Chetz Colwell, Tim Coughlan, Jane Seale What typical models, approaches or frameworks are used in the UK for supporting and delivering ICT for disabled students in post compulsory education and how successful are they? Chetz Colwell, Tim Coughlan, Jane Seale

External drivers Disabled Student Allowance Medical model, Individual solutions Now being reduced (austerity) Equality Act and Public Sector Equality Duty (2010) Has disability voice been lost amongst the others? Practitioner organisations Government funded -funding withdrawn (austerity) Membership organisations- disability or profession specific WCAG2 Dominates academic literature particular from computer scientists No wide-scale transition planning Under-funding of colleges (Further education) DSA (government grant) promotes a medical model and may have enabled institutions to be less inclusive by relying on individual solutions. DSA now being reduced so forcing institutions to adapt. DSA is often a one-off opportunity to assess needs, so tendency to over-recommend, and student may not have what they actually need. Practitioner organisations are not sustained: lost a key org and much of their guidance was lost. Orgs have influenced Unis – previous focus on practitioners; later focus on senior management Commercial orgs have stepped in, e.g. Business Disability Forum has university group NADP membership mainly disability support staff, rather than academic staff

UK Higher Education context: a confusion of models and approaches Discourse of “inclusive teaching”. Different reality focused on adjustments Adjustments often responsive, but increasingly anticipatory Discourse around social model of disability (reducing barriers to learning). Reality of the medical model (resource allocation based on diagnosis) Discourse of mainstreaming but reality of specialist provision Disabled Student Services and Assistive Technology services often very separate from teaching DSA has provided for AT training- often from outside contracted agencies (distributed versus centralised) Differences between claims of compliance with external drivers and reality University websites often poor for accessibility despite presence of accessibility policies and references to WCAG Medical model is reflected in disability services: focus on impairments and disability categories, and emphasis on evidence. Although WCAG awareness is reasonably high, conformance is low. Poor websites means poor transition into university ISO, UN Convention, European strategies and directives have little impact

A lack of impact of a host of models and frameworks derived by UK academics Holistic Model Contextualised Model Staff Development Model This is all despite a huge amount of research in the field- mostly technical in focus rather than pedagogical or organisational

Open University UK: An example Mission to be open (no entry requirements) and offers flexible study Separation between module production and module delivery: different teams and personnel History of initiatives on accessibility ‘Securing Greater Accessibility’ bringing colleagues together from faculties and professional units

Challenges at the OU Older modules and changing processes Tutor professional development Tight production schedules Lack of strategic direction relating to practical actions Lower attainment of some disabled students Older modules produced before changes to accessibility practices, leads to inconsistency Production: often years in advance; tight schedules often don’t leave time for production of alternative formats. Attainment: don’t know specific causes, varies across categories, distance learning suits some but not all

Current and future work Increasing attention to accessibility in module production Through bringing different groups together, building bridges, sharing responsibility. Creating a policy to clarify what is required and what is advised. Range of academic research (past and current) Research: EU4ALL, ASSIST – terminology and language, Inclusive practices in STEM, Support for online study – screens and browsers advice and reasons for requesting print, Time Better Spent – administrative burden. Exploring approaches to analysis of survey feedback from disabled students (paper in Web for All). Developing structure for assessing staff perceptions and practices around accessibility (MAPP) Linking research to practice Innovation – beyond responsiveness, innovation by disabled people?