AccessComputing: Opening Doors to Opportunities (AccessComputing News Feb 2009)

Richard Ladner, PI, and Sheryl Burgstahler, Co-PI

Welcome to AccessComputing News! We invite you to read the stories of several students with disabilities who are successfully pursuing their goals, learn how to make your technology accessible to individuals with disabilities, and discover new ways you can engage in the AccessComputing project as a student or practitioner.

AccessComputing News is a publication of the Alliance for Access to Computing Careers (AccessComputing). Ultimately, the AccessComputing project will open doors to computing opportunities for more people and, as a result, enhance the field with the talents and perspectives of people with disabilities.

AccessComputing engages individuals with disabilities as well as those who support, serve, guide, educate, and employ them. Specifically, AccessComputing serves to:

  • increase the capacity of postsecondary institutions, pre-college educators, veteran associations, projects that broaden participation in computing, and businesses to fully include individuals with disabilities in computing fields
  • create lasting relationships with stakeholders that foster systemic changes toward inclusiveness in computing education and careers
  • implement mentoring and internships to increase the number of individuals with disabilities moving into computing careers
  • expand an online resource (the Knowledge Base) to share research and promising practices worldwide

AccessComputing is a collaboration of the Department of Computer Science & Engineering (CSE) and DO-IT (Disabilities, Opportunities, Internetworking, and Technology) at the University of Washington (UW). AccessComputing is funded by the National Science Foundation's Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering (grant #CNS_0837508 and grant #CNS-0540615). More information is available at www.uw.edu/accesscomputing.