From access accommodations to inclusive education: How the Covid-19 pandemic precipitated change

• In Event: Global commitment and policies to inclusive education

Proposal

During the COVID-19 pandemic, significant changes to teaching and learning occurred to mediate the restrictions on in person teaching and learning in higher education. In many ways, these changes created a more inclusive educational environment in terms of accessing information and course content. While many of these changes might have appeared to be the result of emergency teaching measures, disability accommodations have long provided similar educational flexibility (Dolmage, 2017; Hsiao et al., 2017). Only during the pandemic did these access accommodations become popular, including flexible deadlines, recorded video lectures, and making slide presentations available before class. By outlining this progression, this paper will interrogate how higher education has started to shift from only providing accommodations to students with a diagnosed disability, to a more inclusive teaching model that reduces barriers by integrating common access measures.

The A3 framework, developed by Toyota Motor Corporation, is a process improvement framework that systematically approaches problem solving and continuous improvement (Ross et al., 2017). The A3 framework involves a stepwise approach that outlines the background to establish the context of the problem, describing the conditions of the program, identifying the desired outcome, and analyzing the causes of the problem, and providing action items for improvement and creating follow up plans (Shook, 2008).

This framework provides a new way to look at how many access accommodations have become common practice in higher education in particular as a result of the pandemic. These changes affect higher education institutions globally, particularly in countries with strong disability anti-discrimination laws. Many of these accommodations are technical (digital) in nature, but have required a reconceptualization of effective and inclusive teaching, so as to be achievable for both students and educators.

For example, in the United States of America, 19% of students enrolled in higher education have at least one disability (NCES, 2019). The Americans with Disabilities Act (1990) protects students with disabilities from discrimination, while the recently updated Title II (2024) of the Act provides guidance on how public higher education institutions (including faculty and staff) must comply with these regulations. In response, many higher education institutions are developing accessibility policies or measures to guide their communities on how to begin implementing these new regulations (access measures) at scale, which builds inclusive education practices.
With the resumption of in person education, access accommodations that are in place for all students as a part of inclusive education are now commonly referred to as access measures. This abrupt shift from the individual conceptualization of accommodations support to a broader change in understanding that access measures benefit everyone demonstrates that ideological movement towards inclusive education in pedagogical practice is possible on a large scale. This paper’s analysis will help reveal these changes and inform higher education institutions’ efforts towards inclusive education.

Author

• Kristina Cibuzar, University of Minnesota