This work is closely linked to a wider research project funded by Ministry of Science and Innovation of Spain, State Research Agency and FEDER funds European Union (grant numbers PID2020-112761RB-100/ Feder Funds). Based on the understanding that faculty member is a key social factor in the academic success of students with disabilities (Fleming et al., 2017), this work aim to show the positive aspects, as well as the benefits that faculty members from different fields of knowledge highlight when they talk about their experiences with students with disabilities in their classrooms. Not only benefits but also the main challenges and difficulties they had to face when it came to achieving social and educational inclusion. This work provides evidence of faculty members who show positive attitudes and beliefs toward disability and carry out inclusive practices in the university. To this end, we analyzed the valuations of 119 faculty members about their experience with students with disabilities in their classrooms.
Two research questions guided this analysis:
1) What benefits and positive aspects do faculty members identify regarding the presence of students with disabilities in university classrooms?
2) What challenges do faculty members face when there are students with disabilities in their classrooms?
Universities all over the world have been led to initiate a gradual transformation in order to respond to student diversity. In this process of change, universities have started analyzing the barriers and needs of students with disabilities with the aim of improving the accessibility of all their services and resources (Moriña et al. 2020).
Although the access of people with disabilities to higher education is protected by legislation, the reality is that students still encounter barriers that hinder their full development and, in some cases, the completion of their university studies (Babic & Dowling, 2015). In this context, faculty members play a key role, since it is up to them to carry out inclusive practices and facilitate the learning of all students (Carballo et al., 2019).
Among the elements that facilitate their experience, students with disability highlight their classmates as one of the main facilitators, along with the disability support services and the faculty members who carry out inclusive practices and make reasonable adjustments (Rooney, 2019). On the other hand, they identify numerous barriers, being one of the most common difficulties in the discourse of all students at the international level, the faculty (Martins et al. 2018). Regarding these barriers, students with disabilities highlight the lack of positive attitudes toward disability, which can be influenced by the beliefs of the faculty members about disabilities. Some faculty members are skeptical toward certain types of disabilities, especially non-visible disabilities, while others think that they should not make changes or adjustments, since that would pose a favorable treatment or advantage for the students with disabilities over the rest of the students (Sandoval et al., 2020).

A small number of studies on this topic have given a voice to faculty members (Moriña et al., 2020). From their perspective, faculty members show high predisposition to work for the inclusion of students with disabilities (Carballo et al., 2019). However, they also agree with students with disabilities on their lack of training in disability and inclusive teaching methods and resources (Martins et al., 2018). Moreover, they are often unaware of the existence of university regulations about disability, and even of disability support services (Gelbar et al., 2015). Therefore, in many cases they are guided by their own good will and interest, although with the insecurity of not knowing how to work with students with disabilities in the best possible manner (Biggeri et al., 2019)

The study involved 119 faculty members from different knowledge areas and from 10 Spanish universities. These participants were chosen by their students with disabilities. Specifically, 24 were academics from the area of Arts and Humanities, 14 from STEM, 16 from Health Sciences, 25 from Social and Legal Sciences and 40 from Education. As regards gender, 58.3% were men and 41.66% were women. Most of them were aged between 36 and 60, although seven were under 35 years old and four were over 60. Most had over ten years’ experience, with only six having less than five years’ and twenty-four having between five and ten. All participants had experience working with students with disabilities. To reach out the participants, the disability offices asked students to advise faculty members who had positively influenced their academic experiences and were characterized by developing inclusive practices. When students proposed different faculty members and provided the reasons why they were selected, the research team contacted the faculty members via email and phone call to request their participation in the study. The design of this study was based on a qualitative approach, using the individual semi-structured interview as the main instrument for data collection. Faculty members from different disciplines who did not participate in the study piloted the interview script. Two interviews were conducted with each participant. The first interview analysed the believes and knowledge that participants had in relation to disability; and the second interview studied how participants designed their syllabuses and the educational practices they used. Most of the interviews were held face-to-face. Nevertheless, 18 participants conducted their interviews via Skype and 12 by telephone. The meetings lasted approximately 90 minutes. This research obtained ethical approval from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation. Likewise, all interviews were audio recorded and participants gave their written consent to the use of the data collected for research purposes. Each participant received transcripts by email so that they could make proposals for change in their transcribed interview. To safeguard the anonymity of all participants, we used numbers in the text (P1-P119). Lastly, transcribed data were analysed progressively using an inductive categories and codes system (Miles & Huberman, 2004). Data processing was carried out using MAXQDA 12 software.

One of the main findings of this study is that faculty members who have positive beliefs about disability and carry out an inclusive pedagogy perceive diversity as a positive aspect rather than as a difficulty. They stated that experiences with students with disabilities promote the development of human values, raising awareness of the diversity that exists in society and of the barriers that people with disabilities are still facing. Having students with disabilities in the classroom is also an opportunity of professional development. These situations require the design and use of other teaching methodologies and learning resources, which forces the faculty to find solutions to individualize their teaching. The inclusive faculty consider these situations as challenges from which to learn and not as obstacles. Although they admit that this implies greater effort in the search for solutions, gratification overcomes the extra effort involved in the process of providing individualized responses to students with disabilities, and they see this as a very valuable experience that will help them to attend to future students with disabilities (Becker & Palladino, 2016). Furthermore, the presence of students with disabilities in the classroom is beneficial not only for the faculty members but also for the rest of the students. Nevertheless, what is usually perceived as support, in some cases is also identified as a limitation. The faculty members identified their classmates mostly as a fundamental support, but also as a barrier when they showed negative attitudes or when they did not want to help when a student with a disability needed assistance. The main difficulty encountered by the faculty members was related to the lack of training and information. Additionally, faculty members also identify a lack of coordination when the disability support services do not transmit the information about the student to the faculty.

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