Library Collections: Document: Full Text

Hope is the common denominator of the severely disabled who strive for education. We attempt in this special feature to do two things: First, to present the stories of respos and other quads who have tried their water wings with notable success in acquiring college educations and advanced degrees through various methods. And second, to point the way to future college students -- like Cheryl Hurst, the young Texas polio on the opposite page -- so that they may follow in their wheelsteps.

Obviously, it would be impossible to deal fully in these few pages with the wealth of material we have received. Painfully, we have cut and recut. We have been able to cover as much ground as we have only because of the extraordinary co-operation of our student readers -- most of whom set aside other and more pressing work to write long and friendly letters to us over the past year.

Praise and appreciation of the pioneering spirit of their colleges and their professors, who helped and encouraged them, were emphasized repeatedly in all the letters we received.

Educators have learned that quads still have their heads. Lawyers, teachers, doctors, business men end graduate students have proved that physical disability, even the inability to breathe or move, is no bar to higher education and success.

-- The Editors