Institutions of higher learning have long prided themselves on being spaces of equal opportunity for diverse groups of students. Colleges also want to ensure they provide high-quality educational opportunities that will prepare their students for successful careers and influential futures. With these goals in mind, campus accessibility goes beyond physical spaces and includes consideration and intention from multiple perspectives. But how accessible is your campus?
When it comes to ensuring you’ve created an accessible campus that will meet the needs of college students with a range of abilities, a checklist is an invaluable tool. With a thorough checklist designed around accessibility issues, administrators can design college campuses that meet functionality needs, improve retention, promote student success, adhere to federal law, and maintain students’ civil rights.
The many components of an accessible campus can seem overwhelming. But moving through the considerations step by step will support students and provide an ongoing plan for maintaining equitable access.
Why Is Accessibility Important in Higher Education?
Before you can ask, “How accessible is your campus?” it’s important to zero in on why it matters. Accessibility is a meaningful and necessary consideration in many environments. But it is especially important that higher education institutions put accessibility initiatives at the forefront of their design.
Federal law protects students with disabilities and requires reasonable accommodations for accessing educational spaces. In addition, most institutions include equal access and diversity as part of their mission statements and vision. Colleges want campuses and resources that work for students with a wide variety of needs. Creating physical accessibility and building learning environments that work for all students, faculty, and staff puts those goals into action.
Who Requires and Sets Accessibility Standards?
In the United States, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is a federal civil rights law that applies to public entities—including higher education institutions. Under these protections, people with disabilities are legally provided equal access to services, programs, and activities.
The ADA has a long history since its passage in 1990. Changing legal, social, and cultural landscapes have meant ongoing updates and new interpretations of the law. Staying informed about updates to the law and best practices in order to meet legal requirements is important to ensure ongoing compliance.
While accessibility often brings to mind physical spaces and assistive design elements like ramps for accessing buildings or elevators to ensure mobility, these protections also extend into the digital realm.
Government websites and mobile applications are included in the ADA. Higher education institutions need to be aware of universal design principles and assistive technology to meet legal mandates and ensure positive experiences to support students in their collegiate goals.
Title II of the ADA specifically prohibits the exclusion of individuals with disabilities from participating in or benefiting from the offerings of these public entities. If you are responsible for your university’s public-facing website or digital platforms, you have a legal responsibility to ensure content is compliant and accessible.
Key Features of an Accessible University Campus
It’s clear that college campuses need to be accessible for legal, ethical, and practical reasons, and a checklist for accessibility can help ensure thorough considerations across departments and resources. So, how accessible is your campus, and how can you make it more accessible?
When you have a clear plan, you can more easily delegate accessibility responsibilities to different campus stakeholders and ensure an ongoing commitment to these important aspects of creating and maintaining accessible spaces.
1. Exterior Campus Accessibility
How accessible is your campus exterior? A key aspect of campus accessibility is in the design of physical spaces. The exterior campus areas should be built and maintained with student disability and potential visitor impairments in mind. These considerations include the following:
- Parking: Ensure parking lots have sufficient accessible parking spaces with adequate room for mobility needs and easy access to ramps.
- Pathways: Ensure campus pathways have sufficient width and ramps for maximized accessibility.
- Building Entrances: Evaluate building entrances for accessibility needs. Consider factors like size and ease of use.
2. Interior Campus Accessibility
Just as important as exterior accessibility is the physical space inside campus buildings. How accessible is your campus interior? Navigating classrooms, resource centers, recreational spaces, dormitories, and food halls is key to student autonomy and academic success. As you assess interior campus accessibility, consider these elements:
- Restrooms: Assess restroom accessibility, including adequate space for mobility aid access and assistive devices, as well as design for those who need toileting assistance.
- Elevators: Ensure that elevators are available to access spaces across multiple floors. Also, verify that they are located in places readily accessible with adequate space for ease of use.
- Hallways: Transitional spaces like hallways should be designed with adequate width to ensure mobility ease for students with disabilities and assistive devices.
- Classrooms: Consider seating, visibility, and flexibility when designing classroom spaces. Implementing elements of universal design can ensure maximum usability for classrooms that benefit everyone.
3. Academic Services
In addition to supporting physical accessibility, college campuses need to ensure students have access to equitable academic resources and services. Working closely with the disability services office can help ensure that academic services are spaces of equal access for those with physical and learning disabilities. As you analyze academic services for accessibility, consider the following:
- Libraries: Ensure that libraries have resources available in a range of formats that will allow users with a variety of vision, hearing, and language needs to access materials.
- Study Spaces: Create study spaces that meet a variety of needs, including physical accessibility with adequate space for assistive devices. It’s also important to consider mental health needs and create spaces with a variety of seating, lighting, and sound options for those with different sensory needs.
- Classroom Technology: Ensure that classrooms are adequately equipped with assistive technology designed for a wide range of users and their individual learning needs.
4. Student Life
The physical and academic needs of students with disabilities may be the most obvious when it comes to accessible design. But it’s also important to remember students’ social and recreational needs. On a social level, how accessible is your campus? Student life resources should be designed with maximum flexibility and the diverse needs of users in mind. Consider the following student life areas:
- Dormitories: Ensure that students who need additional space or accessible layouts are supported and well-integrated into dormitory plans. This is another area where universal design principles can ensure that living spaces work well for all students.
- Dining Facilities: Dining halls can be crowded, complex spaces. So be sure to have adequate space for navigating and accessible seating options to meet various needs.
- Recreational Spaces: As you evaluate campus resources, assess recreational spaces for their accommodations. Include adaptive workout equipment and accessible spaces in gyms and social spaces.
5. Accessibility of Campus Services
Students with disabilities should have equal access to campus services, so consider the following when it comes to health centers, counseling services, and administrative offices.
- Interpreters: Ensure that there are adequate language supports so that learners can get information in an accessible, meaningful format.
- Screen Readers: With many resources available in electronic format, be sure that screen readers are available for adequate access.
6. Digital Accessibility
Accessibility has expanded into the digital realm as more and more of campus life takes place in virtual or hybrid spaces. On the campus website and in online classrooms, ensure that you’ve considered accessibility in digital design. How accessible is your campus virtual ecosystem? Following the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) can help in considerations of many areas:
- Captions: Ensure video and audio content have accurate captions for maximized comprehension.
- Adaptability: Create content that can be displayed in multiple ways without losing meaning.
- Distinguishability: Take accessibility design principles into account when choosing contrasting colors and font sizes.
7. Communication and Signage
Navigating a sprawling campus can be difficult for anyone. But it can present particular challenges for those with physical and learning disabilities. Ensure that communication and signage take accessibility needs into consideration:
- Readability: Create signage that has contrast for visibility and includes Braille options.
- Positioning: Use universal design principles to place signs in positions that will be easily readable from a variety of angles and heights.
- Visuals: Including visual elements like iconography can make signage clearer and easier to follow.
- Accessibility: An accessible campus plan is only useful if students know about it! Use signage and interactive campus maps to communicate accessible parking, elevators, and other accessibility features clearly.
Elevate and Uphold Campus Accessibility With Concept3D
After you’ve read through this checklist, now it’s time to ask: How accessible is your campus? Designing an accessible campus that considers a wide range of diverse needs is a winning strategy that promotes inclusion and student success. College administrators have a complex task in creating accessible physical and digital spaces. But they can leverage partnerships across campus and with many different experts to make this important job easier and more efficient.
Creating a checklist for accessibility ensures thorough consideration across different spaces and needs. Once areas for improvement are identified, the work of creating more accessible spaces will offer immediate benefits.
Concept3D is excited to offer a wide variety of accessibility features that can make the task easier and more streamlined. From campus maps to accessible campus calendars, Concept3D works hard to make sure our solutions meet rigorous accessibility requirements and provide ease of use for your students.
Sign up for a demo today to learn more about how Concept3D can improve your campus accessibility.