ACCESSIBILITY INTERNET RALLY FOR HIGH SCHOOLS: MEETING
FEDERAL AND STATE ACCESIBILITY REQUIREMENTS
Presenter(s)
Annie Hudson
Knowbility, Inc.
3925 West Brakerf
Austin Texas 78759
Day Phone: 512.305.0312
Fax: 512.305.0009
Email: ahudson@knowbility.org
Learn how AIR-High helps educators meet IT accessibility mandates and
students to win scholarship prizes all in the context of a fun, friendly web
design competition.
Complete Paper: As per No Child Left Behind, students with disabilities
have a right to be included in the regular classroom. Education in regular
education settings implies more than just physical presence; it includes the
tools to access the curriculum that is taught in the regular classroom. In
Accessibility to information technology is where we’re headed and really
where we should have already been. Not only is it the right thing to do, but
more and more, educators are being held accountable by these kinds of legal
mandates. For most people technology makes things easier. For people with
disabilities, however, technology makes things POSSIBLE. The key is access.
Software, including Internet applications, can be designed to be accessible for
children and adults with disabilities - or it can leave millions of people out.
Just as Federal 508 laws mandate physical access to our public streets and
buildings, the new requirements for “electronic curb cuts” on the information
highway can facilitate access by students with visual, hearing, motor skills,
and cognitive disabilities, and Knowbility’s Accessibility Internet Rally for High
School (AIR-High) program can help educators meet these requirements.
Since 1998, the original AIR program has been successful both in raising
community awareness of the need for access and in improving accessible design
skills by directly engaging web professionals. AIR challenges web pros to learn
accessible web and software design skills in the context of a fun, friendly web
competition. Participating programmers, graphic designers, and program managers
attend accessibility training delivered by world-renowned accessibility
experts. Once they master the techniques, AIR participants are invited to form
teams to apply their new skills by creating an accessible web site for a
nonprofit organization.
Participating nonprofit
organizations receive separate training in creating and maintaining an
accessible web site. The community gathers for one high-energy web-raising day
as teams create fully functional and accessible web sites for organizations
that serve the arts, human services and environmental needs of the community.
Completed sites are judged by experts and awards presented in a high-profile
ceremony. AIR has been produced annually in
Knowbility has completed a step-by-step replication kit to help communities
produce an AIR program locally. In addition, Knowbility has responded to the
educational community’s needs by modifying the basic model to the requirements
of the school community, and has developed the Accessibility Internet Rally for
Texas High Schools (AIR-High). AIR-High is a web design competition that
specifically benefits schools while raising understanding of design techniques.
Throughout the fall of 2005, Knowbility will train representatives from
school districts across the state in accessible design techniques and give them
resources to pass those techniques on to students. The AIR-High
training-of-trainers provides lesson plans, ideas, information, links, and
resources that will help teachers address the wide range of student learning
styles and abilities in their classrooms. Educators will see how design and
project-based learning can be used to meet the needs of all students. The
program also highlights lessons and information that demonstrate how assistive
technology can be integrated into the curriculum and provide further help in
creating differentiated learning environments.
Knowbility will support the effort through web casts and online listserves.
Students will have the opportunity to submit their accessible designs in the
spring of 2006 and compete for scholarship prizes. AIR-High highlights and
promotes accessible online content by teaching design skills that result in
school-based websites that are fully accessible. Students learn about
accessibility in the context of a fun, friendly web design competition through
which they may win recognition and scholarship funds for their good work!
AIR-High is co-produced by the
AIR has proven to be a replicable, adaptable and engaging way to spread the
word about accessible web and software design. Knowbility would be pleased to
share our success and ongoing challenges at CSUN in 2006 with a presentation
and Q & A session, given by Knowbility’s AIR-High Program Coordinator,
Annie Hudson.
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