ETBs and HEIs: ALTITUDE Adoption FAQ

Funded by the HEA under PATH 4, the ALTITUDE Project was an extensive cross sectoral collaboration involving six national agencies, fifteen higher education (HE) institutions and six Education and Training Board (ETB) representatives, nominated by Directors of FET to represent the Further Education and Training sector. 

The ALTITUDE Charter, and the associated toolkit and technical report, build on significant existing work on UD in the Irish tertiary education landscape (Kelly & Padden, 2018), and through these outputs, provides a clear roadmap for institutions to make progress.

The development process underpinning the Charter included a review of international literature, and an extensive consultation process featuring:

• A national 2-day 'world cafe' style consultation session (90 mins per day) with over 200 FET/HE staff.
• More than 30 focus groups with learners and staff in ETBs/HEIs across the country.
• A learner survey which received 1200+ responses.
• A national stakeholder dialogue process which included one to one meetings/presentations with a variety of national stakeholders including SOLAS, HEA, QQI, CEUD, ETBI, IUA, THEA, the FET Directors Forum, the IUA Registrars Group, and the THEA (now TUA) Registrars Group.

The vision of the ALTITUDE project looks to a future in tertiary education where ‘all learners are transformatively included through universal design in education’, deriving the name ALTITUDE. It seeks to move us in that direction by supporting HEIs and ETBs to make sustainable progress towards systemically embedding a UD approach…. - one which places human diversity at the heart of tertiary education design and fosters student success for all learners.

Institutions who adopt it will over time benefit from:

• a more unified language of and commitment to a universal design approach in their institution
• a greater culture of shared responsibility for UD, access, and inclusion, operationalising the ‘Inclusion is Everyone’s Business’ mindset.
• a more effective and learner centred approach to compliance with national legislation and policy
• and most importantly, the iterative development of programmes, services, and environments that enable equitable opportunities for all learners to thrive and be successful.

All of the actions and goals of the Charter are aimed at optimising your ongoing institutional processes to create the most inclusive and successful educational experience for the increasingly diverse learner population you serve.

Go to the Charter webpage and download the Charter, Toolkit and Technical Report.

On an ideological level, adopting the Charter is an explicit commitment by the institution to pursue a universal design approach as an important part of delivering educational experiences that meet the needs of all learners. On a practical level, adopting the Charter commits institutions to:

• establish a standing implementation committee/working group (or adapt an existing one) that works best for their organisational structure and governance processes which will be assigned responsibility for working towards the goals and actions within the Charter. The makeup of the group should aim to maximise the impact of the Charter, ensuring representation of senior management, heads of key functions relating to the Charter Pillars, student representatives and UD-knowledgeable staff members. See pg. 15 and 16 of the Charter for further guidance.
• ensuring this group oversees incremental progress to develop strategic enablers for a sustainable UD approach, and foster collaboration to advance related goals in the 4 key pillars – see pg. 17 and 18 of the Charter. Key to this effort will be using regular policy and strategy review cycles to embed UD at the strategic level, and to identify opportunities provided through national and local funding streams to advance goals within the pillars.

It should be noted, while adopting the Charter commits you to the above, you don’t have to have the working group structure already established at the point you adopt the Charter and declare so publicly. It is recognised that changes in governance structures can take some time to design and implement so it is expected that may come within a reasonable timeframe following adoption.

Go to the Charter webpage and download the Charter, Toolkit and Technical Report.

ALTITUDE operates through a self-adoption model. All institutions have to do is to is to publicly release a press/web statement endorsed by senior management which publicly declares your adoption of the Charter, and to begin setting up the governance structures to implement it (see commitments in Q above).

One national adoption day is held annually, where several institutions across the sector who are ready to adopt announce on the same day, as a show of collective action and sectoral commitment to embedding universal design. But institutions do not have to wait for this day to come around, institutions can adopt any time they are ready.

The practical steps to prepare for and initially adopt the Charter include:

1. Go through whatever internal procedures your institution requires in order to get approval to adopt the ALTITUDE Charter (e.g. getting senior sign-off) on your preferred date. Its useful to thoroughly immerse yourself in the Charter, and consider the governance structure that may most impactfully support implementation at this stage. Reach out to altitude@ahead.ie at this stage if you need guidance on setting up an implementation structure or getting started with implementation.
2. Plan an institutional adoption event and/or institutional communications campaign to socialise the Charter with staff and share what the institution’s plans are around it. You may if you wish to copy or adapt the slide deck in the ALTITUDE Comms Pack provided and present it to support understanding of the Charter if running an institutional event.  Contact altitude@ahead.ie if you would like a member of the project team to attend or contribute to this event and set the scene for your adoption of ALTITUDE.
3. Prepare external communications declaring your support for and adoption of the ALTITUDE Charter on your preferred day. A draft ALTITUDE Comms Pack is provided featuring a template statement to be released on your institutions website, a web banner image, adaptable social media images and suggested social media post text, and alternative text for associated images. You may use/adapt the materials in this pack or design your own. 
4. Share your intention to adopt with AHEAD by emailing altitude@ahead.ie and let us know what date you are planning to publicly announce. we will be sure to retweet and amplify your comms on the day to share the good news. We will also feature your institution on a webpage we curate on which institutions have adopted ALTITUDE. Please provide a contact point for any ALTITUDE queries (not published), and details of your social media handles.
5. Release your prepared statement on your website on the day of adoption and amplify it through your social channels. Then the hard work of finalising your governance structures and starting implementation begins!

No, ALTITUDE is currently working through a self-adoption and self-monitoring model. The Charter was developed by the sector, for the sector, and was intended as a value-add to the work of the institution rather than a new oversight mechanism. Throughout the consultation process, stakeholders expressed the need for ALTITUDE to add value and greater coherence to a variety of sometimes disconnected strategic efforts in the access and inclusion space, without adding a significant level of additional reporting to an already overburdened sector.

The further embedding of UD adds enormous strategic value to institutions in their efforts to reach a range of national/international goals concerning student success, accessibility, public sector duty, learner retention, widening participation and sustainability. Because of this, we anticipate that institutions will use their adoption and implementation of ALTITUDE to provide strong evidence of progress in a range of existing reporting obligations.

However, it should be noted that both SOLAS and HEA have shown significant support for the Charter development and implementation to date, and future talks are planned with senior system stakeholders to see how existing funding criteria and reporting mechanisms can be tweaked to incentivise and provide greater accountability on UD/ALTITUDE implementation into the future.

No. Adopting the Charter is the commitment to establishing the implementation structure and using it to oversee/drive implementation of the charter actions and goals in a sustainable fashion over time.

For some institutions, this will involve establishing a completely new committee, while for others at a difference stage of their journey, there may be a suitable existing committee/working group structure which just needs to be reviewed, and its membership/responsibilities updated in line with the guidance and requirements of the Charter.

Remember, ALTITUDE prioritises slow and steady transformation rather than unsustainable attempts to embed UD in a short period of time. So, take some time to bring everyone along with you when planning your implementation structure, and look to see where you can use efforts already in the workplan (e.g. upcoming policy reviews, ongoing strategic planning efforts) to more strongly embed UD as your first 'easy wins'. Approaching the work in this way helps colleagues to understand that UD should become a lens through which you approach the normal day to day business of the institution.

No. Since universal design itself is a process rather than an end point, adopting ALTITUDE is a commitment to the journey of embedding UD, rather than a specific destination at a specific point in time.

The Charter was designed to be suitable for ETBs/HEIs of varying sizes across FET and HE, with varying levels of local and national resources to draw from, so it prioritises iterative transformation over time rather than unsustainable attempts to overhaul practice in a short period. Equally, the Charter recognises that different institutions are at different stages in their embedding of a universal design approach, and through adoption and implementation, encourages them to build on their strengths and make iterative progress on areas for improvement.

Yes, ALTITUDE operates on a self-adoption model, and institutions can do it any time. Annual National Adoption Days are held and several institutions will typically declare their adoption on this date in a show of collective commitment to a UD approach across the sector, but that does not prevent other institutions adopting at different points of the year as they are ready to do so.