Mette Anwar-Westander

Mette Anwar-Westander is the Founding Director of Disabled Students UK (DSUK), a non-profit community led organisation that was developed through Mette’s own experience of inequality as a disabled student. Creating a national community of over 500 students, Mette founded DSUK with the goal of using disabled students lived experience to make the Higher Education sector more inclusive.

DSUK is centred upon the belief that disabled students insights can revolutionise Higher Education. In DSUK, Mette has carved out space for unheard students to have their voices heard. Through training, work opportunities and platforming, DSUK transforms lived experience into recognised sector knowledge. DSUK’s consultants are today widely sought for their research, public speaking, training and consulting services. Through sharing their disability-informed expertise, they are changing the sectors perceptions of disability and ability.

Mette’s evidence-based approach has seen DSUK’s work repeatedly mentioned in parliament. Their 2022 report Going Back is Not a Choice, which presented key lessons from the pandemic, was hailed as a potential game changer for the sector. Most recently, their 2023 Annual Disabled Student Survey became the largest UK survey into university accessibility to date. The survey is supported by university members and represents a culmination of Mette’s dedication to co-production between disabled students, sector staff and external stakeholders, to enact a material change to accessibility in Higher Education. Mette has led Disabled Students UK in working alongside bodies such as the Disabled Students Commission, UKRI and the University of Oxford.

Inspired by the Disability Justice movement, Mette has brought together a new generation of disabled people. Committed to being run by current and former disabled students, DSUK’s engine is disabled students own collective expertise. Championing prefigurativism, Mette has gathered a team that refuses to diminish either their competence or their challenges, implementing an interdependent working style and values of responsibility and compassion.

Mette has a BA in Psychology and Philosophy from the University of Oxford and completed an MSc in Cognitive Neuroscience in 2023. Mette is autistic and has an energy limiting condition. Widely sought for their research and policy work, Mette is frequently invited to present their insights as a keynote speaker.