The University of Bristol has lost its High Court appeal against a ruling that it contributed to the death of a student by failing to adjust its assessments to account for her social anxiety disorder.
Natasha Abrahart, 20, took her own life on 30 April 2018, the day she was due to give a presentation in a 329-seat lecture theatre as part of a laboratory module for her undergraduate physics degree.
In May 2022, the university was ordered by a judge to pay £50,000 in damages to Natasha’s parents, Robert and Margaret Abrahart, after they successfully argued the institution had breached the Equality Act by failing to make adequate adjustments so their daughter could participate in her course.
Bristol had argued that the “ability to explain laboratory work orally, to defend it and to answer questions on it” was “a core competency of a professional scientist” and took the case to appeal. But, in a 62-page judgment handed down on 14 February, Mr Justice Linden found that the university had failed on all seven of its grounds.
