A field visit looks straightforward on a course timetable: meet at a particular place, follow a route and return with observations. The plan may leave important questions unanswered. Can every student use that route? Are the costs and timing clear? What happens when the usual arrangement prevents someone from doing the academic work?
Those questions bring the inclusion theme of EIDU 2026 into everyday university teaching. Innovation can begin with examining an ordinary course requirement and the assumptions built into it.
For academic leaders and faculty-development teams, the opportunity is to move beyond celebrating an individual workaround. A useful teaching experience can reveal what the institution should anticipate, organise and resource before the same barrier appears again.
This is a preview of the fifth International Conference on University Teaching, based on sources checked on 28 October 2026. It examines announced themes and develops an original planning example; it does not report conference outcomes.
Which EIDU is taking place in November 2026?
The event is the V Encuentro Internacional en Docencia Universitaria, described in UNESCO IESALC’s English announcement as the International Conference on University Teaching.
It is organised by the University of Costa Rica, Universidad del Rosario in Colombia and the Centre for University Pedagogies, a project involving UNESCO IESALC and Colombia’s National Open and Distance University, UNAD.
The announced date is 3 November 2026. The event is virtual and free of charge. The University of Costa Rica’s announcement gives the main schedule as 8 a.m.–12:40 p.m., Costa Rica time.
The theme concerns innovation for inclusion and barrier-free pedagogies. The published programme includes workshops and webinars, teaching-experience showcases and a panel examining responsibility for adaptation in higher education.
At the research date, the current conference website states that registrations are full. Earlier invitations should therefore not be read as confirmation that places remain available.
The acronym also appears in other educational contexts. This article concerns the Costa Rica–Colombia initiative, rather than the University of Alcalá’s separate teaching-innovation meeting.
Inclusion raises a question about the course arrangement
When a student encounters a barrier, the immediate response may be a useful individual adjustment. That response can be necessary. It can also reveal a recurring feature of the course that deserves earlier attention.
A requirement may assume that students can travel at a particular time, obtain a resource without difficulty or interpret an instruction that staff regard as obvious. Those assumptions become visible when someone cannot meet them.
The institutional question is what should happen next. Does each student have to negotiate the same obstacle independently, or can the course team improve the arrangement for future participation?
That does not mean an educator can anticipate every circumstance. Nor does planned inclusion replace appropriate individual support. It means that repeated difficulty can become information for course design rather than remain a series of isolated requests.
Use design guidance as a starting point
CAST’s Universal Design for Learning Guidelines provide an independent reference for examining participation. They organise design considerations around engagement, representation, and action and expression. The current 3.0 guidance also addresses clear goals, anticipated challenges and exclusionary practices.
The guidelines offer suggestions for educational design. They are not an evaluation of EIDU, a certification of a course or proof that every option will produce the same outcome.
For a university team, they can support a discussion about where a barrier sits: in access to material, the organisation of an activity, the way a response is expected or another part of the experience. The team still needs to investigate the actual task and learners.
The following example is an editorial illustration of that work, not a tested UDL intervention.
Examine a field activity before the day of the visit
Imagine an introductory urban-studies course in which students investigate how a public space is used. They must record observations, distinguish those observations from assumptions and explain what further evidence would be needed for a stronger interpretation.
The usual activity involves a shared visit to a site. Before confirming it, the course team examines the route, timing, information students receive and resources they are expected to provide.
Several different questions may emerge. A route might be difficult to use. A meeting time might create a conflict that students could have anticipated if notified earlier. A task sheet might describe the destination precisely while leaving the observation method unclear.
These are possible issues in a hypothetical course. They are not descriptions of the institutions organising EIDU.
The team’s first job is to identify the academic purpose. Is direct observation at that location essential? Are students learning a particular field technique, or learning to evaluate evidence about the use of space? The answer affects which changes would preserve the task.
A prepared collection of site records might support one goal while failing to provide another experience the module requires. The alternative should be examined against the actual objective, rather than assumed to be equivalent because it is easier to arrange.
Plan participation without diluting the academic task
Inclusive planning can involve changing an arrangement while retaining a demanding intellectual expectation.
In the urban-studies example, students still need to justify what their observations support and where uncertainty remains. Clarifying the route or instructions does not remove that requirement.
The team might investigate another accessible location, a different way to organise the visit or an appropriate alternative source of evidence. Each possibility needs scrutiny. What would students gain access to, what would change and what academic work would remain?
This approach also helps explain a decision when some part of the activity cannot simply be substituted. A course team should be able to state why a particular experience matters and involve the appropriate colleagues in finding a workable route to participation.
The aim is a defensible educational decision. It is not a promise that every format is interchangeable or that every challenge can be resolved within one lecturer’s workload.
Make responsibility visible
A teacher may identify an obstacle without having the authority or resources to resolve it alone.
A field activity can involve course staff, programme leadership and colleagues responsible for access, student support or practical arrangements. If nobody knows which decision belongs where, students may be left waiting while staff make reasonable assumptions about one another’s roles.
The institution can make a specific plan. Who checks the arrangements? Who explains the task? Who handles a request that requires specialist input? Who can approve a necessary change?
The answers should be available early enough to be useful. An option announced after students have made plans may solve less than the same option discussed during preparation.
Resources also matter. If a revised activity needs staff preparation, suitable materials or coordination time, the programme should recognise that work. Relying on a particularly committed teacher to improvise every year is a fragile way to preserve access.
Invite student input without making students design the whole solution
Students can help staff understand how an activity is experienced. They should not have to carry the full burden of identifying a barrier, proposing a workable alternative and coordinating the institutional response.
In the hypothetical course, the team could provide clear information in advance and explain how students can raise a participation question. Staff could then examine the arrangement with appropriate support rather than ask students to negotiate separately with every person involved.
After the activity, students might identify an instruction that remained unclear or a change that made participation more workable. The course team can use that information to revise its planning.
This is a proposed professional practice, not evidence that one consultation method guarantees inclusion. Different programmes will need arrangements suited to their students, academic requirements and institutional responsibilities.
A useful principle is to treat feedback as information for improving the course, while respecting the limits of what an individual student should be expected to disclose or organise.
Ask what a teaching showcase can establish
EIDU’s teaching-experience showcases offer a setting for professional exchange. A well-described experience can give another institution an idea worth examining. It does not automatically show that the same arrangement will work elsewhere.
A reader or participant can ask for the specific problem. Which feature of the original activity prevented or complicated participation? What did the teaching team change? What support and resources were involved?
Then ask what the account can demonstrate. Student feedback may show that an arrangement became easier to use. Examples of academic work may help examine whether the learning purpose remained intact. A teacher’s reflection may reveal implementation difficulties that a polished summary leaves out.
These forms of evidence answer different questions. None should silently become a claim that an entire institution is now inclusive or that a single change caused every reported improvement.
For the fieldwork example, another university would need to examine its own sites, curriculum and support arrangements before transferring the approach. The most valuable lesson may be the planning question, rather than the exact solution.
Turn an experience into a course decision
A practical institutional discussion can end with one precise change to investigate.
The urban-studies team might decide to make participation requirements clearer before enrolment in an activity, review a recurring route or improve how staff coordinate alternative arrangements. The choice should follow the difficulty actually identified.
The team can also decide what it will look for afterwards: whether students understood the requirements, whether a recurring obstacle remained and whether the academic task still produced the intended kind of work.
This creates a manageable connection between a conference discussion and local practice. It leaves space for uncertainty and revision rather than treating an inspiring example as a finished institutional policy.
Give inclusion a place in faculty development
For university event organisers, EIDU’s theme can prompt a useful conversation about the ordinary arrangements through which students encounter a curriculum.
A shared presentation can establish the question. A subsequent workshop can ask colleagues to examine one real activity, identify its assumptions and determine which decisions need further investigation.
Learning Coach’s guide to choosing between a keynote and a workshop explores how the intended professional work should shape that format.
Its guide to choosing a university keynote on learning and critical thinking offers further context for connecting an event with academic priorities.
To bring a discussion about learning, inclusion and human capabilities to your institution, explore Learning Coach’s keynote offer.
Research scope and limits
This preview uses official event information available on 28 October 2026. The conference is still in the future. Programme descriptions are announcements, and no recordings, proceedings or delivered-session results were reviewed.
CAST’s guidance is used as a design reference, not as a systematic review of intervention effectiveness. The fieldwork scenario and suggested institutional questions are original illustrations. No Learning Coach participation in or endorsement by EIDU’s organisers is implied.
References
EIDU. Official 2026 conference website and programme. Accessed 28 October 2026; registration shown as full.
UNESCO IESALC. International Conference on University Teaching: Innovating for Inclusion, Barrier-Free Pedagogies. Published 13 August 2026; updated 17 August 2026. Accessed 28 October 2026.
University of Costa Rica. EIDU marks five years of international exchange on university teaching. Spanish-language institutional announcement, 7 October 2026. Accessed 28 October 2026.
CAST. Universal Design for Learning Guidelines, version 3.0. Accessed 28 October 2026.
