With the football season ending and renovations on the 107,000-seat Michigan Stadium beginning today, the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor has unveiled a plan to sharply increase its wheelchair-accessible seating.

The plan is the university’s effort to win over the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, which in a letter last month sharply criticized the university as failing to include sufficient access for wheelchair users in the renovation of the venerable stadium’s restrooms, ramps, and seating. The university was given 10 days in which to either comply with the department’s interpretation of the Americans With Disabilities Act or face the loss of federal student aid.

The compromise Michigan is offering would increase the number of wheelchair-accessible seats from 90 to 592 by 2010. According to some advocates for the disabled, 1,000 seats would need to be added during the renovations for the stadium to comply with the disabilities law. And a disability-rights group has filed a lawsuit that accuses the university of violating the law in the stadium project.

University officials said the facility is already in full compliance. Kelly E. Cunningham, a university spokeswoman, said federal regulations call for 1 percent of seats to be wheelchair-accessible in new construction. With approximately 4,000 seats to be added in the renovation, “we are far exceeding” that proportion, said the university’s interim general counsel, Gloria Hage.

It is uncertain whether the university’s plan will meet the Education Department’s standards. Jim Bradshaw, a spokesman for the department, said the Office for Civil Rights was in the process of reviewing the renovation plans. —Mary Andom