact and intellect, not for surviving harmful systems. They are welcomed into leadership roles because their expertise and perspective are essential to improving the institution.

There is no doubt that when students with disabilities help shape curriculum, accessibility plans and campus policy, USC becomes stronger and more honest about the world it claims to prepare students for. When disabled voices guide research or community partnerships, USC models what equity should look like far beyond its gates.

Moving away from inspiration-based framing does not diminish the real challenges that disabled students face. Instead, it reframes those challenges as collective responsibilities rather than individual struggles.

It reminds the campus that the true measure of inclusion is how fully a student with a disability can participate without being expected to perform for an audience.

Does USC want to continue applauding survival or start building belonging?

If the goal is belonging, the work has to focus on removing the structural barriers that go beyond ensuring students with disabilities’ basic survival. It takes more than improving access audits and strengthening accommodation processes.

Other universities have already begun this work. The University of Arizona created a Disability Student Space, which provides community, programming and leadership opportunities. The University of Washington embeds universal design into curriculum planning through its DO-IT Center. 

UC Berkeley involves its Disabled Students’ Program in planning at every level and has invested in long-term accessible design. Even Georgetown University, which is a private university like USC, opened a Disability Cultural Center in 2023 and hosts numerous disability-related campus events.

USC has the resources to meet or exceed these efforts. It only needs to decide that belonging matters enough to follow through.

This is an invitation for USC to do better. It holds influence, and when a university with this reach shifts its approach, others pay attention. That shift can shape the future of higher education.

Inspiration may feel warm, but inclusion creates power. USC has a chance to choose dignity, partnership and community. It is time to move past the survival narrative and create a campus where students with disabilities can belong without needing to inspire anyone first.

Lilly Grossman is a social work graduate student writing about accessibility and campus culture in her column, “The Quiet Part,” which runs every other Thursday. She is also the diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility director at the Daily Trojan.