CUDE

Background

Kirk’s nervous system disorder causes him to live with chronic pain. In particular, fine motor tasks like writing, using a computer, or holding a pencil can be extremely painful. Assistive technology to circumvent these tasks and ergonomic workspaces that address his needs reduces pain and increases function. Kirk is in his senior year of his bachelor's program and preparing to apply to PhD programs.

Completion of a Web Accessibility course is required to earn a Web Design Certificate at Bellevue College in Washington State. In the original curriculum, a large portion of course content focused on legal cases related to web accessibility. Although it is important to understand the role that laws and regulations play, this is not critical to ensure that web designers and developers can actually develop accessible websites.

Background

Background

Canvas is a learning management system (LMS) developed by Instructure. Like most LMSs, Instructure has actively worked to ensure Canvas is accessible to users with disabilities (for details, see the Canvas Accessibility page. However, even if an LMS is fully accessible, an instructor can offer an inaccessible course by creating inaccessible pages or uploading inaccessible content. 

The Center for Innovative Research in Cyberlearning (CIRCL) is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to work with cyberlearning-themed projects to support, synergize, and amplify their efforts. One of the ways CIRCL engages with the many targeted projects is through their dynamic website. The CIRCL site provides a place where new and existing projects can browse project descriptions, read perspectives from community members, and find resources.

At North Dakota State University, engineering students design assistive technologies for veterans with disabilities. Students’ projects must be cost-effective, have a long lifespan, be robust, and be technologically superior to existing options.

AccessCyberlearning, a project supported by the National Science Foundation (grant #1550477), published a set of questions that can be used as a starting point to help online learning (e.g., cyberlearning) projects evaluate the accessibility of their projects.

The checklist, titled Equal Access: Universal Design of Cyberlearning, includes sections on:

Making online learning tools accessible to students and instructors with disabilities is important to meet legal obligations, to ensure equal opportunities, and to broaden participation in academic and careers where some instruction is provided online.

AccessCyberlearning, funded by the National Science Foundation under grant #IIS-1550477, works with current and future cyberlearning researchers, technology developers, and instructors to inform their research with what is known about student differences/disabilities; design innovative learning technologies and teaching strategies that are welcoming to, accessible to, and usable by everyone, including people with disabilities; and ensure that project materials and activities  are welcoming to, acces