This leaflet is one of a series written for the SHEFC-funded Project, Teachability: Creating an accessible curriculum for students with disabilities. The series covers elements of curricula, from Information about the Course or Programme of Study through to Examinations and Assessments. Each leaflet provides information and suggestions for academic staff who are concerned to make their curriculum design and delivery as accessible as it can be to disabled students. Using the Teachability resources is also likely to help people towards meeting some of the legal duties towards disabled students: a curriculum that has been designed to be accessible is likely to be one that anticipates reasonable adjustments (DDA Part IV, Code of Practice revised 2007); and assessing the impact of teaching on disabled students is required by the Public Sector Duty to Promote Disability Equality.
This leaflet is the final one to be written for the series, yet it addresses a question which is best raised at the preliminary stages of course or programme design and then again at review:
Does the course or programme design as far as possible demonstrate awareness of the diverse needs of disabled learners who might want to study it in the future?
Clearly, as a designed course is delivered, teaching practices can aid or inhibit the participation of disabled students. For example, a designed course may include tutorials, and yet the experience of a disabled student may be dependent on the practices of individual teachers.
This booklet takes a step back from the detail of course delivery and looks at more general course design features. Yet this is not to underestimate the importance of course elements which may be relatively minor in terms of time and teaching, and yet crucial in terms of the qualification to which the course leads. For example, if graduating medical students must be able to administer cardio-pulmonary resuscitation, then although learning the procedure would be a fairly minor course element, if the requirement was a condition of graduating, it could emerge as a barrier to some disabled students. This example illustrates the importance of highlighting any non-negotiable, essential skills, abilities or knowledge which students absolutely must have in order to complete the whole course or programme, and making sure that potential students know about them in advance.
The importance of clarity about what is core and/or non-negotiable in a course or programme of study is underlined by legislation. Competence standards can be invoked as a justification for the failure to make reasonable adjustments. But the Disability Discrimination Act Part IV Code of Practice on post-16 education (revised 2007) also states that such competence standards must be very carefully defined and capable of being defended where their application disadvantages disabled people.
The overarching questions for this leaflet are about scope, or the lack of scope, for flexibility within course design. It is an implicit recommendation to those who design or review programmes and courses of study to consider how course or programme requirements or demands which are relatively rigid in their expectations of what students need to do might be less rigid, more flexible, offering all students greater scope to achieve course or programme requirements in alternative ways, yet without compromise to legitimate, genuine and defensible competence standards.
Copyright: The University of Strathclyde 2000 - 2005
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