Followup on questions about the general training course, a warning about minor changes coming to digital accessibility intake forms, and a discussion around the idea of supporting student and faculty successes by looking at the experience in introductory classes.

Mike Williamson reviewed the plan for the initial Digital Accessibility Training, again outlining that the focus for the training is to provide foundational knowledge around the concept of accessibility, why accessibility matters, and what things people can do in their daily practices to make CU a more digitally accessible campus.  Mike also reviewed some of the unanswered questions from November’s meeting.  The questions are presented in Q1 and A1, Q2 and A2 format.  The questions are as follows:

Q1: Will there be training specifically about the creation of accessible documents and document remediation?

A1: Yes, there is a plan to create training and resources geared toward creating and remediating documents accessibly.

Q2: Will Universal Design and Universal Design for Learning concepts be approached in these trainings?

A2: Yes, we will continue to work with the Universal Design team (Joy Adams and Brad Grabham) to ensure we cover these concepts in the trainings.

Q3: Would it be helpful to utilize terminology that is less confusing (i.e. electronic materials v. digital content)?

A3: This is a good point and we’ll continue to check in and work with other campus entities to ensure our language makes sense.  Additionally, once we’ve gotten the first module of training ready, we’ll allow a preview so that folks can check to make sure the terminology makes sense.

Q4: Would it be possible to tie the trainings to a certificate of some kind?

A4: Yes, this is something we’d like to be able to do.  For the first Module, this may not be feasible, but as individuals complete other trainings we’d like to provide them with some type of “reward” for completion, such as a certificate, badge and at some point be able to tie these trainings into performance plans and tenure reviews.

Presented by Kosta Tovstiadi

The organizational changes have been an opportunity to align the digital accessibility program with the goals stated in its roadmap - placing supporting our users in front of compliance. As we review our process looking to serve our users better, we notice that our core process, accessibility review, has a solid foundation but focuses on applications, projects and services rather than on what it is like for our users to work with them.

We needed this application centered-approach to lay the foundation for our work and we still do. We are at a place where in early 2019 we will have a vacant position. The duties for that position have been simplified, reduced and absorbed by current staff so we can focus the position on something new when we re-hire. What should it be?

Looking at the university core processes from the perspective of faculty expectations, we have research, academics, and service. Our efforts in the future could include research and academics, asking questions like “can all of our users participate in research?” and “can all our users participate in our academic life?”. Academics certainly touches a greater number of people, faculty and students, so it makes sense to focus our effort there.

It would mean asking questions like “How can we support all our students to make taking all classes, starting with at least intro classes in every department, easy and enjoyable, regardless of the type of assistive technology the students use?”but also “how can we support faculty in delivering universally designed instruction?”

We will start by having conversations with core instructors in STEM departments, with the goal of getting to a point where the bulk of our core curriculum is accessible by design, without requiring last minute accommodations and stressful time-consuming work for all involved (student, faculty, DS, OIT, OISC etc).

Presented by Mike Williamson

The Digital Accessibility Office is moving forward with the review process overhaul.  They have cut many questions from two of the accessibility review forms and clarified some of the other questions in attempt to streamline the process further.  You can review the two forms in their draft state by accessing the following links: