PAC Student Media

By: Jaron Carvajal, PAC Pulse Staff

There are many services available for the students attending classes at the Palo Alto College campus. The two offices that provide arguably the most important and helpful services are the Disability Support Services and the S.H.A.R.E. Center. The services provided by these two offices are vital for the students at PAC who might need some extra assistance to thrive and succeed in college. Lucky enough, both are easy to find. Once you enter campus from Camino Real look for the Rio Grande Building. After you find it, just walk up the steps and into the building, and both offices are in the first hallway on the right.

The first office you’ll find is the Disability Support Services, or DSS office for short. Previously located in the Palomino Center, they can now be found in room 133A of the Rio Grande Building. Currently being led by Sr. Coordinator Cindy Cook, the DSS office provides services and support for PAC students with disabilities of any kind. Cook has been in charge of overseeing DSS for almost 10 years which she herself states “is very rewarding.” The DSS office provides accommodations for students who self-disclose that they have a disability in order to help them be more successful in their classes. All a student needs to do to receive accommodations is provide documentation of their disability (physical, psychological, or otherwise) that impedes their learning in their classes. Cook and the rest of her staff in DSS are here to make sure that students with disabilities are properly accommodated.

The other full-time staff in the DSS office are Sr. Specialist Elizabeth Garcia who works at the front desk and Sr. Advisor Mako Ivory who assists Cook in sending out the letters of accommodation. Ivory also assists Cook with overseeing Project Access which is an exclusive program to PAC for students with intellectual disabilities and has been available since Fall of 2016. This program has brought in 14 cohorts of students, and as of April 2, recruitment has started for cohort number 15. Garcia and Ivory were recently added to DSS staff last year and Cook mentioned that their addition has helped things run more smoothly. Other than Garcia and Ivory, DSS also has four part-time student workers (two peer advisors and two work studies) who are always ready and willing to assist their fellow students. Whether they’re a full-time campus staff or part-time student worker, everyone working in the DSS office is aware that confidentiality is of the upmost importance, so any students requiring assistance from them know that your privacy will be respected.

Right next door in Rio Grande room 132A and 131 is the S.H.A.R.E. Center. Room 132A contains staff offices, while 131 is where most of the services they provide can be found, so students are recommended to enter and visit through 131. Previously located in Student Center room 100, the two in charge of the S.H.A.R.E. Center are Director of Student Advocacy Carmen Velasquez-Avila and Sr. Coordinator Leticia Inocencio. The S.H.A.R.E. Center has been providing wrap around services for students’ basic needs on campus since 2017. S.H.A.R.E. has two certified mental health counselors on staff should anyone need mental health guidance. There is also a diaper program for students with children, and a clothes closet for students who need business wear for things like job interviews. They also provide food for students in the form of grab-and -go lunches, and starting in April, they will have a food pantry available twice a month for students who may need groceries. Students can make appointments to visit the food pantry through Alamo Experience. Students whose home college is PAC and are registered for six credit hours for the semester, may receive these services from the S.H.A.R.E. Center, though early college high school and dual credit do not qualify for these services due to most of them being underage.

The S.H.A.R.E. Center has a partnership with the San Antonio Food Bank who is on campus Wednesdays and Thursdays, as well as the Texas Diaper Bank who provides them with diapers and wipes to give out to student parents. The S.H.A.R.E. Center also has many partnerships for affordable housing and shelter such as with Roy Maas Youth Alternatives and Opportunity Home San Antonio. They also work with UT Health and Science Center on campus through Wellness 360. It is a clinic on campus for students who may need it. For those without insurance who may be worried, there is only a five-dollar copay for those without insurance. The S.H.A.R.E. Center also runs many events on campus like mental health and other resource fairs and clothes drives. They have a multitude of resources and services, but Velasquez-Avila also stated that if a student needs something they don’t have, all the student needs to do is request it and the staff will do their best to provide it. Velasquez-Avila said herself, “We’re very open to suggestions because we’re here for the students.” She also wanted to mention that there will be testing supplies and snacks provided by the S.H.A.R.E. Center during finals week.

Both Cindy Cook and Carmen Velasquez-Avila mentioned the need for spreading the word about both the DSS office and S.H.A.R.E. Center. This is meant to hopefully reach those who may not have heard of these departments on campus. Hopefully this helps those in need of their services find them more easily. These are amazing and vital recourses on campus that everyone should know more about.

Related links:

https://www.alamo.edu/pac/admissions-aid/disability-support-services

https://www.alamo.edu/pac/experience-pac/campus-life/campus-resources/share-center