Universal Design for Learning (UDL) applies the architectural principle of universal design — building for the full range of human bodies and needs from the beginning — to education: designing curricula, assessments, and learning environments that accommodate the full range of human cognitive difference rather than retrofitting accommodations after the fact. The result benefits all learners, not only those with identified differences, because it reveals how narrow conventional educational design actually is. UDL is not a concession to disability but a recognition that the standard methods were never optimal even for those they were designed to serve.
Each step builds on the last.