The majority of this paper is excerpted from the book Universally Designed Leadership (Novak & Rodriguez, 2016). The paper will focus on two important aspects of the Explore Phase: investigating UDL as a system wide decision making framework and building awareness with key players. This paper will highlight the need for administrators to use a variety of quantitative and qualitative information to identify strengths and needs in the district before preparing for implementation. The importance of completing meaningful research on “best in class” districts to guide appropriate goal setting will also be highlighted.