Could Universal Design (UD) Transform Student Service Delivery?
As a service leader or professional at a higher education institution, you may already have heard of Universal Design (UD). In short, the purpose of this approach is to ensure that ‘the design and composition of an environment so that it can be accessed, understood and used to the greatest extent possible by all people regardless of their age, size, ability or disability.’
Certainly, in teaching and learning, this philosophy has become widely adopted across the sector. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) strives to create an accessible and supportive learning environment for all students, regardless of their characteristics. So, the aim is to make sure the experience is positive for everyone, reducing the need to offer adjustments or alternatives.
UD is the broader version of this effort. The good thing is, while it may be broad, it comes replete with a set of 7 principles to be implemented. These are:
Equitable Use
Flexibility in Use
Simple and Intuitive
Perceptible Information
Tolerance for Error
Low Physical Effort
Size and Space for Approach and Use
In this article, we explore each of these 7 principles and key questions they may present for professional service leaders and practitioners. Whether you’re a careers and employability professional, work across mental health and wellbeing, or deal with complaints and reports, the idea is to encourage you to reflect on how your service meets student needs currently, and how it might be enhanced by strategically applying the principles of UD to your service design.
The 7 Principles of Universal Design (UD)
Equitable Use
The principle of equitable use refers to the idea that the service you provide should be equally accessible to all, regardless of differentiating factors such as dis/ability, race and ethnicity, gender, sexuality and socioeconomic background.
Service leaders seeking to ensure all students can access the support they offer on equal footing may consider the following questions:
What barriers might exist for students seeking to access your services depending on different characteristics? Identify these according to different groupings and consider potential interactions between them.
Does the makeup of your staff involved in strategic planning and delivery proportionately represent the diversity of your student body? If not, what mechanisms can you put in place to mitigate potential ‘blind spots’ in your planning?
How can the student voice help you to better understand where your planning and delivery can be improved to better serve the makeup of the student community?
Do any resources, events or interactions you offer come in a variety of accessible formats?
What other services might be useful for students – especially those with intersecting inequalities – to access the support you provide? For example, mental health and wellbeing support may be an important supplement for students submitting complaints and reports.
Are service delivery professionals aware of how to respond to requests from students seeking adjustments or accommodation for their varying needs and abilities?
Do you have a procedure in place that enables you to respond in a timely manner to student enquiries and are students made aware of how long this might take?
Example: London South Bank University (LSBU) asks all students submitting complaints whether they require adjustments, as opposed to waiting for students to approach them. This includes the provision of an extended timeframe, a support worker, a BSL interpreter or information in an alternative format.
Flexibility in Use
Essentially, flexibility in use means that students have a choice of different options when it comes to accessing a service. That way, they are able to navigate it in a way that best suits their needs, experiences and abilities.
Key questions service professionals and leaders may want to consider around this principle include:
What formats will be most useful for meeting the needs of our student body? For example, digital, in-person or a mixture of both – and, importantly, are students able to choose between these formats?
If you have a cancellation policy in place, does this reflect the needs and commitments of a diverse student body?
How will you make students aware of the different ways they can access your service? This information should be readily available and clear to students.
How quickly are you able to adapt and increase the flexibility of access and use of your services? Lessons learned from the pandemic will be important here.
Example: The University of Manchester’s careers service is enhanced by partnership with and signposting to various organisations that support disabled students to access employment opportunities. Their work with EmployAbility offers student careers support that provides specific guidance on navigating the graduate labour market with a disability. This provision is flexible because it accommodates the specific barriers disabled students might face in developing their employability skills, finding opportunities and applying.
Simple and Intuitive
To meet this principle of UD, a service must be easy to navigate for users. However, avoid relying on generalist conceptions of ‘commonsense’, which often obscure barriers that different groups might face.
To ensure your service is clear to all potential users, consider the following questions:
Is it clear to a diverse student body what role your services perform, how they perform it and how they can be accessed?
Is your signposting sufficiently clear and visible to ensure that students with different abilities and availabilities – for example, students who are time poor or have a condition that may prevent them from actively seeking information – are reached?
Where the service you offer is customisable, is that clearly indicated and easy to undertake for students?
Is it easy for students to access your services without supplementary information and resources?
Example: KCL’s centralised student services dashboard is responsive, highlighting guidance at the top related to relevant topics (e.g., cost of living, industrial action).
Perceptible Information
This one is all about signposting and awareness If you’re looking to design services that are universally accessible and usable, users need to know about them – and how they can accommodate their needs.
Some key questions to consider:
How do we increase the visibility of our services, particularly to ensure that those students who are classed as ‘hard to reach’ might gain awareness?
Are all staff aware of the different support services available across the university? Are staff sufficiently trained on how to signpost students to the right support at the right time?
Is there potential to deliver joined up thinking on student support across academic and professional service departments? For example, could personal tutors act as key points of information and referral to services?
How can you design induction activities that deliver essential information and are impactful enough to encourage student engagement with services?
How can you ensure that induction information is followed up with reminders throughout the student lifecycle, and particularly during key transitions?
Example: In order to ensure service providers are well-versed on how to signpost support to students, the University of Worcester have put together an excellent guide for their staff. This includes helpful information and visualisations, such as a flowchart that guides staff on how to support students in distress.
Tolerance for Error
This principle is perhaps the least applicable to student services but it’s still worth bearing in mind. Tolerance for error refers to how the design of a service minimises the possibility of mistakes or unintended actions. So, for example, if you’re filling out an online form and provide an incorrect postcode, the software would notify you to edit this field before you can continue.
You can deliver tolerance for error in your services by considering the following points:
How can you support students to provide appropriate and accurate information that will enable you to offer them the services that they need?
If students approach the wrong service for the kind of support they require, how do you direct them efficiently and effectively to the relevant service?
If you enable students to submit enquiries or reports online, how supportive is that system in guiding students to provide correct information?
How can you orient your service delivery around the needs and abilities of a diverse student body? For example, can you offer flexibility for lateness or cancellations for students who have various other commitments?
Example: Kingston University developed and implemented an intervention to maximise the academic and employability skills of their students. The design of this intervention was guided by the skill set and needs of the student population. As a result, it is well suited to the abilities of the institution’s students, taking into account skills they may have or may be lacking, and aims to support them appropriately.
Low Physical Effort
On the surface, this may seem like it applies only to the physical environment, but you need to think about it in terms of your digital provision, too. Low physical effort means that accessing your service is not physically challenging or off-putting for students. You might consider the following:
If you are asking students to navigate a digital platform to use your services, is the design accessible enough to allow for all abilities? This might include ensuring buttons are big enough and in perceptible colours, so that those with limited motor functions or vision can use it with ease.
Is your physical space and building accessible to students of all abilities?
Are you able to provide adjustments for students who may face greater barriers to accessing your physical or digital spaces?
Example: See the University of Washington’s checklist on how to make services accessible for students using the principles of UD.
Size and Space for Approach and Use
This final principle means ensuring that appropriate size and space is provided for approach, reach, manipulation and use regardless of a user’s body size, posture or mobility. Key considerations when designing the space that your services occupy include:
Is at least part of your front of house set up at a height accessible from a seated position?
Are printed materials or posters visible from both standing and seated perspectives?
Example: See ADA’s checklist for removing barriers to use for existing facilities. These principles can also guide the design and implementation of new facilities and physical spaces.
Designing a Service to Meet Everyone’s Needs
The principles of UD are a great starting point for service leaders looking to ensure that the support they offer is suitable and accessible to an increasingly diverse student body. By focusing on delivery that works for all, you reduce reliance on providing individual adjustments, which can also feel alienating to students with diverse needs – thereby increasing satisfaction and enhancing the student experience.
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