Disability Standards for Education

In 2005 the ‘Disability Standards for Education' (known as the Education Standards) were introduced in Australia. The Education Standards are very important because they help to make sure everyone understands that, under the Disability Discrimination Act (1992) (DDA), students with disability have the right to study on the same basis as students without disability. This means that a person with disability has the same right to take part in education and training, as people without a disability and have the same choices in education that people without a disability have. For more information check out the website Disability Discrimination Act Education Standards.

The Education Standards explain that there are times when a school, TAFE, training provider or university must make particular adjustments to allow people with disability to take part in education. For example a hearing loop may need to be installed in a university lecture hall to allow people with hearing impairments to access the lecture (for more examples click ‘types of adjustments'). However, adjustments must be reasonable and they must not be too hard for the education provider to carry out. Whether an adjustment is reasonable or not can be a very hard thing to work out and the Education Standards help to figure out whether adjustments are reasonable.

If an education or training provider claims that an adjustment is too difficult or expensive to implement, the DDA requires the provider to: