1st Edition
Making Inclusive Higher Education a Reality Creating a University for All
Revealing higher education inclusive practice in action, this key title showcases a range of international case studies from a number of universities in order to highlight approaches to developing a culture of access and inclusion. It provides detailed information on how to transform institutional commitment to access and diversity into systemic change and the creation of a university for all.
By deconstructing assumptions and practices and offering a range of inclusive techniques and case studies to challenge and enhance instruction, this book moves the conversation about inclusivity from a concept to a reality. It evokes and prompts solutions to everyday challenges experienced by those working in higher education and offers the reader a ringside seat to its application, implementation and unearthing inclusive practice gems which showcase inclusive practice at its best.
Providing a whole-institution perspective of student access and inclusion, citing case studies and sharing real world experience, this book will appeal to academic leaders, faculty and professionals in higher education, as well as policy makers. In particular, those charged with addressing issues of access, diversity and inclusion in higher education will find this a vital read.
Contributing Authors
Foreword
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1: Introduction - How do you Create a University for All? Moving from Theory to Action with a Framework for Inclusive Change in Higher Education - Anna Kelly, Lisa Padden & Bairbre Fleming
Chapter 2: Foundations and Scaffolding: Strategic Approach and Organisation
2.1 Adopting an Institutional Approach – moving from Silos to Mainstreaming Inclusion - Anna Kelly
2.2 Creating Universities for All: 30 Top Public Research Universities in the US Respond to Anti-Black Violence – Leslie A. Williams, Patrick Kent Russell, & Frank Tuitt
2.3 Inclusive Post-Secondary Education: Is there such a thing? - Vianne Timmons
2.4 Applying the Values and Principles that underpin Universal Design at a National Level – Gerald Craddock
Chapter 3: Data as a Driver of Change
3.1 Driving Change - Using Data to tell the Story of Inclusion - Bairbre Fleming
3.2 Student Engagement and Retention through a Data Driven Approach in Higher Education: A Case Study of Developing Inclusive Practice addressing the Attainment Gap – Marilyn Holness & Hameed Mozaffari
Chapter 4: 4. From Vision to Practice: A Toolkit for Inclusive Higher Education Institutions
4.1 Tell me How! Development, Methodology and Use of the Toolkit for Inclusive Higher Education Institutions – Lisa Padden
4.2 Who ‘does’ inclusion? Using the Toolkit to Create Change from the Margins – Mary Farrelly
4.3 "It has to come from the top!": Using the Toolkit for Bottom-up Planning for Inclusion - Graham Finlay
4.4 Embedding Inclusion in the Engineering Discipline: using the Toolkit for Inclusive Higher Education Institutions both Online and In Person - Mark Flanagan
Chapter 5: Programme & Curriculum Design, Teaching & Learning
5.1 From National Collaboration to Grassroots Implementation: Achieving Widespread Inclusion through Universal Design for Learning – Lisa Padden
5.2 Drawing from the Global to act Local: How Universal Design for Learning lends itself to Facilitating Inclusion in Moroccan Higher Education – Mustapha Aabi & Seán Bracken
5.3 Achieving Culturally Inclusive Teaching Utilising the Universal Design for Learning Framework – Linda Hui Yang
Chapter 6: Student Supports & Services
6.1 The Structures and Status of Student Support - Bairbre Fleming
6.2 Putting Student Support Centre-stage to Improve Diversity, Belonging and Success: The #Ibelong Project – Liz Thomas
Chapter 7: Physical Campus & Built Environment
7.1 The Campus as a Canvas: How the Built Environment Embodies a University’s Journey Towards Inclusion for All – Kim Lombard
7.2 Universal Design Patterns for Enabling Physical Environments – Hubert Froyen
7.3 Mainstreaming Inclusion and Accessibility of the University Built Environment through Collaboration with and Empowerment of Campus Services – Fiona Sweeney & Tina Lowe
7.4 Beyond Compliance: Embedding Accessibility and Creating Community Through Inclusive Design of the University Built Environment – Tadgh Corcoran & Thomas Hamill
Chapter 8: IT Services & Infrastructure
8.1 Facilitating Inclusion in an Evolving Digital World – Daniel Elliott
8.2 Embedding Inclusion and Accessibility in Higher Education IT – Sinéad O'Rourke, Ryan Teevan, & Janet Collins
8.3 Digital Accessibility in the UK Context – Alistair McNaught
Chapter 9: Conclusion – Carpe Diem – Seize the Day! – Anna Kelly
Appendix
Index
Biography
Anna M. Kelly is Director of Access & Lifelong Learning, University College Dublin. Anna offers leadership to the University community to realise its strategic objective to be a university for all. She has significant expertise in Inclusive Design, organisational change in the fields of access, widening participation, mainstreaming and inclusion.
Lisa Padden is Programme Manager for University College Dublin’s University for All initiative. Lisa has particular expertise in change management, capacity building and professional development in the areas of Universal Design and Universal Design for Learning.
Bairbre Fleming is Deputy Director of Access and Lifelong Learning in University College Dublin. She has extensive experience teaching and supporting underrepresented students with particular emphasis on mature students and part-time programmes.
Diane Reay, Emeritus Professor of Education, University of Cambridge
This inspiring and timely book demonstrates that it is possible to have a university for all. Inclusion is constantly talked about in higher education but rarely reaches the lives of students. 'Making Inclusion in Higher Education a Reality – Creating a University for All’ reveals how to make inclusion a reality that permeates every aspect of life in higher education institutions. Drawing on a richly theorised case study of University College Dublin, it shows that once access and inclusion become everyone’s business, all students, regardless of background, can feel they belong.
Professor Andrew J Deeks, Vice Chancellor and President, Murdoch University, Australia
This is an important book addressing one of the abiding challenges for those involved in higher education – ensuring that the life benefits provided by university education are available to all who have the ambition and ability to undertake third level studies, irrespective of their background. From an institutional perspective, the mainstreaming diversity and inclusion is addressed, while practical guidance is provided for embedding inclusive practice at all levels in the institution, down to curriculum design and IT services. I strongly recommend this book to everyone interested in making their university more inclusive.
Dr. Imran Uddin, Director of the KU Leuven Association
In this volatile and uncertain world, one thing is clear: we need all the talent we can get, to strengthen our societies and our economies, and to ensure a just and sustainable future. To do that, we have to create opportunities for everyone, particularly in higher education.
Making higher education a Reality is, therefore, most welcome, as it brings us one step closer to creating that university for all.
Eva Egron-Polak, Former General Secretary, International Association of Universities (IUA), France
As the pressure to improve inclusion, access, and equity grows in many systems of higher education, scholarly work that is both insightful and practical, is a true find.
The authors of this volume have the knowledge and experience to offer both. Some chapters focus on specific obstacles that stand in the way of inclusive access to HE. Others offer solutions for an institution-wide approach to combatting exclusion.
The book is certainly a worthwhile read!
Professor Colin Scott, Vice President for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion, University College Dublin
The editors of this volume have led a revolution in University College Dublin, developing the concept of University for All as a rallying cry for mainstreaming broad and deep approaches to more inclusive approaches to higher education. In this volume they bring together a wide range of expert contributors to offer a reflective and practical guide which shares and makes accessible the experience of effectively advancing University for All for a wide readership interested in further widening participation and effective support for all students.
Stuart Billingham, Emeritus Professor of Lifelong Learning, York St. John University
This work has a very ambitious title but, unlike some which have gone before it, a wide-ranging and very relevant content to match. There are chapters focused, not only on non-European countries (as we should expect these days), but also those which connect broad themes in policy and practice with case study and other types of research. The work deals with "enabling change", alongside "data as a driver of change" and "IT infrastructure and digital accessibility". It covers perhaps more anticipated topics like "programme and curriculum design, teaching and learning". And there is much more. In my view, a work not to miss.
Professor Lizbeth Goodman, Chair of Creative Technology Innovation, and Inclusive Design for Education, University College Dublin
University for All is a tour de force of evidence-based research which will make a significant positive impact on the reality of Inclusive Design for Education in our global universities and higher education institutes, with life-changing results for students of all backgrounds, ages and abilities. The reality is that there is no 'typical student', no one curriculum or approach that works across disciplines or cultures. And now we must move together to the next frontier of Inclusive Design for Education. This excellent book provides the evidence, examples, and toolkit to support educators and students to move forward with scaffolding to that new frontier!
Maureen Hoyler, President, Council for Opportunity in Education, USA
Making Inclusive Higher Education a Reality is a must-read for each of us working towards more equitable colleges, more equitable higher education systems, or more equitable national higher education policy. The authors take a practical approach that recognises the constraints under which higher education operates and offer realistic steps any institution can take to become more inclusive, more diverse, more prepared to assure that 21st-century students are welcomed and can excel.
