Learning Designed

An Education Power Tool for a Changing World

As the world changes at warp speed and the full diversity of our population is being recognized, educators are now charged with meeting a much higher bar than in the past. Science is clear: there is no such thing as an average learner. All students will need to acquire a much wider range of skills in order to thrive as individuals and solve their communities’ most complex and vexing problems. As a result, educators need new power tools to reach every learner in every environment.    

Learning Designed is just such a power tool.  It is a state-of-the-art online learning platform for professional learning and collaboration that provides personalized experiences for educators within a robust community of support. Learning Designed recognizes that, like students, educators need access to customized resources and coaching within a trustworthy social space that enables experimentation and accelerates change.  Whether in a K-12 or university environment, Learning Designed breaks down the systemic barriers that typically hamper progress, touching every aspect of the learning ecosystem. 

As a top-down and bottom-up solution, Learning Designed harnesses the evidence-based framework known as Universal Design for Learning (UDL) to help educators understand learner variability and improve learning outcomes. The result? Higher performance and an enriched and equitable culture of learning that maximizes everyone’s potential.

Flexible Means to Equity & Excellence

Learning Designed supports educators in designing more effective learning environments and experiences for all learners.  It gives educators convening power and invites a heightened awareness of what different learners need to succeed. Ultimately, more students are much better served in all learning experiences — especially students with learning disabilities, learning and attention issues, those suffering the effects of trauma, and students who are often not served well by the system due to gender, race, language, class, culture, and other issues. Learning Designed empowers educators and teams to do what’s right for learners—at scale.

 

 

The UDL Credentialing and Certification Initiative (UDLCCI)

UDLCCI is the global, field-change initiative that conceptualizes and shepherds the work behind the Learning Designed platform and content. The mission of UDLCCI is to achieve and sustain the optimal, voluntary, and scaled implementation of the Universal Design for Learning Framework and Guidelines through the development of:

  • Broadly-accepted standards and guidelines
  • Field-based expertise representing those standards across a variety of domains
  • Voluntary verification process for documenting the degree to which the UDL Principles and Guidelines are met or addressed in practice and in products

UDLCCI is a multi-phase project that will expand and evolve over time in response to emerging opportunities and stakeholder perspectives. In other words, we are continuing to build the credentials and certifications based on field input. We hope to extend both credentialing and certification of UDL globally into a wide variety of learning environments. 

The UDLCCI is led by Lead Partner Organizations: CAST and the UDL Implementation and Research Network (UDL-IRN). The project is in Phase 3 (2021 — 2023). UDLCCI is actively seeking investments of interest, expertise and commitment to moving our mission forward during this acceleration and incubation period. 

 

Initiative Lead Partners