While we have the general Accessibility Guidelines for Online Courses, the purpose of these subject area studies, this one generously funded by the Deans of Instruction, is to have subject matter experts examine their specific subject areas for potential accessibility barriers. And then with the assistance of Accessible Ed & Disability Resources and Distance Education, make recommendations on how to overcome those barriers.

This is the second study of this type. The first was in Math, and we hope to hold a 3^rd in the fall with Chemistry. We are focused mainly on STEM fields as they are more complicated to make accessible online, but we will consider any SAC application. If your SAC is interested in participating in this sort of study, please fill out the Subject Area Accessibility Study application.

The objectives of this recent study was to develop a set of accessibility guidelines for CAS, CIS and CS faculty on how to deal with these areas that may cause barriers for people with visual disabilities:

• Programming environments that use graphical interfaces
• Complex diagrams
• Screen shots of code
• Videos without clear narration
• Inaccessible publisher materials

The will benefit more than just CAS, CIS and CS. They have far reaching benefits for not only our educational programs, but for other institutions of higher education too.

Thank you to our wonderful faculty researchers, Deans of Instruction, Accessible Ed & Disability Resources and Distance Learning/Instructional Support for making this research possible! Below are some photos of everyone hard at work! OK, we had fun too!

Gayathri, Phyllis, Supada, Angel and Marc testing for screen reader accessibility.

Gayathri & Angel testing Programming environments

Kaela and Susan

• What is Web Accessibility?
• PCC’s Accessibility Guidelines for Online Courses
• How to Make Accessible:
  • PowerPoints (Versions 2010, 2011, 2013)
  • Desire2Learn Web Pages
  • Word documents (Versions 2010, 2011, 2013)
  • PDFs
  • Video and Audio
  • Math and Science
• Questions to ask your publishers about their online materials

By providing one to every fully online instructor, we hope to ensure that instructors have the knowledge and tools to create accessible online courses. Of course, support will continue to be provided through trainings, the website, course reviews and over the shoulder assistance. But now you can get many of the answers yourself either through the handbook or on the website. The Web Accessibility for Online Courses website also has video tutorials!

• Susan Watson from Computer Applications
• Gayathri Iyer from Computer Science
• Marc Goodman from Computer Information Systems

The study is supported by Instructional Support/Distance Learning, Accessible Ed & Disability Resources and the Deans of Instruction. Many thanks to them and our faculty.

We will post study updates on the study on this blog. I think it will be a very exciting study that not only benefits PCC, but other institutions and instructors struggling to provide accessible online content.

Stay tuned!