The Accessibility Gap in School Policy Documents - and how to bridge it

School policy documents play a central role in shaping everyday educational practice, defining expectations, rights, responsibilities, and procedures to students, parents, teachers, and school leaders. However, these documents are often written in ways that unintentionally exclude the very communities they are meant to serve.

This fireside chat will explore the concept of hidden barriers in school policy documents, with a particular focus on accessibility. Drawing on research and practical examples, the talk will examine how language complexity, document structure, formatting, and assumptions about prior knowledge can create obstacles for parents and students with disabilities, those with lower literacy levels, multilingual families, and communities already marginalised within education systems.

The discussion will also consider how digital publication has not automatically resulted in greater accessibility. While policies are increasingly available online, many still fail to meet basic accessibility standards for screen readers, plain language, or alternative formats.

Finally, the talk will reflect on how emerging technologies, including AI, present both opportunities and risks. AI tools can support clearer communication and accessibility-focused redesign, but only if equity and inclusion are treated as core principles rather than afterthoughts.

The aim of this conversation is to encourage educators, policymakers, and system leaders to critically reflect on how school policies are designed, who they are really written for, and how small, intentional changes can make a meaningful difference to access, understanding, and trust.

For livestream: https://youtube.com/live/pXepVTp-U3Q?feature=share

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