EDITOR'S NOTE: Since this article was published, the Justice Department extended the rule's compliance dates by one year. Public entities serving 50,000 or more people now have until April 26, 2027. Smaller public institutions now have until April 26, 2028.

Most educators know that making digital resources accessible is important. Many also know about the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) that has been around since 1990. Some might even know about the Department of Justice’s Title II ADA recent ruling that mandates digital accessibility for state and local governments—including education systems.

But did you know the deadline for that mandate is coming up quickly? And is your school district ready?

Think someone else in your district is ensuring compliance? Think again.

“Everyone in a school district owns this responsibility,” says Luis Perez, Senior Director of Disability and Accessibility at CAST. With eight years of experience applying the CAST-developed Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework, which has accessibility as a foundation, Perez stresses that this is no longer just a "best practice"—it is a legal mandate with a ticking clock.

Perez shares an overview of this landmark update to Title II of the ADA, along with a five-step plan your district can implement to ensure compliance.

What is Title II?

Title II of the ADA specifically governs state and local government entities, which includes public K-12 school districts, public universities, and community colleges. The core mission is simple: all services, activities, and programs provided by these institutions must be accessible to people with disabilities.

A recent ruling has introduced a rigorous, specific standard for digital content into the ADA. Public schools are now required to ensure their web and mobile content meets the international benchmark for accessibility: WCAG 2.1 Level AA.

Compliance is not a distant goal. For many, the deadline is fast approaching. The timeline is dictated by the population of the area the district serves:

• Districts serving > 50,000 people: UPDATED April 28, 2026: Deadline is now April 26, 2027
• Districts serving < 50,000 people: UPDATED April 28, 2026: Deadline is now April 26, 2028.

An important note: "population" refers to the local census data (e.g., the 2020 Census) of the town or county, not the number of students enrolled in the schools.

A Shared Responsibility: The Cross-Functional Team

A common misconception is that accessibility is a “tech problem” for the IT department to solve. Perez emphasizes that true conformance requires a cross-functional team. While a leadership-level point person (such as a CIO or ADA Coordinator) must steer the ship, the responsibility is shared across:

• Curriculum and Instruction: Ensuring digital lesson plans are readable by screen readers and meet other accessibility requirements.
• Procurement: Vetting third-party software for accessibility before purchase.
• Special and General Education: Aligning classroom tools with student needs.
• Families and Community: Providing feedback on the user experience.

The Five-Step Plan for Conformance

Achieving WCAG 2.1 Level AA compliance might seem overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be. Perez outlines a five-step approach to make the process manageable:

1. The Audit: Conduct a comprehensive review of all technology properties to understand the current "state of the union" and the scope of work required.
2. The Roadmap: Create a clear timeline to bridge identified gaps. Focus on "high-leverage" items—mission-critical systems like enrollment portals and high-traffic pages identified through web analytics.
3. Procurement Reform: Update Request for Proposals (RFPs) to include strict accessibility requirements. This shares the burden of compliance with vendors.
4. Staff Training: Build internal capacity. When teachers and staff know how to create accessible content from the start, you stop the “leaky bucket” of inaccessible materials.
5. Documentation and Public Statement: Document every action taken. A public accessibility statement on the district website communicates transparency and progress to the community.

Tech & Learning also recently published Becoming More Digitally Accessible: Practical Steps Toward WCAG-Aligned Design, which offers more specific advice and tips.

The Role of the Vendor

School districts rely on a vast ecosystem of educational technology vendors. Under the new ruling, vendors must be proactive partners. Perez has this advice for companies selling to school districts:

• Maintain a public Accessibility Statement.
• Designate a clear point of contact for accessibility queries.
• Provide an Accessibility Conformance Report (ACR), generated through the Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT).

This documentation allows districts to evaluate whether a tool is a help or a hindrance to their compliance goals.

Why It Matters: Beyond Legal Liability

The consequences of ignoring these deadlines are significant. Beyond the threat of costly investigations, legal complaints, and lawsuits, there is the matter of reputational damage.

However, Perez encourages districts to look beyond the fear of litigation. Accessibility should not be viewed as a one-time “snapshot” or a checkbox for compliance. Instead, it is about creating a sustainable, continuous process that ensures every student has equal access to education.

Digital accessibility is no longer optional in education. It is a matter of equity, compliance, usability, and professional responsibility. Whether we frame it as “becoming more digitally accessible” or as aligning our materials with Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), the underlying principle is the same: design content that all learners can access, navigate, and understand.

Accessibility is not a specialized add-on. It is a core component of instructional design, communication strategy, and leadership practice.

In this article, I will outline practical, high-impact steps educators and institutions can take immediately to improve digital accessibility across documents, presentations, websites, learning management systems (LMS), and multimedia materials.

Start with the Basics: Use Built-In Accessibility Checkers

The most efficient entry point for evaluating accessibility is leveraging the tools already available in productivity platforms. In MS Office, the accessibility checker is built directly into Word, PowerPoint, and Excel. The tool identifies missing alternative text, insufficient heading structures, table issues, and more. Errors are categorized by severity and include guided remediation steps.

Similarly, many LMS platforms, such as D2L and Canvas, provide built-in accessibility checkers for course content. The complete version of Adobe Acrobat includes an Accessibility Checker for PDFs. Web-based tools such as accessibilitychecker.org and WebAdmin’s WAVE can audit web content and contrast ratios.

A simple institutional expectation, “run the accessibility checker before publishing,” can dramatically reduce barriers.

Color Contrast

Digital accessibility has several facets. One of the easiest to address is color contrast, which remains one of the most common accessibility failures.

WCAG 2.0 Level AA requires:

• A contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 for normal text
• A contrast ratio of at least 3:1 for large text

WCAG 2.1 extends requirements to graphics and interface components, requiring at least 3:1 contrast. Level AAA raises expectations to 7:1 for normal text. Large text is defined as 14-point bold (approximately 18.66px) or 18-point regular (24px).

Contrast is not about aesthetics; it is about legibility for users with low vision, color vision deficiency, or aging-related visual decline. Tools such as WebAIM’s Color Contrast Checker and browser developer tools can quickly evaluate compliance. ColorZilla can extract color codes from page elements for precise analysis.

Critically, color cannot be the sole means of conveying meaning. If red text indicates “important,” it must also include textual reinforcement such as “Important” or bold/underline formatting.

Typography and Readability

Font choice and formatting significantly influence accessibility. Use simple plain legible fonts such Verdana, Calibri, Tahoma, Georgia, Raleway, Gill Sans, Corbel, Garamond, or Century Gothic.

Beyond that, best practices include:

• Avoid ALL CAPS, which reduce readability and are difficult for screen readers.
• Use left-aligned (or right-aligned in RTL languages) text rather than fully justified blocks.
• Avoid decorative script or overly stylized fonts.
• Use consistent font families and sizing throughout a document.
• Use the largest reasonable font size.

For projected presentations, the minimum font size should be calculated based on viewing distance. Multiply the distance from the farthest seat (in inches) by 0.11 to determine the minimum projected font height in inches. For example, in a room where the farthest seat is 20 feet (240 inches) away, the projected text should be at least 2.64 inches high. Design for the person in the back row or the student viewing on a small screen.

Alternative Text: Describing Visual Information

Images, charts, and graphics must include alternative (alt) text so screen reader users can understand the content. Alternative text should convey the purpose of the image, be concise while still descriptive, and avoid redundant phrasing such as “Image of…” unless necessary.

For example, instead of writing “Photo,” write: “Bar graph showing 15 students prefer chocolate ice cream, the highest category.” If an image is purely decorative, it should be marked as decorative so screen readers skip it.

Use Informative Links, not “Click Here”

Screen reader users often navigate by scanning a list of links. If every link reads “click here,” the content becomes meaningless out of context.

Link text should describe the destination. Instead of “Click here,” use “Accessibility Guidelines from the National Center on Accessible Digital Educational Materials.”

Descriptive link text improves both accessibility and usability for all users.

Structure and Navigation Landmarks

Accessibility depends on structure, not visual formatting. Make sure to use proper heading styles (Heading 1, Heading 2, etc.) rather than bold text alone. Include page numbers, headers, and footers when appropriate. Use bullets or numbered lists instead of narrative listings separated by commas.

These structural elements create navigation landmarks for screen readers and magnification software.

Designing for Magnification and Reflow

Users who rely on magnification software often zoom content to 120% or more. Content must remain usable at increased magnification without requiring horizontal scrolling.

Consider the following:

• Avoid fixed column widths.
• Ensure text reflows dynamically.
• Avoid overlapping text boxes.
• Use solid backgrounds instead of complex textures.
• Enable reflow in PDFs.
• Avoid horizontal scrolling; screen readers rely on vertical flow.

Responsive web design principles inherently support accessibility by adapting content to screen size.

Tables: Use for Data, not Layout

Tables should present data and not be used to control layout. Accessible tables should include:

• A clearly defined header row.
• Avoid merged or split cells.
• Avoid complex nested structures.
• Include alt text describing the table’s structure or purpose.
• Do not split rows across pages.

Do not “fake” tables using tabs or spacing as screen readers will not understand how to present that information appropriately.

Multimedia: Captions and Transcripts

Audio and video content must include text alternatives. Creators should include closed captions for video and transcripts for both audio and video files. Many platforms, such as Zoom, automatically generate transcripts, though these should be reviewed for accuracy. Transcripts can also support translation for multilingual communities.

Accessibility in multimedia supports not only individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing, but also multilingual learners, users in noisy environments, and those who prefer reading to listening.

Keyboard Navigation

All web content and LMS environments should be fully navigable via keyboard. Users who cannot operate a mouse rely on tab navigation, logical focus order, and accessible form controls. Institutions should regularly test their sites by navigating using only the keyboard.

Emerging AI and Assistive Technologies

Emerging tools that expand accessibility possibilities:

• DeepL and Google Translate support multilingual access.
• Read&Write Gold supports dyslexic learners.
• Google Lens and Microsoft Seeing AI assist users with visual impairments.
• Khanmigo and other AI tutors can provide alternative explanations.

Remember that technology is not a substitute for accessible design. An AI tool can augment accessibility; it does not excuse inaccessible content.

Accessibility as Leadership Practice

Digital accessibility is not merely a compliance requirement under ADA or Section 508. It reflects institutional values around inclusion, universal design, and educational equity.

Resources such as these provide frameworks for systemic implementation of accessibility.

• The National Center on Accessible Digital Educational Materials
• The National Instructional Materials Accessibility Standard (NIMAS)
• The DAISY Consortium

Leaders should move from individual compliance toward institutional culture. Establish accessibility review processes and provide faculty development. Consider creating accessible templates from which faculty can work. Include accessibility considerations in procurement decisions and embed accessibility expectations in instructional design policies.

Accessibility improves usability for everyone. Clear structure benefits busy professionals. Captions support multilingual learners. Strong contrast improves readability in bright rooms. Accessible PDFs improve mobile usability. In short, accessibility is good design.

Accessibility is iterative, not perfectionist. Each improvement removes a barrier for someone. When educators design with accessibility in mind from the outset, they signal that all learners belong and that access to knowledge is not conditional on ability. That commitment is not merely technical. It is ethical.

When Laurie Dale started her role as Senior Leader of Assistive Technology Solutions at Ability Beyond, she knew she had to get creative when it came to providing technological assistance to young adults with disabilities.

“It was me, myself, and I,” Dale says. “So I looked around and thought, 'Well, who am I going to trust to help me with this project?' And the only people I really trust, as far as their opinions go, are the people using the technology for themselves. So that's how we came up with the TIP Squad.”

The TIP (Technology Innovations for Peers) Squad provides young adults with disabilities the chance to learn technology skills and build adaptive solutions to barriers they and their peers face.

These days Dale and the students she works with are quickly and cheaply building adaptive tools with the help of 3D printers. It’s been a very successful program at Ability Beyond, a nonprofit with locations in Bethel, Connecticut, and Chappaqua, N.Y., that educates and assists people with disabilities. The organization recently received $32,000 in grants from Verizon for the TIP Squad.

Dale says that educators looking to start similar accessibility programs with the help of 3D printing should remember it’s easier than it looks and that students benefit in many ways.

3D Printing and Accessibility: Listening To What Those With Disabilities Need

3D printers are amazing devices, and designing accessibility tools can sound high-tech, but the process itself is straightforward.

“We just make what's needed,” Dale says. “Somebody has a need. And they say, ‘What about this?’ Or ‘How could we help this person with that?’ And we just make it from there.”

The types of tools they make with 3D printers include a device that makes it easier for someone to hold a pen or crayon, and another tool that can steady a key so someone who might not otherwise be able to open a lock now can. Another tool is a device that rolls dice, which can allow for more accessible gaming.

Sometimes Dale and her team design their own tools, while in other instances they find existing designs at Makers Making Change, a nonprofit that provides open-source 3D printing designs for assistive tech tools.

Starting a 3D Printing Program and Jobs Training

If you’re an educator thinking of starting a 3D printing program with students, Dale’s advice is: Go for it!

“It's easier than you think, and you just have to do it," she says. "The only way to really understand it is when you start printing it, and you go. 'Well, why did it do that?' And then you can figure out why it did that.”

Her program has been designed as a job-training program as well.

“The TIP Squad has always been about getting an honest opinion from someone with a disability and using the technology and working toward soft skills for employment,” she says. “The TIP Squad members have to come on time. They have to wear specific clothes. They have to be neat. They have to work together as a team, all those beginning steps that make for successful employment.”

AI and The Future of 3D Printing

Dale says that while many new tech advances are not designed with accessibility in mind, “the byproduct is, people with disabilities can be more independent.”

That’s very true of AI technology, which will help bolster assistive technology in many ways and could make 3D printing easier for everyone.

“Within a year or two, you're going to be able to say, ‘I need a hand brace.’ Just say it, and it will print it,” Dale says, which isn’t as far out as it may sound since 3D designs are already available on the internet. AI might also be able to help guide students through the 3D printing process.

“A large part of the difficulties TIP Squad members face is communication,” Dale says. “Reading, understanding certain things, understanding how people are talking to them. AI can really help change that.”

• Best 3D Printers For Schools
• Teaching Robotics And STEM With The Help Of 3D Printers

The FCC’s Affordable Connectivity Program, which helps low-income families pay for home internet services, will end without Congressional action. The program, known as the ACP, will stop enrolling new applicants on Feb. 7, and funding for all participants will run out by May. This has huge implications for school connectivity and the digital divide as the program aids nearly 23 million households to obtain internet access. 

Despite the dire state of the ACP, John Harrington, chief executive officer of Funds for Learning, says there’s a possibility for better funding for schools going forward. 

“One of the shortcomings of the ACP has been the fact that it still relies on families applying for it,” he says. “It certainly helped reduce or shrink the number of students who are not connected, but there's still a certain percentage of students that when they go home, they're not connected.” 

Instead of funding for ACP, many of the school stakeholders who Harrington speaks with are focused on encouraging the FCC to expand eligibility for E-Rate funding. The E-Rate is an FCC program that makes internet access more affordable for schools and libraries but currently cannot be used to provide wireless hotspots to students to take home. 

Affordable Connectivity Program: A Best-Case Scenario  

The FCC has proposed a rule change to E-Rate that would allow wifi hotspots to be eligible for funding. If enacted, it could be a better means for schools to ensure internet access for students than the existing ACP programs, which require individual households to apply, something that isn’t always feasible for all students' families. Expanding E-Rate eligibility to the home would bypass this. 

“That would be a game changer for schools and libraries because then we would put them in the driver's seat for getting those connections into the hands of students and library patrons,” Harrington says. “They don't have to urge the parents to apply for it. They don't have to try to get community support drummed or run awareness campaigns. They literally can just get the wifi hotspots that they need for the students who need it.” 

He adds, “Another significant advantage of that is that schools can also manage things like filtering cybersecurity for that device that is connected to the student’s networks, so they have a lot more control.” 

The Worst-Case Scenario  

Harrington stresses the best-case scenario described above may not come to pass. Instead, E-Rate funding may not be broadened and ACP might lose funding.

“That's the real nightmare scenario,” Harrington says. “We've got all these devices in the hands of all these students, which is fantastic. We're really seeing how these learning management systems and content systems and all this stuff has really been incorporated to provide personalized learning, all these opportunities, and now we're approaching this cliff.” 

On top of these concerns, ACP funding has many applications beyond its use by students that wouldn’t be covered by E-Rate. “It doesn’t address the overall need for connectivity,” Harrington says. He notes that not every household has a student and people still need internet access for many aspects of modern life from applying for work to telehealth. 

Reasons For Optimism  

E-Rate funding was recently updated to include providing wifi access for schools. “That's a big step forward,” he says, which makes him optimistic the FCC is willing to update E-Rate. In addition, the FCC can change E-Rate without the need for increasingly elusive bipartisan political support, and possibly without allocating more funding. 

“The program has about a billion dollars in available spending that’s not requested each year. So there is money available. And it doesn't require an act of Congress to make those funds available, so that's why I'm pinning my hopes on this solution,” he says. “The FCC is well positioned to help support this need in a way that would better serve the community.” 

• How Schools Use Drones to Deliver Internet to Students
• How School Leaders Can Address the Inequities of the AI Digital Divide

Technology in the classroom is part of our everyday world and, as part of that, we must ensure that all students have access to the devices and the content they need for learning. Accessibility ensures everyone, including those with disabilities, can use and benefit from products, services, and information.  

“In many cases, students with IEP and 504 plans and students who do not have an identified disability need access to tools to leverage that content,” says Christine Fox, Project Director, Center on Inclusive Technology & Education Systems (CITES) at CAST, a nonprofit that helps students with learning differences succeed in school and life. “Inclusive practices previously have been siloed in school districts, with the special education and assistive technology department focused on supporting students with disabilities, while the edtech and IT department focused on providing resources for everyone. However, there is a genuine need for collaboration across the district from the top down with edtech solution providers to ensure that inclusive practices start at the top.”

Fox will present on this topic at Tech & Learning’s upcoming EdExec Summit. Below, she shares insights and guidance for solution providers to ensure inclusive technology ecosystems so all learners can access personalized tools and resources. 

Develop and Design 

Prioritizing accessibility in development and design doesn't ensure equitable student learning. Simply accommodating accessibility needs without a broader understanding of district requirements leads solution providers to modify tools retroactively. Fox says that technology should be seamlessly integrated into the district's existing systems rather than treated as a mere add-on.

To ensure that edtech products and programs are available to all learners, Fox offers the following basics for solution providers to help create a more inclusive educational environment, improve their company's reputation, and promote positive change in the industry:

• Make sure products and programs are accessible to people with disabilities.
• Consider the needs of all learners, including those from diverse backgrounds and with different learning styles.
• Use inclusive language and images in products and programs.
• Collect feedback from learners and use it to improve products and programs.
• Partner with organizations that are working to make education more inclusive.

Forging Partnerships

The assistive technology sector is witnessing an emerging trend of collaboration and comprehension. 

Fox advises solution providers to collaborate with state and national assistive technology organizations implementing these technologies in schools. A partnership enhances their understanding of students' disability-related needs, providing optimal and effective solutions.

Specifically, these partnerships would allow solution providers to:

• Gain access to a network of experts in the field of assistive technology
• Learn about the latest trends and developments in assistive technology
• Get feedback on their products and services from educators and students with disabilities
• Develop new assistive technologies that meet the specific needs of students with disabilities

A few organizations to consider:

CAST is an example of a nonprofit that provides educational resources and support for students with learning differences, including tools for assessment and intervention and advocacy support. The Center on Inclusive Technology & Education Systems (CITES) at CAST provides a framework to empower school districts to create and sustain inclusive technology systems that serve all students, including students with disabilities who require assistive technology or accessible educational materials. 

The Office of Educational Technology (OET) is developing policies and support to provide an inclusive platform for learners with disabilities. The Valuable Perspectives for EdTech Companies one-pager, webinars, and blogs support the value of accessible tools and solutions for everyone. 

The Office of Civil Rights (OCR) is the government agency that ensures education access and promotes excellence nationwide through vigorous civil rights enforcement, including accessibility. 

The GAAD Foundation, established in 2021, expands on the Global Accessibility Awareness Day's mission and aims to make accessibility a core requirement in technology and digital product development. 

Fox hopes to continue to raise awareness of the importance of inclusive technology, understanding the law, and, most importantly, understanding that building with accessibility in mind from the start is the easiest and most ethical thing to do for all learners. 

“Numerous resources are available to help district leaders and solution providers in the community,” Fox says. “They can use this as an opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to accessibility, just as many people are obtaining security certifications to demonstrate their commitment to security. We hope that accessibility will become a goal people strive for rather than scramble to achieve.”

• EdExec Summit
• Virtual ASL Interpreters: 5 Tips for Using Technology to Improve Accessibility

For educators, one of the best things about creating a district, school, or classroom website is being able to easily and efficiently communicate critical information with students and families. By focusing on making it accessible, educators can be sure that all stakeholders are on the same (web) page. 

“If you have an accessible website, guess what? You’ve reached the widest possible audience,” said Laura Ogando, program manager digital literacy and inclusion for the New York City Department of Education, during the recent #NYCSchools Tech Summit. (Available free on demand here). “When we don’t, we leave people out.” 

Here are some best practices for educators looking to connect with everyone, from Ogando.

Remember The Basics 

To create an accessible website, Ogando said educators should: 

Use proper formatting
- This includes headings and subheadings, both of which should be correctly tagged by using the proper style format that can be read by the screen readers used by visually impaired. Ditto using numbered lists versus bulleted lists.

Write in plain language
- Content should be written between a 6th- and 9th-grade reading level so it can be easily perceived and understood the first time it is read. Teachers should be wary of using “edu-jargon” and be mindful of presenting information clearly for parents and students. Plain language is also more easily understood by AI-translation devices.

Provide alt text for all images and tables
- Again, this is critical for screen readers to help describe the image. “If you don’t have alt text, it’s like the image is not there,” said Ogando.

Have at least a 4.5:1 color contrast between the text and the background
- People don’t perceive color the same way. For example, gray on white may be hard for some to see. This could be tricky with some schools’ colors, which should be used as accents not in the main body of pages

Link correctly - Links should be meaningful. Be mindful to avoid using “click here” every time as it can be confusing for screen readers, and to indicate if a link opens in a new window or not.

Publish Web Pages, Don’t Post Documents 

By taking the time to create a web page rather than just uploading a document, it can be more easily found by search engines, including your own site’s search tool. “When you embed a document, yes, it’s on the page, but it’s like on top of the page, not really in it,” said Ogando. This construction makes it harder to find keywords and be accessed by screen readers. 

An embedded document can also be trickier to read on smaller devices, such as a phone or tablet, and require swiping side to side to view, which is inconvenient. “If the content is loaded on that page, it’s going to be properly formatted for that screen size,” Ogando said. “So if you have longer content, you can keep scrolling to read it, not have to go back and forth to read a whole sentence.”

Be mindful of using tables as sometimes content needs to be read vertically rather than horizontally (or vice versa), and a screen reader will not be able to make that distinction. Also avoid PDFs as much as possible unless you have the proper software (Adobe) to create one, and even then, screen readers can have trouble with these (see below).

Note: Some very specific items should not be posted as web pages, such as forms that need to be signed, anything with personally identifiable information, or in-language translations.

Link To Originals

Although you may get asked to post PDFs, it’s not always a best practice as you may be duplicating content from another site. In addition to concerns around rights and responsibility, you also cannot ensure accessibility, make updates, or create translated versions.

“The moment you download and upload a PDF, it’s practically obsolete,” said Ogando. 

Instead, link to the PDF on its original site and make sure it opens in a new (marked) window. “And once you link to the proper page, you never have to think about it again,” Ogando said. 

Also remember that as the webmaster of a site, you’re the gatekeeper, and you have every right to question where something is coming from or why it’s being posted. “Part of being a webmaster is being an advocate,” said Ogando. “So when you see that people are not creating accessible content, remind them to make it accessible.”

NYC DOE InfoHub Resources

Digital Accessibility

Making Accessible Content

Making Print Documents Accessible 

Accessible PDFs and Fillable Forms

Plain Language

NYC DOE Training Info

Person-lead remote learning

Register for FREE on-demand sessions through OTIS.Teq

See the full presentation slide deck here 

• How Schools and Districts Are Connecting with Families
• Classroom Engagement: 4 Tips From Students for Teachers

Rushing to create online curriculum and activities? That content must be made accessible. If you are taking screenshots or pictures of documents that you share or post online, it's probably not accessible. At this point, you should assume that the documents you create will end up on the device of a person with a disability.

There's a lot of support to ensure they access it!

In NYC, The Office of Digital Inclusion & The Mayor’s Office of People with Disabilities are partnering to support schools with this work.

Here are some classes and resources for educators:

• Encourage staff to attend an upcoming online session
  *Inclusive classroom, ELLs, creating inclusive content and more!
  *NYC DOE staff can take Siteimprove Academy Digital Accessibility classes and receive a free license, worth $250
• Visit the Digital Accessibility page
• Read the guide on making accessible documents from the Mayor’s Office of People with Disabilities
• Read the guide on creating accessible slide decks from the Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities
• Join our Digital Inclusion Community (for NYC staff)

Innovative educators understand the importance of including all learners and their families in the content we create—and they help others do the same.

cross posted at The Innovative Educator 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.  

The Institute for Emerging Issues (IEI) at NC State University today announced formation of Building a New Digital Economy in NC (BAND-NC), a new support program designed to make the state “first in digital inclusion.” 

BAND-NC, which  launched with initial support from Roanoke Electric Cooperative and the North Carolina’s Electric Cooperatives, in partnership with the NC Broadband Infrastructure Office (BIO), will provide grants to counties to develop plans to increase the percentage of their residents that adopt and are able to use broadband services. BAND-NC seeks to help North Carolina become the first state in the nation where every county has a digital inclusion plan by the end of 2022. 

Digital inclusion plans will include strategies to increase access to devices and make broadband affordable to more people. They also aim to equip a range of stakeholders with knowledge of how to utilize broadband: enabling young learners to do homework online and older learners to retrain online, expanding job possibilities through telework, improving access to telehealth services, expanding business markets, improving crop yields and adding efficiency to farm operations. 

Data from the NC Broadband Infrastructure Office show disparities in adoption of broadband services, with both a rural-urban and an income divide. Rural households subscribe at lower rates than urban households (as low as 49.7% in Graham County and as high as 89.7% in Wake County). Households making under $20,000 a year subscribe at a 51.2% rate compared to 93.8% of those making $75,000 or more a year. 

As part of BAND-NC, the state Broadband Office and IEI will host a series of meetings to assist community leaders in developing and implementing county-level digital inclusion plans. Roanoke Electric’s work will support development of plans in Bertie, Halifax, Hertford, Northampton, Gates, Perquimans and Chowan counties, while North Carolina’s Electric Cooperatives will fund three selected county plans from among its 93-county service area. 

Over the next few months, the Institute for Emerging Issues is seeking other investors in BAND-NC, with the goal of making $5,000 grants available across the state to counties developing digital inclusion plans.  Interested counties would submit plans August 6 for review on a competitive basis, with selected plans receiving grants to begin implementing their initial strategies. 

To see a full listing of North Carolina broadband adoption rates, by county and income level, go to iei.ncsu.edu/band-nc-data/

All schools receiving public funding must make content accessible to everyone including those with disabilities. If your school or district is interested in helping staff understand why this is important, then consider Accessibility for Everyone for your next great book study.

Inclusive research

In the book author Laura Kalbag talks about the importance of including people with disabilities in user research studies. This can serve as a reminder to educators about the importance of designing learning in ways that includes feedback from students as to the ways they learn best.

Real life experiences

Throughout the book, Kalbag points to real life experiences of how accessibility helps her brother Sam, who grew up with cerebral palsy. As an educator, hearing how her brother interacts with technology provides a strong case for the need to have technology integrated into the curriculum. Her experiences with Sam also point to the importance of every individual being able to manage the accessibility options that best work for them. 

What's inside?

The book is 160 pages or nearly four hours on Audible and goes through the following topics:

• Considering Accessibility 
• Disabilities and Impairments 
• Planning for Accessibility 
• Content and Design 
• Accessibility and HTML
• Evaluation and Testing Laws and Guidelines

Continued Learning

Only digital content is accessible content. Learning how to create accessible content should, and possible in the future, will, be a requirement for all educators. To help keep up with the field you can follow Laura Kalbag on Twitter. She also recommends following the hashtag #AXSCHAT where people talk about their accessibility needs and possible solutions. The A11Y Project, a community-driven effort to make web accessibility easier,  has a whole list of people to follow. Many of those listed have accessibility needs and can provide a personal perspective. 

cross posted at The Innovative Educator 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.   

Easy peasy accessibility tip:

Provide participants with handouts before, not after, workshops, learning opportunities, or any type of event.

What do you mean?

Have you ever been to an event where they tell you that you'll get slides and handouts after the event or in a follow up email? This is an example of getting materials after an event. This reduces accessibility. This is because for some people, having a digital copy of the materials makes learning about and understanding the topic easier. This can apply to a variety of learning styles, disabilities, or for those not fluent in the language. 

Why not just provide the material afterwards?

Some people may want to follow along during, not after, an event. They may want to access the material live. 

How does providing digital content before an event help?

Providing access to materials in advance can be helpful in obvious ways as well as ways that may never have occurred to us. Here are some of the more obvious ways having materials in advance can help.

Those needing visual accommodations can access the materials by adjusting size, color contrast, or using a braille or screen reader.

Providing materials in advance of an event helps those needing hearing accommodations in a variety of ways. For example, if you have a slide show, ensure the transcript is in the presenter notes, so those who do not hear well can read what you are saying. During the presentation, turn closed captioning on your slides, to provide additional support.

When participants have the materials, they don’t have to worry as much about missing something. They can go back and reference it. Additionally, for some people it is helpful to have the material that is being presented, in advance so they can interact with it in a variety of ways and focus on the learning. They may want to highlight pieces, take notes on what they are learning, file or store the information in ways that make sense to them, for later access, etc. 

Practical Considerations

An easy way to provide access to all materials is to provide a hyperdoc agenda. This means an agenda with links to all relevant materials, handouts, and presentations. Place a link to this agenda in promotional materials, emails, calendar invites, flyers, etc.

Why isn’t everybody doing this?

Some people may feel that if someone wants an accommodation such as receiving materials in advance, they should just as for it. While this does provide access, it is not inclusive and it singles people out. 

Presenters may be hesitant to provide materials in advance because people may:

• Not to attend if they have the materials in advance
• Not to pay attention to the presenter  
• Steal their proprietary content 

Each of these hesitations can be addressed in the following ways.

• Attendance
  Ensure you make clear the benefits of attending face-to-face i.e. interactive activities, networking opportunities
• Paying attention to the presenter
  Direct participants on where their attention should be focused
• Stealing content
  On slides and handouts indicate the author and sharing permissions

Your turn

Now that you know providing materials in advance, doesn’t take any more effort and it provides a better experience for your participants, how might you change your practice? Do you still hold some fears about sharing content with participants or are you ready to give it a shot?

cross posted at The Innovative Educator 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal. 

There may be times when you think it is okay to provide a print/paper only version of content for a student. The reality as is you should do this never, ever, never, never, ever.

That's because, if you’re thinking paper first, you’re not thinking accessible first. 

If content is not digital FIRST, it is not: 

• Find-able through CTRL+F or tabs
• Increasable to a variety of sizes 
• Readable by a screen reader
• Searchable by search engines 
• Translatable by Artificial Intelligence

Credit for creating the FIRST acronym to my digital accessibility and inclusion colleagues at the New York City Department of Education: Clay Smith and Patricia Paddock.  

cross posted at The Innovative Educator 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.

Lynn Wehrman, President and Founder of WeCo Accessibility Services, will deliver the keynote address at the #NYCSchoolsTech Website Accessibility Conference.

As the leader of a company founded and run by digital technologists, all of whom live with disabilities, Lynn will spotlight the positive impacts of website accessibility for students, parents and the community.

Her talk will include the following:

• Lynn’s own journey to grasp digital accessibility in a government role
• Beyond just blindness: a brief primer of the disabilities people live and how they impact computer use
• How accessible websites include and empower others
• Ways accessibility improves user experience for everyone
• Knowing when to update for accessibility and when to start over

The Website Accessibility Conference, co-hosted by Tech&Learning and the New York City Department of Education, will be held November 5th 2019 at Wagner Middle School, 220 East 76th Street, New York, NY.

To learn more about the conference or to register, visit https://www.techlearninglive.com/nycdoe_website_accessibility_summit/363566

In her book, Haben Girma, the first deafblind student to graduate Harvard Law, explains her frustration with not being able to access the cafeteria menu at her college. Like most humans, Haben loves delicious food. Fighting for this access was part of her inspiration for later pursuing her law degree.

It's surprising that large food chain like Domino's pizza, doesn't get that everyone, including those with disabilities, want access to the food they find delicious. 

The Domino's Decision

Fortunately, the  U.S. Supreme Court understands this. Their recent decision to not hear Domino's petition on whether its website is accessible to the disabled is a win for everyone who believes in inclusivity. While Domino's, and some other retailers, consider this a loss, their view is short-sighted.

• First, it's a terrible look from a public relations perspective to take a stand against providing access to your goods to those with disabilities. 
• Second, it's a terrible business decision to cut off the largest minority community in the world, those with disabilities. 

Accessibility on School Websites

Retailers are not the only ones being sued for not providing accessible content. The largest school system in the nation, the New York City Department of Education has an agreement with the Office of Civil Rights to ensure all websites are accessible. More and more schools should anticipate being the focus of increased scrutiny and challenges to the accessibility of their websites. Failure to do so can have devastating consequences. These include costly lawsuits as well as possibly losing millions of dollars in federal funding. 

Fortunately, most school staff are excited to discover ways to learn how to include more of their school community into communication.

Preparing for Accessibility

To prepare and respond accordingly more and more businesses and government agencies are creating digital content with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines in mind. This means they provide training and support to staff to ensure they understand how to do this.  

Accessibility isn't just the right thing to do, it also makes content better for everyone. Doesn't it make sense to invest time and money into making content better and available to those with disabilities rather than investing time and money into lawsuits?

cross posted at The Innovative Educator 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.

Part of making content accessible includes ensuring that the contrast ratio is set to be fully accessible to anyone. Inaccessible color contrast is the top issue for digital content, but fixing it, or having it right from the start, is easy. In this article you'll learn why this is important, what the standard is for color contrast, and how to make content with accessible color contrast.

Why this is important

• 6% of population is color blind 
• 2.3% of population has low vision (BCVA of less than 20/70, visual field loss, or legal blindness)
• Everyone using a device in bright sunlight struggles with poor color contrast

The Web Content Accessibility Guideline Standard for color contrast:

• 4.5:1 or higher for most text 
• 3:1 or higher for large text (18 font) or large bold text (14 point, bold)

How to find out if you're meeting the standard

• Use ColorZilla to find the color codes of text and background
• Paste the color codes into WebAim’s Color Contrast Checker

What if you don't meet the standard?

• Use the lightness slider to adjust the color so it has a contrast ratio that passes.
• When you have a passing ratio, replace your colors with the new colors.

Back In the classroom

When educators use color contrast that meets accessibility standards, they help to make content that all students and their families can access. They should also teach their students to create accessible content as well.

cross posted at The Innovative Educator 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.   

Tech&Learning and the New York City Department of Education are co-hosting the Website Accessibility Summit, to be held November 5th 2019 at Wagner Middle School, 220 East 76th Street, New York, NY.

Summit attendees will learn about the offerings of website providers and how to create and manage accessible school websites. 

To register or learn more, visit techlearninglive.com.

Website owners want all visitors to their site to be able to access the content. This requires ensuring the site is accessible so no one is left out. Making a site accessible is not intuitive, but once you understand the basic concepts you'll discover:

• It is not difficult, 
• it becomes second nature, and 
• accessible content is better content. 

Fortunately, more and more platforms support the ability to create and maintain websites that are compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). Here are steps you can take to ensure you have a site that can be accessed by everyone including the 15-20% of the population who have disabilities.

Step 1: Choose WCAG 2.0 Compliant Theme or Template

The first step is to select an accessibility-ready theme or template. Most sites allow you to search for accessible themes or templates. Some are even moving toward making them all accessible. 

While many accessibility issues can’t be addressed effectively if you have an inaccessible theme, some sites, such as Wordpress, have plug-ins that may help with common accessibility problems. 

If you are having trouble, contact your provider for guidance. They usually have a list of accessibility-ready options. 

Step 2: Accessible Content Creation

Once you have a theme or template chosen, or a plug-in added to solve the underlying accessibility of your site, you need to create, or re-create, accessible content for the site. 

Content remediation/creation includes: 

• Add alternative text [Alt text] -descriptive text for images and graphics 
• Use proper color contrast 
• Structure headings in an accessible format 
• Caption videos
• All documents on your site must be accessible (avoid PDFs)
• Provide meaningful hyperlinks

Here are a few resources to help you learn about accessible content:

• Web Fundamentals: Accessibility, Analytics, and SEO - Siteimprove
• Tutorials - W3C 
• Creating Accessible Documents  - National Center on Accessible Educational Materials

Step 3: Develop Accessibility Testing Plan

Ensure ongoing compliance by creating a regular WCAG 2.0 AA evaluation schedule.  

• Select a testing tool
• WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool is one that is free, easy to use, and works well if your site is small
• If you require more robust testing, you may want to purchase an evaluation tool
• Determine priority page(s) for automated and/or manual testing 

cross posted at The Innovative Educator 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.

The Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 say the websites of all government agencies and those that receive federal funding must be accessible to everyone including those with disabilities. This means all public schools and schools that receive any federal funding.

Making your website accessible requires content contributors to know strategies such as using meaningful hyperlinks, proper color contrast, using alt text for images, and formatting with proper heading structure.

Determining your website's accessibility

Fortunately, determining a websites accessibility is quite simple using a tool call WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool.  Simply visit the site and paste the url into the field.

The WAVE Report

Once you hit enter you will get a report with errors and alerts. 

Reading the Report

To read the report, simply click the red flag to determine your issues. In this example we see there are issues such as missing alternative text. To learn about the issue, simply click the "i" next to the issue for more information.

More information

When you select the little "i" you receive more information about the error. You'll learn the following:

• What it means
• Why it matters
• How to fix it
• The standards and guidelines

This is the first step in testing a websites accessibility. After the automated testing, a human can take a closer look at the errors and alerts. When you do, you may find that the content management system hosting the website is not accessibility friendly. If that's the case, do your best to reach out to them to change that or switch platforms.

cross posted at The Innovative Educator 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.  

Capstone announces substantial updates to its PebbleGo™ database to facilitate accessibility for all students. Among the improvements include compliance with Section 508 standards (U.S. Workforce Rehabilitation Act of 1973) and WCAG 2.1 AA (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines), ensuring PebbleGo is accessible to children with vision, cognitive, physical, and hearing disabilities.

New accessibility features include:

• Simple, predictable navigation
• Text-to-Speech on all articles
• Transcripts for all videos
• Alternative text and descriptive titles for meaningful images
• Screen reader support
• Access keys for keyboard-only navigation
• Color contrast design to support students with color-blindness and low vision

PebbleGo is now also mobile-responsive, offering touchscreen navigation and providing at-home and on-the-go access on smartphones, tablets, and computers to support school-to-home programs, independent learning and English language learners. 

All PebbleGo modules include text written for the needs of K-3 learners, narrated by professional voice-over artists to provide scaffolds for emerging and struggling readers and English language learners.

PebbleGo was named a Best of Show at ISTE 2019 winner by Tech & Learning

Are you doing everything possible to create an inclusive environment for your students?

Haben Girma, author of Haben: The DeafBlind Woman Who Conquered Harvard Law spoke to educators at an Accessibility Expo in New York City. She shared advice for making schools more accessible for students.

Check out her six tips and consider how you can integrate them into your classroom this year.

6 tips for creating a more accessible and inclusive classroom

Multiple Formats

Use as many formats as possible to help students learn. The more formats you use; the more students you will reach.

Assumptions

Don’t make assumptions. Girma had teachers who assumed because she was blind she could not use computers or do art. She loves computers and they support accessibility. She also enjoys creating art. Rather than assume what a student can or can’t do, and before excusing them from an activity, start by trying to figure out how a topic can be made accessible. Speak to the student, other students, colleagues, and experts.

Role Models

Hire teachers with disabilities. Bring in speakers with disabilities. Have students with disabilities share ways they learn and live in this world.

Accessible Digital Content

All content you share with students should follow the web content accessibility guidelines. This enables students with disabilities, those who are not fluent in English, and everyone else, access content more effectively.

Teach Inclusion

Commit to teaching inclusively. If you’re not sure how to start, there are endless free resources online to help you get started.

Remove Barriers

Look around your school community. Identify barriers. Work to remove the barriers. Invite students to help.

Girma asks educators to just commit to doing one thing to make their school more accessible to students with disabilities. What could you commit to?

cross posted at The Innovative Educator

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.   

Comcast announced today it is significantly expanding eligibility for Internet Essentials to include all qualified low-income households in its service area.  The Company estimates that more than three million additional low-income households, including households with people with disabilities, are now eligible to apply.  It estimates a total of nearly seven million households now have access to low-cost Internet service, which doubles the total number of previously eligible households.  

To be eligible to apply to the program, low-income applicants simply need to show they are participating in one of more than a dozen different government assistance programs.  These include: Medicaid, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and Supplemental Security Income (SSI).  A full list of these programs can be found at www.internetessentials.com.  The Company already accepts applications from households that have a student eligible to participate in the National School Lunch Program, live in public housing or receive HUD Housing Assistance, including Section 8 vouchers, or participate in the Veterans Pension Program, as well as low-income seniors and community college students in select pilot markets.  

According to U.S. Census data, households living in cities with the highest poverty rates, are up to 10 times more likely than those in higher earning communities not to have fixed broadband at home.  For example, in Palo Alto, California, or Bethesda, Maryland – where poverty rates are very low – only about six percent of households do not have a broadband Internet subscription – 94 percent are connected.  But in Trenton, New Jersey, and Flint, Michigan – where poverty rates are way above the national average – 60 percent or more of households do not have fixed broadband at home – that is, less than half are connected.  That gap of more than 50 points defines the digital divide in this country.  

The program includes: multiple options to access free digital literacy training in print, online, and in person, the option to purchase an Internet-ready computer for less than $150; and low-cost, high-speed Internet service for $9.95 a month plus tax.  The program is structured as a partnership between Comcast and tens of thousands of school districts, libraries, elected officials, and nonprofit community partners.  For more information, or to apply for the program in seven different languages,  visit www.internetessentials.com or call 1-855-846-8376.  Spanish-only speakers can also call 1-855-765-6995. 

“One out of every 300 Americans will attend a New York City school,” said NYCDOE Chancellor Richard Carranza (@DOEChancellor) in his opening welcome at the #NYCSchoolsTech Conference, held at Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts (https://www.laguardiahs.org/ ) this week. “Ensuring all of these students have access to technology is crucial.“

This pledge was evident in the day’s robust program that focused on digital inclusion and kicked off with a spirited performance by the EPIC Players, a neuro-inclusive theatre company, performing the prologue to Little Shop of Horrors. 

Victor Calise: Mayor’s Office of People with Disabilities

Victor Calise, the Commissioner of the Mayor’s Office of People with Disabilities shared that they are working to make New York City the most accessible city in the world. He told the audience that each and everyone of them needs to think about accessibility and how it affects us, our students, and their families. We can do this my ensuring people with disabilities are included.

There are two ways to ensure we include people with disabilities: 

1. Ensure we have truly inclusive education and inclusive classrooms:
   We can do this through technology in classrooms. We must provide the technology tools that students need.
2. Include people with disabilities in the workforce:
   79% of people with disabilities are jobless. It is the job of schools and educators to help prepare students who can be employed.

Keynote: Jason Green

The program kicked off with a keynote from Jason Green, CEO of Learning Innovation Catalyst (LINC) and author of Blended Learning in Action.  Mr. Green asked the audience of about 1,000 New York educators about their own experiences with learning, and noted that “most teachers model their classrooms not by how they learned, but by how they were taught.”

“Your students might be the first generation to never finish college,” he said. How do schools prepare this new generation for jobs that don’t yet exist?  He outlined three key elements:

1. Teachers must become the 21-century learners they are trying to create
   He noted that most professional development models don’t work, and highlighted the Stanford “model of generative change” (https://edpolicy.stanford.edu/library/publications/93 ) that outlines a PD timeline to help teachers become agents of change.
2. Teachers must create classrooms where students love learning.
   To achieve this, Mr. Green recommended the “PAACC” approach that includes: Personalization; Agency, Authentic audience; Connectivity; and Creativity.
3.  Schools must become cultural catalysts for change
   He suggested these tenets to help change school community cultures: Equity; Trust; Agency; Collaboration; and Risk taking. He asked the audience: how are you embracing these tenets? Do you invite colleagues to visit your classroom? Do you visit theirs?

Breakout Sessions

The dozens of breakout sessions throughout the day offered deep dives on a multitude of topics, many with a focus on how to support digital inclusion. Each session included links to helpful resources. There were classes for those starting their journey like “Get Going with Digital Accessibility & Inclusion” and “My Journey to an Inclusive Website.” There were also workshops for those ready to dig in and begin creating inclusive content such as “Writing for Effective Translation” and “Having a Broader Vision for Screen Readers. There were also workshops from Google, and Microsoft on how to “DigIn to Accessibility.” You can view all the #NYCSchoolsTech Summit agendas and resources on the tabs in the Summit “Workshops at a Glance.”

NYCDOE Walks the Walk

I had the pleasure of talking to staff members of the Office of Digital Communication and Inclusion including John Kirkwood, Digital Inclusion Director, Nica Lalli, Senior Director of Digital Communications, and Patty Paddock, Director of Digital Communications and Inclusion, about New York City DOE’s digital inclusion initiative.

After entering into an agreement with the United States Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights in 2016, the New York City Department of Education vowed to create a fully accessible website. This spurred intense research by the department as they figured out what it would mean to make their website accessible.

Offering accessible websites has been an ADA requirement since 2008, but until recently, most agencies hadn’t held public institutions accountable. The NYCDOE knew they had an obligation to change that not just for their own schools, but to become a model for other districts around the country.

“To achieve accessibility, we must think digitally,” said Nica Lalli. Once content is digital it can be accessed by screen readers, translated, captioned, and much more. This it is why it is important that we inspire and teach staff how to make content that is digitally accessible to those with a wide range of disabilities. 

The Office of Digital Inclusion helps staff learn to create digital content with these three easy ways to get started:

Make sure your content is written… 

• at a grade 6–9 reading level 
• find out the reading level at Tinyurl.com/MSReadingLevel 
• use short sentences and common, everyday words 

Check to see if you have... 

• headings (formatted from a style ribbon) 
• bulleted lists 
• descriptive hyperlinks (no "click here") 
• proper contrast 
• contact information

Give all of your images… 

• alternative text (alt text) 

Once the district launched the accessible website, they began teaching staff at central, districts, and schools about how to create digitally inclusive content.

“We need to embed accessibility into everything we offer,” Mr. Kirkwood said. The district is using school webmasters who are often a school’s Technology Single Point of Contact (SPOC) or Parent Coordinator to help them learn how their school community can digitally inclusive.  “We want to change the cultural mindset around accessibility,” he continued.

“Once you start down the road of accessibility, you will keep going down that road,” said Ms. Lalli. “We’re okay dong this slowly, as long as we keep moving.”

The NYCDOE has generously assembled Digital Accessibility and Inclusion guidance that any district can use: Schools.nyc.gov/DigitalInclusion.

Special Thanks

Special thanks to Lisa Nielsen, Senior Director Digital Literacy and Inclusion, Jane Pook, Chief Digital Communications Officer, and to JoJo Farrell, Ed Tech Program Manager, for their hospitality throughout the conference. 

It was inspiring to see a district the size of New York City not just take on the complex issue of digital inclusion, but also position itself as a model to districts of all sizes around the country.

Funds For Learning has released findings from its ninth annual E-Rate Trends Report. 

Results reveal that the E-rate program remains critical in establishing broadband connectivity for schools and libraries. Key provisions of the 2014 E-rate Order that expanded federal support for broadband internet connections will expire in 2020. The FCC calls upon stakeholders to present insights to determine how the program will serve schools and libraries in the upcoming decade.

Key 2019 survey findings include: 

• Digital learning continues to explode. 88 percent of applicants expect bandwidth needs of schools and libraries to increase in the next three years.
• New admin creates positive results. 81 percent of applicants are satisfied with E-rate’s management under Radha Sekar, FCC Chairman Pai’s pick to improve customer service.
• Barriers to internet still exist. 82 percent of applicants agree that insufficient internet access to home of students or library patrons is significant issue in their community.
• New policies yield lower prices. 70 percent of applicants agree that E-rate competitive bidding rules are lowering prices for their internet access services.
• Wi-Fi remains mission critical. 88 percent of applicants feel Wi-Fi is extremely important in fulfilling their mission. 79 percent of applicants in FY18 cited the same need, showing a consistent trend in Wi-Fi access for schools and libraries.

Visit https://www.fundsforlearning.com/2019ErateTrends to download the complete 2019 Trends Report.

Haben Girma, the first deaf-blind student to graduate Harvard Law spoke at an Accessibility Expo to a New York City Department of Education audience about the importance of sharing positive disability stories and services available. 

At the Expo attendees saw amazing work happening in schools with students. If you did not have the opportunity to attend, you don't have a way to find out about what's happening. That's because schools, districts, government agencies, and those who use their services, often can do a  better job of sharing. They forget about sharing their QR codes and hashtags and websites. They forget to celebrate on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and Snapchat.

As a result, important stories and services are not widely known. Haben Girma has useful advice for how educators about how they can do a better job of posting positive stories. 

Girma advises the following:
 

Frame

Frame the story in a respectful, positive way.  

Post accessibly

If you're posting a video, make sure the video has captions. 

If you're posting a photo, add an alt text.

You can learn from Girma directly in the video below. You can also find out how she is able to communicate with hearing person communicate. When you visit the video, turn on the captions. You'll see why they are helpful for people with and without disabilities. 

Want to know more? Check out Girma's Brief Guide to Producing Positive Disability Stories.  

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal. 

Victor Calise, Commissioner at the Mayor's Office for People with Disabilities and Haben Girma, the first deaf-blind person to graduate from Harvard Law, shared several lessons about the world's largest minority group with attendees at the NYC Department of Education's Accessibility Expo. The Expo was held at Brooklyn Law School on May 31st. 

Don't know what the largest minority group is? It is people with disabilities. They make up about one billion people world-wide.
 

Lesson's about the world's largest minority group

Innovation
Disability is an opportunity for innovation.

Accessible environments
People with disabilities are not disabled. The only thing that disables people is their environment. If we make the environment (physical, social, digital) accessible, we enable the person.

Special needs
When describing people with disabilities, you may want to rethink the term "special needs." We all have special needs. 

Hold the mic
If a microphone is available when you are speaking, use it. Someone may need you to use it so they can hear better. Don't make them ask or stand out. 

Employment
75% of people with disabilities are jobless. Communities do a bad job of transitioning disabled youth from school to college or career. 

Communities like New York City are getting better at addressing this need with programs such as NYC: AT WORK and Access VR. These programs help match people to jobs.

Overcoming disability
Reconsider thinking about how successful people with disabilities "overcame" their disability. Victor Calise said he would never trade in his disability. His disability is not to be overcome. Instead communities must help to remove digital, attitudinal, and physical barriers so those with disabilities can do whatever they want. 

Nothing about us, without us
Do not create, decide, build, name, make policies about something affecting disabled people without their participation and input. 

Don't be grateful
Non-disabled people should not feel grateful about not having disabilities. Haben Girma explains that this perpetuates hierarchies of us versus them. This continues the marginalization of people with disabilities. 

Just ask
If you are unsure how to refer to someone's disability, ask them.

Want more?

You can watch an amateur Facebook livestream of each speaker. Unfortunately, captions are not automatic on Facebook, so the videos are not completely accessible. However, I did try to capture the sign language interpreter as I captured the videos, so there is some accessibility available. 

Watch the 11-minute livestream.

Part 1: 29 minutes. Haben begins at at 10:00
Part 2: 4 minutes
Part 3:  25 minutes

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.

Accessibility options exist with each of the big three tech companies, Google,Microsoft, Apple. That’s a move in the right direction, but it is not enough. Currently, creating accessible content requires content creators, rather than platform providers, to do the heavy lifting. Each company’s platform design places accessibility in the hands of the content creator as an afterthought.

Call to Action: #AccessibilityFirst

• Make accessible the default, rather than a technique that content creators must be trained in and work to access.
• Make accessibility a core functionality, not just a feature.
• Incorporate accessibility into the design rather than something that is checked afterwards.
• Ensure accessibility is visible in main menus rather than something you need to leave the document for and click multiple times to access.
• Integrate accessibility rather than making it an add on.
• Create default settings that make accessibility automatic rather than something that must be turned on.
• Show an error message when inaccessible content is being created, just like when you have a misspelling.

People with disabilities are the world's largest minority group. When accessible is not integrated into the design of content creation platforms, that sends a message from these companies that more than 1 billion people around the world (source: World Heath Organization) with disabilities are an afterthought.

These companies were created by young, able-body individuals who themselves are becoming older and less able-bodied. As the leaders of these mega-billion-dollar company’s age, and their users age, it is clear there needs to be a shift to a more inclusive default.

The Challenge

Let’s put out a challenge to the big three, Microsoft, Apple, and Google. Lead the way to making inclusive digital content a core feature, not an optional afterthought. 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal. 

SETDA, the principal membership association of U.S. state and territorial digital learning leaders, today released a new national report, State K-12 Broadband Leadership: Driving Connectivity, Access and Student Success. This report highlights the impact of state leadership in driving policy decisions at the state level to support broadband networks, bandwidth capacity, Wi-Fi implementation, and off campus access for low-income families. Educators, policy makers and the private sector can benefit from organized and accessible information regarding states’ K12 broadband approaches. The work includes examples of states providing leadership for effective and efficient broadband and Wi-Fi implementation and case studies for Connecticut, Kentucky and Minnesota. Accompanying this report is an online State K12 Broadband Leadership map which includes an overview of the approach for broadband implementation for all states and Guam. 

Full Report
Online State K12 Broadband Leadership Map

There is technology that allows you to take a photo of a poster, book, page from a magazine, etc. then convert it to text. From there it can be read aloud, translated, and read aloud in the translated language. It can also be brought into a word processing program for editing in the translated language to increase accuracy.

Here are some ways this technology makes content accessible to learners: 

• Visually impaired learners can hear the content read
• Learners who are not reading at the level of the text can have the content read to them
• Learners for whom English is not their first language can have the content translated. It can also be read to them in their language.

How To:

Here is how this works:
First, on your phone, take the photo in Office Lens. Then save it to OneNote. 

Next, go to your computer and open OneNote. Then, follow these steps: 

• Go to “View” in the menu
• Select “Immersive Reader”
• o   This converts the photo into text
• Go to the bottom of the screen a select the play arrow
• o   This reads the text
• Select “Reading Preferences” in the top right part of your screen
• Go to “Translate”
• Pick a language
• Select “Document”
• o   Now your document is translated
• You can go to the bottom of the screen and select the play arrow to hear the document read aloud

Here is a demonstration:

Your turn

What do you think? Is this something you might use with your students? How do you see using it?

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.   

Closed captioning is helpful for many students during presentations.This is because captioning makes content more accessible and inclusive. It is accessible to those who are hearing impaired. Students may learn better if a presentation is closed captioned because captioning makes content cognitively easier to understand. Students for whom English is not their first language will have an easier time comprehending what is presented. 

However, closed captioning wasn't always that easy to do. 

Until now. 

Now, closed captioning in Google Slides is easy peasy. Just select "Present" and select "captions." Have questions? Read this "how to" from Google or watch the demo below. 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.   

More and more educators and schools are using Facebook to connect with families. However, they might not be connecting with as many families as possible if they are not ensuring they are posting inclusive content. This is particularly important in places like New York City which serves a population where 20% of students have disabilities. About half of the population speaks a language other than English at home according to census bureau data.  

Plain Language

Posts should be written below a grade 9 level. This is so the content can be more accessible for those with cognitive or neurological issues. It is also because plain language translates more accurately than complex language.

Alt Text

Add alt text to your images so that those using screen readers know what is is your image.  Here is how:

For New Photos

1)  Select "Edit Photo" 

2)  Click "Alt text" and enter text 

For Existing Photos  

1) Click on the picture in the post. 

2) Select "Options" under the picture. 

3) Select "Change Alt Text."

4) Select "Override generated text."  

5) Enter new text and save.

Checking Photos for Alt Text

To see if a photo has alt text follow these steps.

1) Right click on the photo and select "inspect." 

2) When you are in the inspect screen click accessibility and see what words come up for image. 

Your Turn

What do you think? Will you incorporate these tips into past and future Facebook posts? 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.   

Listen Technologies, provider of assistive listening systems for 20 years, has announced the launch of Listen EVERYWHERE Wi-Fi product. Listen EVERYWHERE replaces Audio Everywhere and features upgraded hardware, a streamlined finish and a new server with professional audio outputs.

In venues featuring Listen EVERYWHERE hardware, patrons and guests can experience wireless audio streamed directly to iOS and Android smart phones and tablets via a free downloadable app.

Listen EVERYWHERE is intended for classroom settings where ambient noise and distance can make it difficult for students to hear audio clearly. The product also can be used in indoor arenas and airports and in combination with other ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) systems such as ListenRF, ListenIR or ListenLOOP for assistive listening.

While the product was in beta testing, industry trade magazine CE Pro, in conjunction with sister sites Commercial Integrator and Security Sales & Integration, recognized Listen EVERYWHERE with an Internet of Things (IoT) Award.  More information about Listen EVERYWHERE is available at www.listeneverywhere.com.

Twitter is an important platform for sharing stories, ideas, and connecting with others. However, many Tweeters are unintentionally leaving out 15% of the world’s population who have disabilities by not composing accessible Tweets.  Fortunately, making accessible Tweets only requires awareness in a few areas.

Camel Case Hashtags

When you use hashtags, make them camel case.  This means the first letter of each word is capital. This then becomes discernible to a screen reader allow the words to be read individually rather than a nonsensical word.

The example below shows an example of using camel case for the #GovTechLive conference.

 Avoid URL Shorteners

In the early days of Twitter, we shortened URLs because of the character limitation. Today URLs are no longer judged by characters, so it is not necessary. When you use a URL shortener, the screen reader says every letter. If you use the original URL most screen readers can read the words in the URL.

Plain English

Write using plain English. Some ways to do this include avoiding acronyms and writing below a 9th grade reading level. Most word processing programs have readability checkers built in. Online documents such as Google have extensions you can add.

Alt Text

Use alt text (short for alternative text) to tell those viewing your Tweet what is in the image. On Twitter you can set this up by going to “Settings and privacy,” then selecting “Accessibility” and checking “Compose image descriptions.” 

 Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.   

Innovative educators usually know the basics of ensuring their tech works before presenting to students, staff, and families. Check the sound. Check the monitor. But that's just the beginning. If we really want to ensure we are including everyone in have access to what we are presenting, technology can take us even further.

Here are some ideas based on recommendations from WC3 Website Accessibility Initiative to you get started. 

1) Invite Technology Use

Too often those without accessibility needs demonize technology, yet technology may be just the tool that is needed to include everyone. Of course set parameters around expectations for those in the room, but do NOT tell them how to access content. Technology can be used as a tool to focus, access information in a visual or auditory way and much more

2) Ensure All Material Is Available in Accessible Formats

Create all content digitally. Then send participants a link to all material in advance. At the event ensure there is an easy way to access the link to the content in case they didn't receive it in advance. If they have the material in advance or during the session this will enable all participants to access materials in the way that suits them best and meets their needs.

When creating materials, ensure they follow accessibility guidelines such as proper heading structure, alt text, correct hyperlinks, color contrast, and closed captioning

3) Check the Mic!

Some people don't like presenting with microphones and do a very cursory check to see if folks can hear them without the mic. This puts those who can't hear in an uncomfortable situation. Rather than just using the mic so everyone can hear, you put the onus on the participant who may have hearing issues. Don't do that. If you're presenting in a large room, put the burden on yourself.  Use the mic. Then still work to ensure everyone can hear well and let those who might need assistance in hearing know where the speakers are amplifying the sound.

4) Have Participants Use the Mic or Repeat

Does a participant have a question or something to contribute? Make sure that what they are sharing can be understood by the room. You can do this in a few ways. Here are some options: 

• Have the participant come to the mic
• Have a way for participants to submit questions digitally
• Repeat the question or contribution (though this takes extra time)

5) Create an Accessible Presentation

Make text and visuals large enough to read or understand. Use an easy-to-read font. When in doubt, keep it simple. Use sufficient color contrast. 

6) Close Caption Your Presentation...in Multiple Languages

Use tools like dictation or MS Translator to provide captions in your language as well as the language your audience speaks. This works well to help those with cognitive or language issues access information.

7) Describe Media

If you are showing images make sure that all participants know what appears in the image by describing it. Work this into the natural flow of what you are presenting by talking about the image you are showing i.e. as we can see in the title of this headline story from the Wall Street Journal that reads...

If you show a video ensure it has closed captioning.  If your video does not have words, but instead is just images, ensure you describe it as it is playing.

8) Use Plain Language

Presentations are not the time to show off your vocabulary or knowledge of jargon, acronyms, or idioms. Not only will those who are new to the language or have cognitive disabilities have difficulty accessing the information, it is also harder for the information to be picked up by dictation or translation tools.  

Your Turn

What do you think? Are you using any of these strategies when you present to students, staff, or families? Are there some ideas you see here that you may incorporate into your practice? Are there strategies that you use that are not listed here?  

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.  

If you are an innovative educator, than you know that you serve students with varying abilities and learning differences. Some are visible, like a person in a wheelchair. Some may not be visible such as a person who is colorblind. Some have varying levels of visibility such as someone on the autism spectrum. Some may progress and become more visible over time or as you get to know the student. There are also those who have multiple disabilities which can affect areas like cognition, speech, and mobility.  Disability can come in a wide variety of forms, both visible and invisible and can affect any of us at any time.

Here is a breakdown of areas where learners may need support:

Conventional Approaches Weren't Inclusive

In the traditional classroom of the 20th century, for the most part, students affected by learning differences often had no special accommodations. Those that did may have had to be separated from other students receiving intense, often intrusive interventions. 

Ways Technology Makes Accessible Possible

Today, in the modern classroom, this no longer has to be the case for students. Technology makes accessible possible for so many more students than ever before. Once content is digital students can

[Alexa, Google Home, or HomePod: Guide to Determining What's Right For You]

• Have the content read to them
• Change the colors
• Change the contrast
• Turn content into pictures
• Make math visual
• Add captions to videos 
• Speak and have their speech turned into text
• Turn text into Braille 
• See information in one language and easily turn it into a chosen language and then have it read to them
• Type content and hear it read back to them to ensure it makes sense
• Receive assistance with spelling and grammar
• Use the keyboard only without a mouse to navigate
• Have a screen reader navigate the page
• Access text at their reading level
• Play soothing music to help a student focus or relieve anxiety

Instead of the prohibitive costs associated with accessibility devices in the past, all of this is simply built into many browsers and operating systems. There is no additional cost. As the costs of devices decreases they are now less expensive than buying paper, pencils, notebooks, calculators, printers, rulers, and all the other tools. 

For that same few hundred dollars per year, at what is often less then the cost of low tech, schools that understand the power of an inclusive classroom, can ensure every student has an accessibility hub available to them. They'll also train their teachers how to use these tools and ensure all students devices are set up for optimum learning and creation.  

Your Turn

How do you provide an inclusive classroom? In what ways do you ensure all your students have customized their devices to ensure all accessibility needs are met? How do you create content and material that is accessible to all learners (i.e. using alt text, headings, proper links)? How are you empowering students to know and use the tools that make learning most accessible to them? 

Lisa Nielsen (@InnovativeEdu) has worked as a public-school educator and administrator since 1997. She is a prolific writer best known for her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator. Nielsen is the author of several booksand her writing has been featured in media outlets such as The New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, Tech&Learning, and T.H.E. Journal.   

Innovative educators understand that when posts have images they receive more views and provide a better experience for the reader. What they may not realize is that is only the beginning. You also should describe your images. There are two primary reasons for that.

1. Search Image Optimization (SEO)
2. Accessible to those who can't see images because they are visually impaired or because of bandwidth issues.

Here is how to do that on Twitter and blogs.

1) Alt text tags

Describe your image with short, concise, descriptive language like Hamilton's Lin-Manuel Miranda is doing now that Rob Long told him he should.

2) Title Text

Your title text is what shows when someone hovers over an image. This means you may want it to have a call to action. For example, you might say to click the image to learn more about the topic. Here's what that looks like on blogger.

3) Caption

The caption is the slightly more thorough description of your image for all readers. Another advantage is that captions are more likely to be read then your post. It also provides more context for search engines to understand what you are sharing. You can also use the caption to link to other important information.

4) Image Name

When you save an image, it receives an ugly, nonsensical name as you can see in the image below.

Give your image a sensible names with a few words to describe it. Think of it like a file you are uploading.

That's it. Follow these four rules and it is a win win. You'll receive more eyes on your post not only because the SEO is increased, but also because those who can't see adequately with their eyes will now have access to what you shared via a screen reader.

Lisa Nielsen writes for and speaks to audiences across the globe about learning innovatively and is frequently covered by local and national media for her views on “Passion (not data) Driven Learning,” "Thinking Outside the Ban" to harness the power of technology for learning, and using the power of social media to provide a voice to educators and students. Ms. Nielsen has worked for more than a decade in various capacities to support learning in real and innovative ways that will prepare students for success. In addition to her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator, Ms. Nielsen’s writing is featured in places such as Huffington Post, Tech & Learning, ISTE Connects, ASCD Wholechild, MindShift, Leading & Learning, The Unplugged Mom, and is the author the book Teaching Generation Text.

Disclaimer: The information shared here is strictly that of the author and does not reflect the opinions or endorsement of her employer.

Microsoft is announcing new tools and resources to help make learning accessible for all students.

Updates include:

• OneNote Redesign: The OneNote redesign brings consistency across apps, improves usability for those with vision and mobility impairments, and simplifies navigation controls.
• New Microsoft Educator Community Course: Designed by teachers who work in Special Education, the course outlines 10 ways every educator can make classrooms and learning more accessible for all students with Office 365. O365 for Education is free for students, faculty, and staff, and includes Word, OneNote, Excel and PowerPoint Online. The Educator Community Course is available for free at: https://aka.ms/accessiblecontenttraining.

Overcoming barriers to student achievement is a mission with which all schools have been charged, whether those barriers are lack of financial resources, access to quality curricular offerings, available technology, or a remote rural location. For decades, educators and politicians alike have been advocating for an educational system in which “no child is left behind.” But despite best efforts, inequities persist in remote, rural, and poor communities. Below is an account of how one district overcame their digital inequity.

SETTING

Although New Holland-Middletown Elementary District #88 in Illinois is a high poverty area, efforts by the local community ensure all kids are connected. Located in Logan County in central Illinois, this 72-square-mile district encompasses two small villages and a large, unincorporated area. 120 students attend the district’s K-8 school in Middletown.

Although it’s a high-poverty area with limited resources, a look inside the school reveals students actively using the latest technology. Not only has this rural district managed to obtain broadband Internet, each student has a dedicated device with ubiquitous online access. Students use these devices daily and work with various operating systems (Apple, Google, and Microsoft) in rigorous and engaging blended learning environments. “Makerspaces” and piloting drones are two examples of students engaged in current STEM technology.

Pre-K-grade 2 students use Apple iPads, while intermediate students (grades 3-6) access the cloud with Google Drive, Google Classroom, and Chromebooks. Junior high students (grades 7-8) use laptops and Microsoft Surface devices to collaborate with each other and their teachers via blogging and online learning modules in the Windows 10/Office 365 environment.

A new dedicated “makerspace” was recently funded by a STEM grant that supports design thinking, creating, and tinkering. This centrally located public makerspace, the only one in central Illinois, is being outfitted with MacBooks, interactive displays, 3D printers, and design and construction materials. All of this technology helps level the digital playing field for the students, who had previously been at a disadvantage due to this rural location.

STEPS

Moving from a district equipped with minimal technology to one of innovation was not a simple process. Many large districts with similar levels of poverty have benefitted from philanthropic measures from such companies as Comcast and Sprint through their contributions to districts’ technology efforts. In small rural schools, it is more difficult to obtain such endowments – particularly for only 120 students.

Four years ago, the hard-working people of New Holland and Middletown, Illinois, “rolled up their sleeves” and formed volunteer groups to work together toward ensuring every child left the district as prepared for college and career as any student anywhere.

Through a combination of corporate grants (Lowe’s and Monsanto), social media contests (State Farm/Facebook Neighborhood Assist), and community fund-raising functions (Family Fun Days and celebrity bartender appearances), these two communities worked together to provide much needed modern technology for their students.

This self-reliant community approach to supporting district technology needs put New Holland-Middletown ESD #88 on the map. Instead of being defeated by digital inequity and other disadvantages, the community worked together to provide its students with the tools they need to become college and career-ready.

Todd Dugan is the Superintendent of New Holland-Middletown Elementary District #88 in Illinois. The district has won many awards including inclusion in the White House’s annual “Nation of Makers” recognition. Dugan lives in rural, central Illinois and is currently finishing his doctoral research at Illinois State University, a qualitative case study of high-poverty schools in Illinois, titled “Inadequacy, Inequity and Injustice in Illinois Schools.”

SCHOOLCIO SUMMIT TAKEAWAYS

During the closing session of the SchoolCIO Summit, attendees reflected on their discussions to create a list of takeaways they would bring back to their districts. Here are some highlights:

■ No matter the size of our districts, we are all facing similar issues. I plan to explore the resources shared at Summit, including ConnectEd, ConnectHome, Future Ready, and Common Sense Media School certifications.

■ We should get teachers out of their grade levels and buildings to see what is going on outside their typical environment to see the different ways kids interact and learn differently.

■ School leaders need to lobby E-Rate for changes to the current fund distribution method.

■ School leaders should make better connections with their community organizations, especially Section 8 housing officers, about the needs of local families. Other community resources that could be better utilized include the public library, local businesses, local property management firms, and the YMCA

■ Schools should collaborate with other districts in the same area to compare broadband costs and have bargaining power with local providers who may be charging other districts less.

■ Schools should spend more time researching best practices to connect teachers and students with others who have successful digital equity, innovative learning spaces, and PD programs.

■ Schools should partner with their ISPs in addition to contacting Verizon, Comcast, and AT&T to explore opportunities for high-speed Internet for the home.

DIGITAL EQUITY RESOURCES

What follows are additional resources schools can utilize for digital equity:

CoSN: Digital Equity Toolkit: http://www.cosn.org/focus-areas/leadership-vision/digital-equity-action-agenda

Everyone On: http://everyoneon.org/ (to find low-cost Internet and devices in your area)

ESSA and School Libraries: http://essa.aasl.org/

Future Ready Hub: http://futurereadyschools.org/framework/technology-networks-and-hardware/

Future Ready Librarians: http://futureready.org/about-the-effort/librarians/

National Ed Tech Plan 2016: tech.ed.gov/netp

SETDA’S Broadband Imperative II: http://www.setda.org/priorities/equity-of-access/broadband-imperativeii-2016/

As the ninth largest district in the nation, Orange County (FL) Public Schools is using its size for good. Maurice Draggon, director of curriculum, instruction, and digital learning, shares his district’s story and their pioneering efforts to simplify and standardize the time-consuming process of accessing instructional resources by taking advantage of the IMS Global OneRoster LTI and Thin Common Cartridges. While Draggon is the first to point out that they’re still striving toward their end goal of personalized learning that opens up vast opportunities for every one of Orange County’s 190,000 students, they’re moving ever closer and hoping to help pave the way for other districts around the country as well. Below, Draggon shares his district’s story.

IDENTIFYING NEEDS

Orange County students access digital resources using LaunchPad. In 2012 we began a digital curriculum pilot with about 6,000 students in three elementary, three middle, and one high school. We decided then that curriculum, and not technology, would drive our digital curriculum journey. Another critical decision that helped to shape our digital ecosystem was to substitute, where possible, the digital form of the textbook for the paper-based one. This meant that students and teachers had to use their new 1:1 devices to access core curriculum materials.

As we toured schools those first few weeks, we witnessed how the lengthy log-in process to access instructional materials from each publisher’s Web site repeatedly took away from instructional time. We realized that access to digital resources through a single sign-on (SSO) method and rostering was not a technology imperative but an instructional one—because time wasted logging in was time not learning.

The different SSO and rostering requirements of each publisher created further unnecessary delays to access. I will never forget the frustration we felt when, after working to solve an issue with the enrollment file for one publisher, we couldn’t use the same solution to solve a similar issue with another publisher because they used different file formats. As the number of digital resources grew, we knew that the number of different file formats would eventually overwhelm us and slow the resolution of issues. We had to standardize the roster file being sent to publishers.

So we looked for a system that would provide easy access and also take advantage of the IMS Global OneRoster LTI for SSO and OneRoster CSVs for rostering. With a learning object repository (LOR) already in place to provide additional access to digital resources outside of publishers’ Web sites, we also strove to take advantage of IMS Global Thin Common Cartridges to provide direct access to instructional resources within our district’s LOR.

We now have a district dashboard (ClassLink’s LaunchPad) for teachers and students to access resources, as well as an OneRoster server to provide access to rostering information for all the major publishers. We also use our LOR (SAFARI Montage) to provide additional access to Thin Common Cartridge resources. We’re actively working with all of our partners to:

■ Transition access to their resources to SSO and send them rostering information through the OneRoster CSV or API, and
■ Provide access to their digital resources through a Thin Common Cartridge file in our LOR.

CONTRACTS AND COMMUNICATION

Moving publishers from their proprietary file formats to the open OneRoster format is one of the major challenges in building a digital ecosystem. As we’ve worked with our procurement department to add OneRoster support requirements to new contracts, we’ve also worked with existing publishers (as well as those who contact the district to gauge interest in their product) to encourage their support for OneRoster.

Internally, we’ve worked to reduce the number of teams making roster files and the number of places from which that information is pulled. This in turn simplifies the troubleshooting process and shortens the time needed to solve access issues. We’re in constant contact with our IT partners and often include them in meetings with publishers so that we’re providing a united front to anyone who wishes to do business with the district. Importantly, we’ve also worked to communicate the importance of rostering, SSO, and Thin Common Cartridge to our curriculum leaders.

THIN COMMON CARTRIDGES

Recognizing that publishers have done a great job of identifying some of the vetted instructional resources that can meet standards, we’ve worked with them to provide Thin Common Cartridge files for our LOR. Thin Common Cartridges are files that give us access within our LOR to search the publisher’s Web site for resources—just like we would search resources that we own. When we find a resource that’s helpful, such as an ebook or video tied to a standard, we can add that resource to our collection of Web links, SAFARI resources, and self-created files. When a teacher clicks on the resource, the Thin Common Cartridge connection between our LOR and the publisher’s Web site allows seamless viewing without the need to log in.

THE NEW WAY WE DO BUSINESS

We’ve now expanded the original pilot to 30 schools and we’re rolling out over 70,000 devices for the 2016–2017 school year. The Digital Learning team, which began as part of the Research, Accountability, and Grants Department, has now joined the Curriculum and Instruction Department to create a new department: Curriculum, Instruction, and Digital Learning. This shift reflects the fact that integrating digital tools into the curriculum is simply the new way we do business and is not separate from our core curriculum work.

While publishers have started to provide some, but not dramatic, discounts on their digital (versus printed) resources, these savings shouldn’t be a driving factor for any conversion. Long-term, “going digital” has to reflect what a district eventually wants learning to look like in their classrooms.

It’s critically important for curriculum and technology personnel to communicate so everyone understands the real classroom and learning implications of technology issues. If an IT team, for example, makes a “technology decision” that results in every student losing the equivalent of one full instructional week a year just trying to log in without SSO, that obviously creates significant issues for instruction and learning. While every curriculum leader doesn’t need to understand all the deep technical issues around SSO, rostering, and Thin Common Cartridges, they need to be part of discussions to decide the speed, access, and quality of resources they want students to have.

SCALED AND SUCCESSFUL

From the beginning of our digital curriculum program, we made sure we didn’t put procedures in place in the seven schools that we couldn’t scale up to 30 or 180. Building a digital ecosystem requires equally thoughtful attention to scale.

The best illustration of a successful transition to digital curriculum I can think of involves our LaunchPad implementation. The first year, we averaged 11,000 log-ins a day to access digital resources (not a big number in our district). But as we focused on the instructional impact of using Launchpad to quickly access digital resources, we saw a jump to 11,000 log-ins within the first hour of our second year of implementation. Our daily average on the weekend is now around 11,000 log-ins with no school in session!

TOOLS THEY USE
ORANGE COUNTY

► LaunchPad by ClassLink
► SAFARI Montage

If you're an innovative educator, chances are you publish work on the web. If you publish work on the web, chances are you want others to read that work. If you want others to read that work, then you need to make it accessible. While that "sounds" good, it may "seem" hard. There are sites you can refer to like Web Aim and you can look at these 5 infographics for details. If you want to know three easy guidelines to always keep in mind, a colleague of mine, shared the following with me and I'm sharing with the innovative educators who read this blog.

Three easy guidelines for web accessibility:

• I generally use the blog's default here, which I believe takes this into consideration.
• This is a mistake I make often. I will go back through my recent posts and update to meet this guideline.
• Interesting. Something I likely have done, but will stop doing in future posts.

If you prefer infographics, here is one from http://WebAim.org If you prefer infographics, here is one from http://WebAim.org

What do you think? Are these guidelines you generally follow? Any surprises?

Lisa Nielsen writes for and speaks to audiences across the globe about learning innovatively and is frequently covered by local and national media for her views on “Passion (not data) Driven Learning,” "Thinking Outside the Ban" to harness the power of technology for learning, and using the power of social media to provide a voice to educators and students. Ms. Nielsen has worked for more than a decade in various capacities to support learning in real and innovative ways that will prepare students for success. In addition to her award-winning blog, The Innovative Educator, Ms. Nielsen’s writing is featured in places such as Huffington Post, Tech & Learning, ISTE Connects, ASCD Wholechild, MindShift, Leading & Learning, The Unplugged Mom, and is the author the book Teaching Generation Text.

Disclaimer: The information shared here is strictly that of the author and does not reflect the opinions or endorsement of her employer.

Today's video summarizes the legal and ethical requirements schools and teachers must consider in order to properly educate all students, including those with special accessibility needs.

PD TIPS courtesy of Atomic Learning

Every educator impacts students, but are they able to reach all their students? Anyone working with students with disabilities who fails to provide accessible instruction and materials is inadvertently building barriers to learning. Watch the video here.

PD Tips courtesy ofAtomic Learning