Time to Start Designing With Access in Mind: Designing from the Start
On a navy background, the image reads, “Time to Start Designing with Access in Mind”
There is an event that you want to go to. You heard wonderful things from your friends and colleagues about their previous experience at the event and after looking at the event agenda, you are eager to participate in these crucial conversations on issues you care about and gain new experiences and perspectives along the way.
When you go to sign up, there is a section for accessibility requests. Yay! They did not make it difficult by providing the space to request. You input your request that is considered quite common in the virtual space and you sign up to attend.
The day of the event comes. You click on the link provided in the email to attend an event that caught your eye when you were first considering attending. As you get in, a lot is happening. They put so much effort in providing an immersive experience that tends to get lost in virtual events. Once you situated yourself from the excitement, you realize that you cannot find the captions.
Everything started to click.
The event organizers and panelists are in a Zoom meeting and it is being live streamed into this platform that did not have the capability to provide captions. It had the ability to divide English and French audio, but no captions, not even auto-captions.
Why even ask about accessibility accommodations requests if you are not willing to follow up about them.
This is a memory
This is a real experience I had. I only scratch the surface of the barriers I faced at this conference. There are more issues, including my perspective of facilitating a side event with my team which I was not able to do because of this gap.
It is frustrating,
sadly,
not surprising,
or new for me.
Don’t worry, I sent a looooong email to the person responsible for the entire conference and listed all the issues I experienced, and opportunities to learn to make the event accessible for the next time.
The worst experience about this was not even that the event is not accessible to me but the attitudes about the inaccessibility when I brought this issue up. I luckily had my peers to back me up and support me during this situation.
So, what was missing?
There are many steps and moving parts to event planning. Especially multiple days with different stakeholders across many time zones. I have been part of and worked on event planning and facilitating. I know that there may not be resources or there are technical limitations that make it extremely difficult to provide full access.
Here are two clear concepts that were missing in this process
Universal Design and
Maintaining Communication
Universal Design
Best explained by the Centre for Excellence in Universal Design,
“Universal Design is the design and composition of an environment so that it can be accessed, understood and used to the greatest extent possible by all people regardless of their age, size, ability or disability.”
It is looking at the environment that you exist in and plan on utilizing and improving the space so that everyone can access it in an inclusive and equitable way. The first step?
Acknowledging that many (if not all) environments and tools are NOT accessible.
Centre for Excellence in Universal Design’s 7 Principles are a great tool to learn and understand what is the expectation of Universal Design. It is also a tool that can start evaluating whether or not your environments and designs align to the principles to learn about your gaps.
Designing Events and Programs
Where does Universal Design come in when planning events and programs to your community? Well, everyone who wants to participate and thinks they would find value in your information should be able to meaningfully access it and feel comfortable to participate and contribute to the conversation. Do you want your hard work to be inclusive to anyone who is interested?
The key is to design this in mind at the start of your planning.
Not when you get the requests. In. The. Beginning.
Design accessibility and inclusion at the start!
You do not need the requests to figure out how you can make events and programs accessible. The requests are a great way to confirm that you are not missing anything. Ask all the questions when planning so you do not have to pivot or majorly change a key aspect at the last minute in your effort of “inclusion.”
Different accessibility needs
I know, there are so many considerations that you may not even know is a barrier for someone (I am still learning about more through the disability community). However, the internet has many resources and voices that share experiences in efforts to increase awareness and accessibility. Are you willing to take the initiative to look around and ask?
Here are 5 barriers to accessibility in relation to my experience with the conference
Attitudinal: After bringing up the inaccessibility of the event, the attitudes I received back that were inconsiderate and pointing the blame on everyone except themselves as event organizers
Organizational or Systemic: Requiring organizations to put a box for accommodations requests but organizers forgetting to take the crucial step of looking at it and following through (or at least following up).
Physical Environment: Ok, there is none really in my conference experience since it was virtual and in the comfort of my own home. For future in-person events, can this person access the building without going through a questionable and unsafe alleyway to the only accessible door only to find out there is also a ramp needed on the way there. I know there are buildings that are still set up this way.
Informational or Communications: Captions! I needed captions to get the information from the event. That was my accommodation request. At that point, I could not care if it was craptions (auto-captioning, typed by AI, not a human captioner)
Technological: The platform did not even have the ability to provide captions, could I have the option to join the Zoom meeting to see them? (By the way, they also forgot to activate auto-captions on their end so it would not have worked anyway).
You can learn more about how Accessible Campus defines these 5 accessibility barriers in the perspective of the Universal Design for Learning.
Key Tip: If you are struggling to find information for solutions and tools to help you in achieving Universal Design, check out Universal Design for Learning, there are many resources as Universal Design was mainly focused in education.
Maintaining Communication
One of the key components of designing events, programming, and environments is maintaining communication. You cannot do full accessibility without communicating with people who experience barriers. This happens in two ways, one way is providing an avenue for consultation and feedback to understand gaps in your work. Another way is communicating to people about accessibility requests to provide meaningful access to those who wish to participate.
Community Feedback
Taking the initiative to reduce barriers means being open to feedback. However, if you want to design from the start, you would need to do your due diligence on researching for considerations that need to be made to your work. However, not every resource speaks to all barriers that people experience, especially, if you are only focused on meeting legislation and/or legal requirements.
The internet is a great starting point to figure out what gaps that may have not ever crossed your mind. The people who experience barriers to your work and organizations that exist to reduce these barriers for a better society are great resources that can provide specific considerations that you may miss.
Taking in all different types of resources can give you a great overview that can be applied to all your work and save time in the long run. It is that phrase that is mentioned often within the disability community of “once we know better, we do better.”
Accessibility Requests
Most people take the approach of accessibility requests as their only indicator for providing accessibility. The issue of exclusively using accessibility requests instead of combining the tool with the work of designing from the start is potentially having difficulties adapting to fit with someone’s accessibility needs in a short amount of time.
Using accessibility requests along with considering access needs before the requests come in can be an excellent tool to make sure you did not miss anything. It can be a form of feedback to ensure that people are not left out due to their needs. It is increasingly important when considering services that take time to book or have a high demand.
However…
If you are to use accessibility requests as part of your registration process, communicating with the person is key.
I may have a controversial opinion about this but I am just going to mention it. If you ask about accessibility needs and the person fills it in the form, it should not be the person’s responsibility to follow up, it is yours. You requested their needs, you follow up about them back to them to inform them whether or not it can be fulfilled.
If you wanted an email from them on my accessibility requests, do not make them answer the question in the form. Just clearly mention that if you have accessibility needs, please email using the email you provided.
The amount of times I have to fill a form and there is an email underneath it. The statement below never stated that I had to, just if I had anything additional like concerns. I cannot read minds here.
Either way, you need to inform people who send in accessibility requests because I don’t know about you but, we live in an inaccessible society. We need to know if our needs are going to be met. There are many steps that information would need to be provided.
Initial: When the accessibility request is provided and you follow up to start the discussion of whether it is a plausible request within the resources (time is a resource here). This is also a great place to mention that you are working on it and/or providing information on why the request may not be met, providing a place to explore different options if possible.
Confirmation: If the accessibility request can be made, you still need to confirm that it is going to happen to the person that requested it. It is great communication and it can allow the person to relax a little about their needs being met. This is also the time to give the person contact information (if different than initial and confirmation) for during the event and program in case something goes wrong.
During: Things happen. Technical issues, someone does not show up, logistical issues that may have not been considered. A contact person is needed to ensure good communication and commitment that if something goes wrong, a dedicated person can work to resolve the issues. This includes informing the person if it is an issue that is beyond your control. Keeping the person informed is key in this situation.
Feedback: Feedback is crucial to improving and learning. There are many things that you may not have considered or foreseen and asking for feedback and people’s experiences can provide answers or ideas that would have otherwise not been thought of.
Communication is key. I was missing this during my experience at the conference. I was fortunate to know who was technically in charge of the conference to send feedback to them for the future (it was not the email provided in the note under the accessibility request box on the form). I am aware of how difficult it can be. There are many moving parts to designing in general, to add access to the equation when it was not taught or prioritized can be intimidating. However, there are many first steps that can be taken to move towards a more accessibility experience.
Different Tools and Steps to Take
Here are a few recommendations for steps to take to improve accessibility in your work.
Accessibility Checklists
There are many accessibility checklists available as a free resource on the internet. They may not be specific to your needs but they are a great starting place to figure out where you stand, what you have considered, and where are your gaps.
Basic Accessibility Checklist - Access Awareness Week Nova Scotia
Event Accessibility Checklist (including multi-day events) - Autistic Self Advocacy Network
Virtual Events Accessibility Checklist - The Communications Network
Nova Scotia Accessible Events Guide - Nova Scotia Accessibility Directorate
I do think that troubleshooting is a missing element of accessibility checklists that can help people. It is an advocacy dream I have to provide that perspective to event planning and design. You can learn more from my Advocacy Dreams Blog.
2. Universal Design
As I mentioned in the beginning of this blog, universal design is key to understanding how to design from the start and why it is important. Start with the resources below and maybe delve into Universal Design for Learning for more inspiration.
3. Have a dedicated person responsible for accessibility requests when asking for requests to ensure that the person has an equitable and inclusive experience where they can meaningfully participate. Follow the steps for maintaining communication to maximize a person’s experience and the confidence from you to provide access.
The recommendations are not meant to be exhaustive. They are starting points to take the initiative to provide accessibility and my request to continue working towards an inclusive and accessible society. While experiencing inaccessibility sucks, it is also my drive to spread awareness and give permission to not be perfect. If you didn’t know, I spread awareness to you to give you the opportunity to learn and make the next person experience better. Once you know, please take the lesson and voice of the disability community, once we know better, we do better. We can always do better, take the initiative to make the change, even if it is in small steps.
Amanda