How to get academic adjustments at an Australian university

Short answer first: you register with your university's disability or equity service, hand over medical documentation, meet an adviser and come out with a written plan that you then get in front of your coordinators. The plan has a different name at every university: an Academic Adjustment Plan at the University of Melbourne, a Student Access Plan at UQ, an Equitable Learning Plan at UNSW, an Education Access Plan at ANU. Exam adjustments sit on a separate and much earlier deadline. Underneath all of it are the Disability Standards for Education 2005, which oblige the university to consult you and adjust.

This article is about the process and the timing, at five universities that publish both. It is not legal advice. If your university is not named here, search its student site for disability, accessibility, equitable learning or access plan, because the service is the same thing under four or five different signs.

What does the law actually require of your university?

Two federal instruments. Section 22 of the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 makes it unlawful for an educational authority to discriminate against a student on the ground of disability, including by denying or limiting access to any benefit it provides. Section 31 provides for disability standards to be made, and section 32 makes contravening one unlawful. The standard that matters to you is the Disability Standards for Education 2005, whose own introduction records that it was formulated by the Commonwealth Attorney-General under subsection 31(1).

• An adjustment is defined, not left to goodwill. Section 3.3 defines it as a measure or action that helps a student with a disability apply for enrolment, participate in a course or use facilities and services on the same basis as a student without a disability, including an aid, a facility or a service the student needs because of the disability.
• Reasonable means balanced, not convenient. Section 3.4 says an adjustment is reasonable if it balances the interests of all parties affected, and lists what to weigh: your disability, your views, the effect on your learning outcomes, participation and independence, the effect on everyone else, and the costs and benefits.
• The university has to ask you first. Section 3.5 requires the provider to consult you, or your associate, about whether the adjustment is reasonable and whether another would be less disruptive and no less beneficial. Section 3.6 makes it consider whether the adjustment will need to change over time.
• Time is part of the duty. Section 3.7 says the provider must take reasonable steps to ensure any required adjustment is made within a reasonable time, and that what is reasonable depends in part on whether you gave your information in a timely way.
• Assessment is covered. Section 6.2 applies the same consult, decide and adjust cycle to learning experiences including assessment and certification requirements, and section 6.3 lists adapting assessment procedures so you can show the knowledge being assessed.
• The university keeps its standards. Subsection 3.4(3) says the provider may maintain the academic requirements of the course and other components inherent in or essential to its nature. Section 10.2 adds the unjustifiable hardship exception.

Read those together and the shape of your case is set. You are not asking for a favour or an easier degree. You are asking for the thing that removes a barrier without touching what the course is testing, and section 3.7 makes the clock part of the obligation on both sides.

What is the plan called, and who runs it?

Every university runs one service and issues one document. Learning its name is the first practical step, because nothing in the system responds to the words you would use naturally.

• Melbourne: Student Equity and Disability Services, and an Academic Adjustment Plan. The SEDS pages set out four steps: prepare, register, create your plan, action your plan. The plan arrives once you are registered, and you use it to tell subject coordinators what you need.
• UQ: the Accessibility and Welfare team, and a Student Access Plan. UQ's Reasonable Adjustments for Students Procedure has an adviser assess your documentation, identify adjustments, consult staff about the inherent requirements of the course, and place the result in a Student Access Plan.
• UNSW: Equitable Learning Services, and an Equitable Learning Plan. UNSW's registration page says a facilitator builds the plan with you after an appointment, and that eligibility covers neurodivergence, physical and mental health conditions, the effects of trauma, and being a primary carer.
• ANU: Accessibility, and an Education Access Plan. ANU's how to register page says you must be enrolled first, then register through the Access Student Portal, upload documentation and see a case manager.
• Monash: Disability Support Services, which assesses you and makes recommendations. Monash's alternative assessment arrangements page says DSS assesses your condition and provides recommendations, that this can take some time, and that you register by a deadline for each assessment period. The page names no plan document.

The last column is the one students skip. At UNSW and Melbourne the document reaches staff because you send it. At ANU and Monash the university routes it. Find out which kind you are at in week one, because a plan sitting in your email is worth nothing in week eleven.

What evidence do you need, and how old can it be?

Documentation from a health professional that describes effect, not just diagnosis. The wording is consistent across the five.

UNSW says your documentation must state the nature and duration of your condition, any treatment you are receiving and the impact on your studies. It must be less than two years old, in English, and written on letterhead, signed and dated by an appropriate medical practitioner, specialist, educational psychologist or other professional. If the documentation is not sufficient, UNSW says it will contact you to request more. It also warns that documents you sent to the University Admissions Centre with your application are not forwarded, and your facilitator cannot see them.

ANU asks for current medical documentation setting out diagnosis, impact on studies and recommendations for reasonable adjustments, or its own Health Practitioner Report, and its procedure names documentation less than two years old. UQ requires medical documentation that outlines the condition and its functional impact on your ability to study as planned, and for exceptional circumstances the evidence can include third party verification. Melbourne supports conditions with an impact of six weeks or more, and its prepare to register page prefers its Health Professional Report and documents issued within two years for ongoing circumstances.

Getting a useful report out of a ten minute appointment

Your GP writes what you ask for. Ask badly and you get a certificate saying you have a condition, which is the one thing the service already assumes.

1. Book a long appointment and bring the university's own form. ANU, UNSW and Melbourne all publish a health professional report template.
2. Give your practitioner the list of what the university wants stated: nature, duration, treatment, and impact on study.
3. Turn your symptoms into study terms before you go. Reading speed, sitting still for two hours, mornings, noise, keyboard use, a three hour prac.
4. Ask for recommendations, not requests. ANU asks for recommendations for reasonable adjustments, and a report that names extra time or rest breaks gives the adviser something to work with.
5. Check the date and the letterhead before you upload. UNSW requires both, says it will contact you for more evidence if the documentation is not sufficient, and adds that leaving things to the last minute only adds to your stress.

One privacy note. This is sensitive health information and it stays with the service, not your faculty. UQ's procedure says the number of people made aware should be on a need to know basis and, where possible, restricted to the functional impact rather than the diagnosis. What your university may do with records about you more broadly is covered in student data and privacy law in Australia.

When do you have to apply for exam adjustments?

Earlier than feels reasonable, and on a deadline that belongs to the exams office rather than the disability service. This is the single most common way a valid plan produces no adjustment.

• UQ: 5pm on Friday of Week 8. The alternative exam arrangements page says applications for Semester 1 and 2 end-of-semester exams close then, that Semester 2 2026 central in-semester exams close 14 days before the exam date, and that summer end-of-semester exams close 14 days before the period starts.
• Monash: a published date per assessment period. Its table sets 5pm Melbourne time on Friday 16 October for semester two final assessments held 2 to 18 November, and Friday 6 November for the Juris Doctor trimester 3 final assessments.
• Melbourne: a cut-off for each study period, before the timetable is built. SEDS says it needs time to set up alternative exam arrangements, so all registration steps have to be completed by a date it publishes for each exam period, and its alternative exam arrangements page notes that there are deadlines to finalise them for each study period. The Semester 2 2026 date has passed, and the Semester 2 supplementary date was listed as TBC in September 2026.
• UNSW: at least two weeks before the exam period. UNSW says exam adjustments may not be implemented if your plan is not finalised before the deadline, that the deadline is set by the Exams Team rather than by the service, and that it falls at least two weeks before the exam period starts.
• ANU: two deadlines, depending on who runs the exam. The specific examination arrangements page says the Examinations Office emails students the deadlines for centrally run exams, and that for College exams you contact your course convener at least two weeks before the date, with later requests considered case by case.

Now add the queue in front of the deadline. UNSW says appointment wait times can reach three weeks in the lead-up to exams. ANU says it can take at least two weeks to meet an adviser after registering, and gives Access and Inclusion ten working days to issue the plan once complete documentation is in. Counting back from a Week 8 deadline, registering in Week 1 is not early. It is on time.

Which adjustments do universities actually list?

The published lists are more generous than most students assume, and they go well beyond extra time. UQ's procedure names alternative arrangements for exams, extensions to assessment deadlines, study-load adjustments, deferment of enrolment, alternate modes of delivery, alternate methods of assessment, a participation assistant, adaptation of premises or equipment, and adjustments to academic participation such as an occasional absence or the need to leave class.

Melbourne's list adds specifics. An academic support worker can take notes in lectures and scribe or read in exams. Reading materials are reformatted into accessible files with alternative text on diagrams, videos are checked for captions, and materials can sometimes be released early. Some students may be eligible for note-taking software that records lectures and classes where permitted, gives live captions and pulls transcripts, slides and notes into one place. Extensions may be up to and including 10 business days, placement arrangements can include a placement closer to home or part time instead of full time, and flexible attendance can mean attending online or changing class streams.

For exams, Melbourne lists extra reading or writing time, rest breaks, sitting on a computer or by hand, a change of venue, a scribe or reader, and timetable preferences such as one exam per day, and applies them to end-of-semester, supplementary and special exams, in-class and mid-semester tests and practical exams. UQ adds ergonomic furniture, personal equipment, food and drink, and specially prepared papers, while noting that not all of them can be arranged for off-campus exams. UQ's procedure also caps an exam session at four hours including extra time and rest breaks unless you ask in writing to sit it in one go, and caps a single day at six hours.

Placements deserve their own note, because they are the adjustment students ask for last and need earliest. UNSW says you must register at least one term before a work-integrated learning placement starts so adjustments such as the placement location, flexible scheduling or accessible technology can be arranged.

Does a plan let you record lectures?

It helps your case and it does not settle it. At the universities that publish a rule, recording is governed by a separate policy, and a plan interacts with that policy rather than overriding it. Melbourne lists recording lectures and classes where permitted among the note-taking supports some students may be eligible for, and that phrase carries the whole qualification.

The practical effect is that you end up holding two documents: the plan that says recording is a reasonable adjustment for you, and the permission your university's recording policy requires. The rules on who gives permission, what a yes covers, whether you may share the file and when you have to delete it are set out in recording lectures at Australian universities, including which universities treat the plan itself as the approval, and they are not the same at UQ, Melbourne and ANU.

The email that gets the yes

Send it in the first week of semester, to the person your recording policy names, with the plan attached.

1. Name the unit or course and the classes you want to record.
2. Attach the plan, or the part of it that names recording or assistive technology.
3. Say it is for your own study of that unit, and that you will not share the file.
4. Say when you will delete it.
5. Keep the reply in writing, because the permission and the plan are separate records.

What if the adjustment is refused?

Refusals mostly come in two shapes, and they have different answers. One is a service that will not put an adjustment in your plan. The other is a faculty that says the adjustment cannot be made because of what the course requires.

For the first, use the internal review. ANU's procedure on adjustments for students who disclose a disability says students are told in writing about their right to a review when the plan is issued, that an application for review goes by email to the Manager of Access and Inclusion within 20 working days of the decision being communicated, that the Manager makes a fresh recommendation as if making the original one and provides it within ten working days, and that a student still unsatisfied appeals to the Registrar. UQ's procedure sends appeals to the Academic Registrar under the Student Grievance Resolution Policy.

The second shape is harder, because the law allows it. Subsection 3.4(3) of the Standards lets a provider maintain the academic requirements of a course and anything inherent in or essential to its nature. ANU's procedure puts this into practice: the course convener, in consultation with Access and Inclusion, assesses whether the student can meet the inherent requirements, and where even reasonable adjustments will not get there, enrolment in that course is not possible and the service helps the student find alternatives. UQ's procedure asks the Associate Dean (Academic) one question, whether the student can address the core academic requirements if reasonable adjustments are provided, and puts the onus on the school to explain a no. Ask for the inherent requirement statement in writing.

Outside the university, the Australian Human Rights Commission takes complaints about disability discrimination. It accepts written complaints only, charges no fee, does not require a lawyer, and tries to resolve matters through conciliation. If a complaint is terminated you may be able to take it to the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia or the Federal Court, with 60 days to apply. The Commission itself says it is experiencing significant delays, so treat it as the route after the internal one, not instead of it.

How do you make the adjustment do something for your marks?

An adjustment removes a barrier. It does not study for you, and a plan with extra time on it can quietly become a reason to leave revision later. UQ's procedure says students should negotiate adjustments before commencement or early in the semester, and the same instinct works for the studying.

Build the week around what the plan actually gave you. If it gave you lecture recordings or captioned video, the recording is a source to work from once, not a lecture to sit through twice. If it gave you note-taking support, the notes still have to become questions you can answer without looking. If it gave you extensions of up to 10 business days, the plan for using them is written in week one, not on the night before. Testing yourself on your own notes across the semester carries the most weight here, and it is set out in active recall.

Then sort the calendar once. Put the exam adjustment deadline in it the day you register, along with the date your plan expires, because ANU's recommendations are valid only for the semester in which they are made unless the plan says otherwise, and UNSW renews every teaching period and sometimes asks for new documentation first.

Where Notibo fits

If your plan allows recording, and your lecturer has said yes, Notibo records on a computer and gives you back a transcript, structured notes and flashcards with spaced repetition. It also turns PDF, PPTX and DOCX files into notes and flashcards, which is the practical route for the reformatted readings and slide decks that arrive through an adjustment. Transcripts and notes export as PDF or Word.

Know the limits before you rely on it. The first 14 days of Pro are free, with 240 minutes of recording and no card. When the trial ends, the free plan gives 30 minutes of recording a month, and Pro is 9.99 euro a month or 88.99 euro a year. Uploads are capped at 50 MB and one recording can run up to two hours. On a computer, Chrome and Edge can capture a browser tab's sound and on Windows the whole system sound, while Safari and Firefox give the microphone only. Files are stored in the EU on Supabase in Frankfurt, and transcription and the AI notes run on US processors under standard contractual clauses, which the privacy policy lists.

None of that replaces the permission. Your plan and your university's recording policy are still the two documents that decide whether the recorder should be running at all.