“For Everyone”: The Hidden Risk of Universal Design for Learning

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is often held up as the solution to inclusion. It is an approach that fosters a flexible learning environment where information is offered in multiple formats and students can engage with content and demonstrate their learning in a variety of ways. The goal is to reduce barriers from the outset by designing instruction that anticipates learner diversity, rather than relying on supports added after the fact. In theory, this creates classrooms that already include the “ramp,” rather than requiring it to be built later.

But in practice, this attempt to create a universal ramp can blur a line that should never disappear:
the line between universal supports and individualized accommodations.

And when that line is blurred, something much deeper becomes blurred with it:
disabled students’ rights, identities, and understanding of the supports they are legally entitled to.

In classrooms where UDL becomes the only language, students are not taught what an accommodation is or that they have a right to individualized support when universal approaches fall short. They grow up believing that the environment has already been designed for them and that if they still cannot access learning, the problem must lie within themselves. The system’s failure becomes the student’s burden.

This is how erasure happens. Quietly. Incrementally. Wrapped in the language of “for everyone.”

We also need to be honest about what teachers are already doing. Many educators are consistently applying UDL principles. They design flexible lessons, provide choices, and adapt instruction daily. Yet exclusions are rising. School-based violence is rising. Students are being placed on partial days or removed from classrooms altogether.

If UDL is already happening and these harms persist, then UDL cannot be the missing ingredient.
The issue is not a lack of effort or skill.
It is something structural.

Universality sells. Rights do not. As long as UDL is packaged as a universal solution, something that can be bought, implemented, and scaled, it becomes attractive to systems that want inclusion without confronting inequity. This can unintentionally feed a model where disability is abstracted, depersonalized, and replaced with “all learners” language because that language is easier to market. But what is profitable is not always what is just.

When UDL is positioned as the cornerstone of inclusion, responsibility shifts unfairly onto individual teachers. If a student continues to struggle, the assumption becomes that the teacher simply did not design universally enough. Inclusion becomes a personal responsibility and, when universal strategies fall short, a personal failure. Meanwhile, the system remains unchanged and unexamined.

And it is disabled, neurodivergent, and racialized students who continue to bear the cost.

Because here is what must remain clear:
Universal supports are not accommodations.
UDL does not replace individualized supports or lessen schools’ legal obligations.
And universal strategies alone cannot meet every need.

Schools still have a duty to accommodate to the point of undue hardship. Students remain entitled to individualized, specific supports. And they deserve to understand these rights.

When the line between universal design and individualized accommodation is blurred, students lose the ability to recognize when a ramp is missing. Many do not even know what the ramp is or that they are entitled to it. They are left believing the classroom was built for them and that if they still cannot access it, they simply need to adjust.

This is not inclusion. This is structural harm disguised as progressive practice.

The question is not whether we should blur the line. It is whether we will stop confusing erasure with equity.

We need to name disability.
We need to talk openly about differences and access needs.
We need to ensure students know not only what works for them, but why, and that individualized accommodations are a right, not a courtesy.

UDL can open doors.
Accommodations keep them open.
A rights-based foundation ensures those doors do not collapse.

Students deserve all three, and they deserve a system honest enough to name the difference rather than blur it away.