As part of the ongoing Covid-19 lockdown, all tertiary institutions across Uganda were required to shift to Open Distance and eLearning (ODeL). Before an institution can be cleared to offer remote teaching and learning, they need to show that they adhere to guidelines that were issued in July 2020 by the National Council for Higher Education (NCHE). One of the requirements is an interactive learning management system (LMS) that effectively supports eLearning, which should provide for student-to-student interactions; student and instructor interactions, and evaluation of interaction. However, institutions are not required to ensure that all remote learning activities, and in particular the LMS and its content, are accessible to students with disabilities, even though 12.4% of the population have a disability (National Population and Housing Census, 2014).
Following the UN (Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), 2020), we define people with disabilities as those who have long-term impairments that make it difficult for them to fully and effectively participate in society on an equal footing with others (Article 1). These impairments can be sensory, physical, mental, or cognitive. Our use of the term “people with disabilities” follows the recommendations in Hanson et al. (2015) and echoes the particular terminology and person-first language used in many relevant legal and policy documents. We recognize, however, that terms such as disability and impairment are inherently problematic and will return to this in Section Discussion.
The 2014 Uganda National Population and Housing Census defined disability prevalence as the proportion of the population aged two years and above who had difficulty in seeing, walking, hearing or remembering (National Population and Housing Census, 2014). In order to ensure that those with disabilities can access higher education, strong laws and policies that promote inclusive education need to be in place. Article 24 of the UN (Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), 2020) defines inclusion as a process of systemic reform embodying changes and modifications in content, teaching methods, approaches, structures and strategies in education to overcome barriers with a vision serving to provide all students of the relevant age range with an equitable and participatory learning experience and environment that best corresponds to their requirements and preferences.”
This paper examines the extent to which Uganda’s policy environment promotes inclusive ODeL, reviews the extent VLEs of selected public and private universities in Uganda are currently accessible to people with disabilities, and suggests recommendations on how existing gaps in policy and implementation of VLEs can be addressed to improve the accessibility of VLEs of universities in Uganda.