Designing for All

What My Mother and My Students Taught Me About Learning

When I think about why inclusive learning design matters so much to me, it doesn’t start with research or frameworks. It starts with my mother.

She is one of the most competent, insightful, and determined women I knowand she also happens to have cerebral palsy. Growing up alongside her, I witnessed firsthand how often the world forgets to accommodate difference.

I watched her navigate spaces, systems, and assumptions that weren’t built with her in mind, and I learned a lesson early on:

When people are excluded, it’s not because they can’t participate. It is because the design isn’t working.

That lens shaped me. It made me pay attention to how people learn, how they access information, and how they feel when they do (or don’t) belong.

Later, as a classroom teacher and advocate for my students in Special Education, I saw the same patterns play out in schools. Bright, curious learners were being left behind. Not because they weren’t capable, but because the system wasn’t flexible. So I adapted, I redesigned, and I advocated hard. Every accommodation, every alternate format, every reworked lesson was a step toward making sure more students could thrive.

Now, as a learning experience designer in the private sector, I carry those lessons with me. My audience may have changed, but the need for inclusive, accessible design hasn’t.

Today, when I build eLearning, I think about:

• Learners who process differently or need more time

• Employees with invisible disabilities or chronic fatigue

• Working parents squeezing training in between meetings

• And yes, learners like my mom: brilliant, capable, and too often underestimated

Inclusive design is about so much more than compliance. It’s about empathy. It’s about equity. And it’s about belonging. Making sure no one has to fight for access, because the door was already open.

This is why I design. Because learning should be for everyone, and because the right design can change lives.