Accessibility Beyond Borders!
What did we learn from accessibility leaders at six global Higher Education institutions?

Watch highlights from our panel discussion. You'll find longer clips as you scroll further down this page. Captions are available.
Global map showing locations of University of Tampa in the USA, Trent University in Canada, University College Cork in Ireland, University of Reading in the UK, Izmir University of Economics in Turkey.

This April, more than 100 people from around the world attended the International Ally User Group's first online panel discussion. They listened to the experiences of six accessibility experts from six institutions in six different countries. Up for discussion were five themes relevant to digital accessibility in Higher Education:

Raising student awareness of alternative formats

Many institutions offer their learning content to students in alternative formats by using tools such as Anthology Ally. To benefit from these alternative formats, students have to know that they are available. What tips do our panellists have for raising student awareness of alternative formats and their uses?

The University of Tampa's Academic Technology Accessibility Specialist, Sharon Austin, explains that while their Advanced Digital Learning Center targets students specifically, it's really important for teaching staff to demonstrate this option to students and to share the benefits of alternative formats.

Some faculty are unaware of the convenience of this, so we educate them about the multimodal opportunities that alternative formats offer.

Sharon Austin, University of Tampa.

Dr Esin Caglayan, Director of Teaching and Learning Center at Izmir University of Economics agrees. At Esin's institution, they share resources explaining alternative formats with instructors. They ask those instructors to use their influence to spell out the benefits to students.

Instructors have direct communication, so what the instructor says is more important than a general announcement or a flyer…

Dr Esin Caglayan, Izmir University of Economics

In terms of promoting the benefits of alternative formats to all students, not only those with impairments or disabilities, Terry Greene, Senior eLearning Designer at Trent University, recommends following the principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) which emphasise multiple means of expression.

Sharon Austin suggests making the possibilities that alternative formats allow as relevant as possible to students. Alternate formats such as Immersive Reader allow the student to set the colours and fonts according to their preference or have content read aloud to them.

…appealing to personal customization, it's a very powerful tool to getting students to use alternative formats.

Sharon Austin, University of Tampa.
Watch Sharon Austin, Dr Esin Caglayan and Terry Greene talk about raising student awareness of alternative formats. Captions are available.

Engaging staff in accessibility

University teaching staff wear many hats: instructor, researcher, personal tutor. With so many responsibilities, what strategies might we use to persuade them to consider digital accessibility?

Dr Tharindu Liyanagunawardena, Digital Accessibility Officer at the University of Reading speaks to the importance of making digital accessibility tangible, rather than an abstract concept. Tharindu suggests using anecdotes, user stories and examples that are relevant to the instructor's subject area. She also recommends making their accessibility journey easier by using templates and tools to simplify the application of accessible practices.

Our colleagues could be world experts in their study, but they may not be an expert of digital accessibility, so awareness is so important.

Dr Tharindu Liyanagunawardena, University of Reading.

Mandatory training has its place as well, according to Sarah Whittaker, a Senior Manager Teaching with Technology working in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). At Sarah's institution they embed accessibility within all their mandatory training courses.

…we showcase not just the accessibility features, but why you want to do this. So why you want to add an alternative description to the image.

Sarah Whittaker, Senior Manager Teaching with Technology

Accessibility advocates sometimes hear responses like, “but I don't have any disabled students” from teaching staff who are reluctant to engage with accessible practices. How can we encourage them to reconsider?

Dr Esin Caglayan suggests countering with the fact that, “you may not be sure of that. There may be students with certain disabilities like dyslexia, which [the students] themselves are even not aware of”.

…there are some students who hesitate to submit an official report to their instructors or to their faculty or share anything about their disabilities. So, we may not be sure of, you know, different learning styles, different preferences, or disabilities.

Dr Esin Caglayan, Izmir University of Economics.

At Izmir University of Economics, Esin says, they empower instructors through training programs and by sharing accessible templates that help save staff time.

There is also the legal perspective. Trent University is located in Ontario, Terry Greene points out that they have to comply with the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act which has principles of dignity, independence, integration, and equal opportunity.

So, if someone said to me “but I don't have any disabled students” and “I don't have any time for this,” I would say, “tough luck, pal, you have to do this”.

Terry Greene, Trent University.
Watch Dr Tharindu Liyanagunawardena, Sarah Whittaker, Dr Esin Caglayan and Terry Greene discuss strategies for encouraging staff to create accessible content. Captions are available.

Institutional accessibility policies

Creating an accessibility policy is a key part of the Worldwide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative's (WAI) guide to Planning and Managing Web Accessibility. Tharindu describes how the University of Reading has spent more than two years creating such a policy. Their policy is reaching the final stages towards institution-wide approval. Work started in 2021 within the Digital Accessibility Working Group, chaired by Reading's Chief Strategy Officer and University Secretary, identifying how the University needed to change to become truly digitally accessible.

This Working Group consisted of people from across the University… Legal, Quality, Technology Enhanced Learning and Teaching, Digital Technology Services, Teaching and Learning, Diversity and Inclusion, Disability Support, Procurement, Digital Portfolio, Governance, and HR.

Dr Tharindu Liyanagunawardena, University of Reading.

While Reading were developing their policy, they commissioned an accessibility audit and established a dedicated accessibility role to which Tharindu was appointed in September 2022.

Other attendees shared their institution's accessibility policies. Jodi Goldberg shared New York University's Website Accessibility Policy and Krystal Iseminger shared the WSU Tech Accessibility Policy and Plan. The present author shared the generic IT accessibility policy template which is based on University College London's IT accessibility policy.

Watch Dr Tharindu Liyanagunawardena explain the origins of University of Reading's digital accessibility policy. Captions are available.

Institutional challenges to accessibility

One of the powers of community is the chance to share questions and concerns and work with peers to find answers. What did our panellists consider to be the challenges their institution faces in terms of digital accessibility?

James Northridge, Inclusive UCC Project Manager at University College Cork (UCC) is thinking to the future. While the Inclusive UCC project has fantastic support and buy-in from senior leadership, with their Deputy President and Registrar acting as project leader, how can they sustain that momentum into the long term?

We have strong leadership, good momentum, good funding, but I guess one of the core challenges for me are what happens when "the shine" goes off the project? …we're at that sort of tipping point. Have we built enough momentum and buy-in and have we got enough staff on board to actually keep them on board?

James Northridge, University College Cork.

The Planning and Managing Web Accessibility guide from the W3C has a section dedicated to sustaining momentum with accessibility. To help to sustain their Inclusive UCC project, James and his team ensured that accessibility and Universal Design were part of several core goals of UCC's new five-year Strategic Plan.

…that for me was really important, because it meant we would get accessibility built into quite a lot. It wasn't just the accessibility part, it was accessibility across the whole spectrum, the “whole accessibility approach”.

James Northridge, University College Cork.

For Sarah Whittaker, her biggest challenge is awareness and buy-in. Unlike Ontario, the United Arab Emirates does not have a specific accessibility law. However, she is encouraged by recent government programs such as Leave No Emirate Behind. The UAE refers to people with disabilities as 'people of determination' in recognition of their achievements in different fields.

So, it is changing, which is great. However, is it changing fast enough? …we don't have a specific Accessibility Team, which I wish we had. We need to hire and get a team together.

Sarah Whittaker, Senior Manager Teaching with Technology.
Watch James Northridge and Sarah Whittaker explain institutional challenges to digital accessibility. Captions are available.

Accessibility wins

We asked our panellists to conclude the session by sharing some of their “accessibility wins”.

Terry Greene points to an Open Educational Resource (OER) he created with colleagues from Trent University, Brock University, Seneca College, University of Windsor, McMaster University, Cambrian College and Nipissing University. The Liberated Learner has a module called The Technologist that helps students to develop skill in navigating technology, including sections on podcasting and video production.

…if you as an Instructor want to give the students the opportunity to not just do an essay if they don't want, but to create a podcast or a video instead, it's a little scary at times because you may not know how to support the creation of those yourself, so enter this module, you can share it to your students and say, “hey, you want to do a podcast? Here's step by step instructions on how to do that”. …that's what I would call an accessibility win for us.

Terry Greene, Trent University.

James Northridge highlights his work with student interns who reviewed modules for accessibility over the summer. This was partly supported by materials shared from the University of Southampton's Accessibility Allies programme.

We saw the scores jump quite high in terms of those twenty modules and also we were building capacity within the twenty staff. So, the instructors or staff that ran those modules or courses bought into that. We did a showcase back to the staff in terms of what the students learned.

James Northridge, University College Cork.

This summer James re-opened their programme, this time with 18 student interns who remediated 182 modules that teaching staff have submitted for review.

…again, it's expression of interest by staff, and the idea that staff are brought in to be part of this, they have to commit to meeting the students regularly and they have to commit to giving the students support and ongoing training.

James Northridge, University College Cork.

Dr Tharindu Liyanagunawardena recalls running an accessibility workshop with University of Reading's Creative Team. They create beautiful brochures that can have some accessibility challenges.

I'm so pleased to say that all actively engaged in this workshop. We are getting more than usual number of queries from the Creative Team right now and this is because they are trying to incorporate the accessibility into their designs and also into their practices.

Dr Tharindu Liyanagunawardena, University of Reading.

Finding opportunities to integrate accessibility into mandated training programs can be a route to success according to Sarah Whittaker. She remembers a mandate from the UAE Ministry of Education to provide instructional design training to System Course Team Leaders (SCTLs). Sarah made sure that accessibility was part of that training, which she taught to over 500 participants.

I'm happy to announce there's no yellow on white font in any of our courses anymore. People are using the headers. People are adding the alt description to their images. It's a huge improvement from what we were doing before.

Sarah Whittaker, Senior Manager Teaching with Technology.
Watch all our panellists share their "accessibility wins". Captions are available.

Watch the full panel session

The hour-long meeting recording is available to watch online. Further related files from the session are available on the Ally community website.

The International Ally Group meets on the fourth Thursday of every month. Find details of their next event on the Ally community calendar.

Matthew Deeprose is co-chair of the International Ally User Group. He arranged and co-ordinated the panel discussion.