City College Dublin Declares its Adoption of the ALTITUDE Charter

CCD Statement: City College Dublin are delighted to declare its adoption of the ALTITUDE Charter.  Our adoption of the ALTITUDE Charter signals our clear commitment to creating a learning environment where all students feel valued, supported, and able to succeed. Universal Design strengthens not only access but belonging and excellence. We are proud to join the national call to action and to lead by example in building a more inclusive tertiary education system. 

City College Dublin is proud to publicly declare its support for and adoption of ALTITUDE – the National Charter for Universal Design in Tertiary Education. By doing so, we join institutions across Ireland in a collective national call to action to advance Universal Design (UD) and to build a more inclusive, learner-centred tertiary education system. 

At City College Dublin, we recognise that the diversity of our student body is one of our greatest strengths. Our learners bring varied experiences, ambitions, identities, and pathways into higher education. As an institution committed to academic excellence and professional relevance, we believe that inclusive design is fundamental to enabling all students to participate fully and succeed.  Universal Design aligns strongly with City College Dublin’s mission to provide high-quality, flexible and accessible education that responds to the evolving needs of learners and society. We believe inclusion is a shared responsibility across all roles and functions within the College. Through adoption of the ALTITUDE Charter, we commit to working collaboratively across academic, professional, and support teams to embed Universal Design more systematically in our programmes, policies, services, and environments. 

Commenting on the institution’s adoption of ALTITUDE, CEO of City College Dublin, Philip Burke, welcomed this development: 

“At City College Dublin, we see Universal Design not as an adjunct to quality, but as central to it. Our adoption of the ALTITUDE Charter represents a deliberate and strategic commitment to embedding inclusive practice across every aspect of our institution, from programme design and assessment to digital delivery and student support.  As a QQI-validated higher education institution serving a diverse and increasingly global student body, we recognise that inclusion must be designed in from the outset, not retrofitted.   ALTITUDE provides a clear national framework to guide that work.  We are proud to join this cross-sectoral call to action and to play our part in building a tertiary education system where inclusion is everyone’s responsibility and where every learner has an equitable opportunity to thrive.”  

 

Our Commitment to Implementation 

Following our adoption of the ALTITUDE Charter and our public support for the national call to action, City College Dublin will now formally review our governance structures to ensure effective and sustainable implementation of Universal Design principles. 

We will establish a dedicated Universal Design/ALTITUDE working group, informed by the committee model outlined within the Charter. This group will provide strategic oversight, coordinate cross-institutional collaboration, and guide measurable progress across the Charter’s key pillars. Where appropriate, we will align this work with existing academic governance and quality assurance structures to ensure that Universal Design becomes embedded within our core institutional processes. 

Through this structured and collaborative approach, we aim to strengthen inclusive practice across: 

• Learning, Teaching and Assessment 
• Student Supports, Services and Social Engagement 
• The Physical Learning Environment 
• The Digital Environment 

Our focus will be on continuous improvement, informed by evidence, learner voice, and national best practice. 

About the ALTITUDE Charter 

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

Learn More About What it Means for Institutions to Adopt and Implement ALTITUDE. 

The learner population in tertiary education is becoming increasingly diverse, and students’ lives are also increasingly complex. The responsibility on educational institutions to provide equitable access for all is now strongly embedded in Irish legislation, and national tertiary education strategies contain more specific goals to implement a Universal Design approach, (SOLAS, 2020; Higher Education Authority, 2022).  

The aim is to move towards a system where ‘Inclusion is Everyone’s Business’, where all staff play their part in delivering an inclusive educational experience. 

Universal Design, or UD for short, offers us an evidence-based approach to engender this mindset, and is increasingly seen as a central tenet of our response to rising diversity, (Centre for Excellence in Universal Design, 2022). But how can we embed a UD approach in our institutions? 

That’s where ALTITUDE – the National Charter for Universal Design in Tertiary Education – comes in to play. 

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 Charter was launched in Spring 2024, alongside an accompanying technical report and implementation toolkit. 

The vision of the 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. 

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.  

Drawing from national and international literature, the Charter recommends key strategic enablers, which institutions should put in place over time to support the sustainable implementation of UD, and proposes collaborative action to work towards goals under 4 key pillars of our institutions: 

• Learning, Teaching & Assessment; 
• Supports, Services & Social Engagement;  
• the Physical Environment;  
• and the Digital Environment 

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.  

The cross-sectoral development of the ALTITUDE Charter   represents a landmark moment for the tertiary education sector, signalling its intent to place human diversity at the heart of its design and delivery. 

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

Learn More About What it Means for Institutions to Adopt and Implement ALTITUDE.