Loyola College has always considered differently abled students as God's special children. As proof for this, Loyola College in collaboration with Vidaya Vrikshah (a Chennai based NGO) launched a Resource Centre for the Differently Abled (RCDA) under the guidance of the Principal, Rev. Dr. Albert Muthumalai S. J. The center was inaugurated on Jan 16th, 2006 as part of students service center by Prof Eugine (Senior professor, dept of Economics) along with Mr. Krishnaswamy  IPS (Retd) of Vidya Vriksha, an alumnus of the College, Dr. S.P.Thyagarajan, former Vice Chancellor, University of Madras and Dr. M. Anandakrishnan, Chairman, Madras Institute of Development Studies & former Vice Chancellor of Anna University inaugurated the center. The then Secretary Rev. Fr. F. Andrew S.J. and then Rector Rev. Dr. B. Jeyaraj S.J. also played a role of importance in inauguration of RCDA.

The Principal, Rev. Dr. Albert Muthumalai S.J.,  extended an invitation to Ann Moideen of Ann Foundation  USA, to attend the inauguration of RCDA. Ms Moideen, founder and President of the foundation participated in the inauguration along with her colleagues Ann Parsons (a visually impaired teacher) and  Kevin Popplowell. After the inauguration, Professor S. Amalraj (Department of Tamil) took over as the staff-in-charge of the RCDA.

A few days after the inauguration, the Ann Foundation conducted a 4 day workshop for the visually challenged students. This was the first time ever a workshop for the visually challenged was conducted at Loyola College.

In 2005, Ms Moideen  met with Fr. Principal, to discuss the possibilities of starting a Computer Literacy Center for the visually impaired with the use of "Jaws" software. At that time Loyola did not have any such software or the programs for the visually impaired. Ms. Moideen, played an integral role in the establishment of the 'Computer Literacy Center" for the visually impaired .She also donated two "Jaws" software to Loyola worth one lakh. Thus a 'Computer literacy' project was established by Ms. Ann Moideen of Ann Foundation, New York.

Professor Vijay, an English literature lecturer who lost his vision at a young age, participated in the workshop. He was far from being computer savvy was also very reluctant to learn computer but Ann persuaded him to undergo a crash course and he participated in the workshop. Today, he uses computers to teach students and also conduct research, opening up a realm of learning experiences and the ability to share with students at deeper level than previously possible.

In October 2006, the Ann foundation, conducted a second workshop for the visually challenged. The workshop was co-coordinated by Prof. S. Amal Raj  and Mrs. Dr. Shirley Panicker, ( a faculty of the Bio technology department). The workshop   was conducted by, Ann Moideen, Ann Parsons & Patricia Rex and they trained the students to use the specially designed keyboards for the visually challenged. Several visually impaired students from the College actively participated in the workshop.

On December 3rd, 2006 (World disability day), over 250 visually challenged college students from Chennai gathered at Loyola College for a seminar.  The chief guest was Dr. Nagabooshanam, former Vice Chancellor of the Law University.   Mr. Shridhar, a placement officer from the Social Welfare department discussed the various opportunities for learning and employment that are available to the visually challenged and the differently abled people. Various topics were discussed at the seminar and it had a big impact and was a big success. The seminar was sponsored by the Foundation for Academic Excellence and Access ( FAEA ) which is a part of the Ford foundation and Nalli Kuppuswamy Chetty.

In 2007, the RCDA got the UGC grant for the Higher Education of Persons with Special Needs (HEPSN). With this fund, Braille printers, furniture, five computers, JAWS, teaching, talking and typing software, etc. were purchased.  An assistant was also appointed to assist the visually impaired students. The center was made accessible to all the differently abled students and these students made full use of these facilities during their free time. These facilities are still offering great help to the differently abled students of the college and the Center looks to develop it further.

In December 2008, Mrs. Mary Elizabeth, from the Goodwill Organization conducted a month long workshop for the third year Tamil Literature students.

In June of 2009, Professor J. Jerald Inico (Department of Computer Science) took charge of the RCDA. It was made accessible to the differently abled students by shifting it to a new location near library, which is more spacious. Rev Dr. S. Peter S.J., Secretary and Rev. Fr. K. Amal S.J., rector have played a vital role in allocating new & extra space for the centre.

The RCDA has also signed a Memorandum with the National Institute for the Visually Handicapped (NIVH). 
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Annual Report (2009-2010)

The Resource Center for the Differently Abled organized as many as thirteen programmes exclusively for the differently-abled students for the academic year of 2009-2010 with the help of the UGC HEPSN fund.  

With the objective of imparting the English language learning skills to the differently-abled through electronic systems, the first workshop on ' Language Lab- Level -1 ' held at UGC-Language Lab on 29 th   of July, 2009.  The resource person was Professor James Sundaraj, Head of the Department of English, Loyola College.   Smt. Meenakshi Rajagopal, IAS, State Commissioner for the disabled, Government of Tamil Nadu inaugurated the event and also the launch of the development of the RCDA for the academic year. 

The second programme was the workshop on   Web Resources: Internet and Web Textbooks on the 1 st   of September 2009. The main objective of this programme was to introduce Web resources available for imparting knowledge to the differently-abled.   Shri K. Ramachandran , Manager - Corporate Communications, Cognizant Technology Solutions, Chennai, Shri. A. E. Karthik, Worth Trust, Chennai and    Smt. Gayathri, Sri Verma & Sri Anubahv, Bookshare India, Delhi were the resource persons.  On the same day, the newly established Model Resource Center for Disability Services (MRCDS) was inaugurated by   Hon. D. Napoleon, Minister of State for Social Justice and Empowerment, Government of India. Twenty five new computers with JAWS and other necessary devices and software were installed at the MRCDS. 

The third programme was the   Right to Read Campaign   which happened to be the first of its kind in India organized in coordination with the Loyola NSS, Loyola Student Union and Department of Sociology on 26th of September 2009. The event focused on the rights of the differently abled. NSS students from about a hundred colleges from in and around Chennai had gathered at Sauliere Hall. The main objective of the campaign was to accelerate change in copyright law, to raise public awareness on the issue and to gather Indian support for the Treaty for the Blind proposed by the World Blind Union at the World Intellectual Property Organization. The Chief Guest of the event was   Mr. Shri Kumar Verma, a well known writer, social activist and a professor of creative English and English literature. The programme was sponsored by Center for Internet and Society (CIS), India . The event included a signature campaign, a rally, a panel discussion and also a music extravaganza by the music band from the National Association for the Blind (NAB), Chennai.  

The fourth programme was the biggest of the events. It was the   National Conference on ICTs for the Differently abled for Education, Employment and Entrepreneurship (NCIDEEE 2009)   which was held from the 1st   to 3rd   of December 2009 which also happened to be the World Day of persons with disability. The National Conference was organized in association with NASSCOM, Computer Society of India and Centre for the Internet &Society. The Conference was sponsored by the Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment, Tamilnadu State Council for Higher Education & Tamilnadu State Council for Science & Technology. Over fourty resource persons who are pioneers in the field of Optical Character Recognition (OCR), Text To Speech (TTS) and Web Content Accessibility Guidelines from across the country participated in the Conference and shared their experience and knowledge with the others. The chief guest for the inaugural function was   Dr. S. S. Singh , Technical Director, Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, Government of India, New Delhi . The chief guest for the Valedictory function was   Smt. Kannegi Packianathan , IAS, Special Secretary, and Government of Tamil Nadu.  In addition, a capacity building workshop for the differently abled and a workshop on Web Content Accessibility Guidelines for Web Architects and Web Designers were also organized. In remembrance of the conference, the conference proceedings with the ISBN number 978-81-910217-0-7 had been released.

With the purpose of training the trainers, our fifth event on   "Orientation Course for the teachers of the differently abled students"   was organized from 14 th   to 18 th   of December 2009. The event was sponsored by the National Institute of Visually Handicapped (NIVH), Chennai. Shri. K. Jeyakrishnan, Editor, PC-Friend, Tamil Computer and Valar Thozhil was the chief guest of the inaugural function. Over twenty five selected teachers in Tamil Nadu participated in the orientation course and benefitted from it.   Professor Albert Antony Raj, Department of Computer Science,   Professor Vijaya Peter Raj, Department of MCA,   Shri. A. E. Karthik, Worth Trust, Chennai and   Ms. Jemmimah   from Vasan Eye Care were the resource person. They trained the participants in various fields.

The sixth event was The General public awareness and networking programme on   Managing and solving Retinal problems   held on 11 th   of January, 2010. The chief guest and resource person for the event was   Dr Rajat N Agarwal , University of Southern California, U.S.A. The event was organized in coordination with the Helen Keller Research Center, Loyola College and Retina India . Over a hundred retinal patients from in and around Chennai participated in the event. 

The seventh programme was the  Counseling program for the parents of Visually Impaired : A Special Care for the Special Children. The event was organized in association with the Parents Teachers Association of Loyola College. The parents of fifteen differently-abled students in our college participated in the event. The guests of honor/Councilors for the event were   Mr. Rajesh Parack,   a visually challenged graduate and entrepreneur and   Mrs. Uma Rao, the Chennai coordinator, Retina India .

The eight programme was the   Sports Event for the Visually Impaired students   from Loyola College which included competitions in Chess, Volley ball, Standing long jump and Discuss throw. The event was held from 8th   to 12th   of February 2010. More than fourty students from the college participated in the competitions and the prizes for the various events were distributed on the College Sports Day 2010. The consigned event was sponsored by   Sri. D.K Patel, Hong Kong.  

The ninth programme was the workshop on   'Computer Applications and Essential Tools for the Differently Abled'   which was inaugurated on 23 rd   of February 2010 by   Sri.DAS SURYAWANSHI,   State Commissioner for Disabilities, Karnataka State, which was done especially for the development of the differently-abled final year students of the college. The workshop concluded by 24th   March 2010 enabled several students to benefit out of it. A similar programme is proposed to be conducted during the summer vacation for the school students.

In our continuous effort in imparting the English language learning skills to the differently-abled through electronic systems, our tenth programme on   "Language Lab: Level 2"   was held at UGC-Language Lab on 4th   March 2010. The resource person for the event was   Professor X.Manoharan , Department of English, Loyola College . The event was mainly based on the introduction of phonetics and the basic fundamentals of speech sounds in English and its classification. 

The eleventh programme was the   workshop on music for mind and soul. The inaugural function was held on 09th   March 2010. In lieu of this fest being organized, the events are scheduled spanning for three weeks, under the auspices of music master   H. Balachandran . The consigned event was sponsored by   Sri. D.K Patel , Hong Kong. 

The twelfth programme was the   workshop on soft skills to empower the differently-abled students   which was held on 10th   March 2010. The main idea of the event was to enable the students to realize the Opportunities available to them for recruitment and the behavior and the various sections of the recruitment process. The resource person for the event was   Mr. Sabarish from Smart Training Resources, Chennai. More than sixty differently-abled students participated in the event and they were introduced to the various dimensions of soft skills such as communication skills, language flow, verbal toning, etc. The resource person also informed them about the various job opportunities available to them today. The event was organized in association with the Training and Placement Cell of Loyola College.

The thirteenth programme was a workshop on the   Introduction of Online talking books & Libraries held on 15th   March 2010. The resource person for the event was   Mr. Venkataraman, BookShare India, Chennai. The event also witnessed the signing of an MOU for accessing web libraries of more than fourty thousand books for a period of one year. 

The student volunteers for the RCDA include   Dhanraj. K, Andrew Dominic Claremont, Shrayas Rajagopal, Arnold Geo, Alfred Jerome Lazarus and Aravind   all of whose work in this academic year has been commendable.  In addition new staffs have been appointed to the MRCDS since the 10th  February 2010 and they have been organizing regular training sessions for the differently-abled students from 9 am to 6 pm every day. The new staffs have been funded by the NIVH, the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, Government of India. The new staffs include a coordinator cum social worker, and IT manager cum instructor and an assistant.   Shri D. K. Patel   from Hong Kong has also sponsored two additional staffs for sports and music. 

The academic year of 2009-2010 happened to be a remarkable one for the development of the differently-abled students in our college. This year saw a differently-abled student,   Lawrence Joseph Jebarathinam, a 2009 pass out of the Department of Tamil who received the gold medal for B.A. Tamil Literature. One of our differently- abled student   R. Muthu , (07-TL-32) has secured third place in the Car Rally held on Feb 28, 2010 organized by National Association for the Blind, Chennai. Also, a team led by a differently- abled student   D. Balanagendran (07-CO-010) won first prize in the Quiz competition organized by Welfare Foundation for the Blind held at MCC, Chennai on Mar 20, 2010. Loyola College Student Union confers 'Excellence in Leadership Award' to a differently abled student   D. Balanagendran. (07-CO-010). He also received the Karisma Award worth Rs 50,000/- on the College Day instituted by   Sri Ram Agarwal, Mumbai given by Freedom Scientific. USA . A differently abled student   Kannadasan   (08 TL 019) also received a gold medal on the College Day for his excellent Academic performance. Differently abled volleyball team members led by   Captain Karthick P.   (07-TL-026) secured second place in Villupuram Para Olympic Meet among 12 teams played at Vilupuram on Mar 21, 2010. One of our differently abled  student E. Arun (08-PEL-11) got placement from Tamil Nadu State Government and some other students also have got placements in some MNC companies through campus recruitment. The College management also appreciates   M. Mahendran   (07-TL-013), a representative for the differently- abled for his best cooperation.