Spotlight on Emily Moore
Emily Moore is an educational technology expert and a new member of DIAGRAM’s General Advisory Committee as well as the Technical Advisory Subcommittee. She’s been highly involved in our interactives work as well as helping to build partnerships to further the accessibility work. Emily is the Director of Research and Accessibility for the PhET Interactive Simulations project at the University of Colorado Boulder. Founded in 2002, PhET works to creates free interactive math and science simulations based on extensive education research. The purpose of these simulations is to engage students through an intuitive, game-like environment where students learn through exploration and discovery. On a more personal note, Emily is from Georgia but spent her teen years traveling around the western United States in a camper van with her parents. This past August she and her husband welcomed a beautiful baby girl, Adalene Blue, into their family. Congratulations Emily and thanks for joining our community, we are thrilled to have you!
Since the beginning of the year, a lot has happened in the Standards space. Here is a very short summary.
On January 5, 2017 the IDPF officially published the EPUB 3.1 family of specifications for digital publishing. Most interesting for the accessibility community is the inclusion of the EPUB Accessibility 1.0 Conformance and Discovery Requirements for EPUB Publications.
On January 5, 2017 the IDPF officially published the EPUB 3.1 family of specifications for digital publishing. Most interesting for the accessibility community is the inclusion of the EPUB Accessibility 1.0 Conformance and Discovery Requirements for EPUB Publications. http://www.idpf.org/epub/a11y/accessibility.html For the first time we have a formal specification that enables publications to be certified as accessible. This specification builds on WCAG 2.0 and adds requirements specific to published documents.
On February 1, the combination of the W3C and the IDPF was announced. The press release can be found at: https://www.w3.org/2017/01/pressrelease-idpf-w3c-combination.html.en This merger enables all IDPF Members to participate in the W3C Publishing Business Group (PBG) for two years at the same rates as were paid under the IDPF. Also, the EPUB 3.1 family of specifications, including the EPUB Accessibility 1.0 Specification have been submitted to the W3C. We are looking forward to having the W3C Lead the Web to its full potential for publishing! The Work previously conducted by the IDPF is moving to a variety of W3C groups:
- The “Digital Publishing Interest Group” is developing a charter for a publishing working group that will lead to a specification to add the functionality of web publications (books in browsers) as well as an off-line downloadable form (e.g. EPUB 4).
- The “Publishing Business Group” will be formed to lead publishing activities in the W3C.
- An “EPUB 3 Community Group” has been formed to further develop the EPUB 3.1 family of specifications. This is of particular importance because the publishing community needs a rock solid specification to use now and in the future; this provides a clear roadmap for publishing to use EPUB 3 now and eventually move to EPUB 4 and to web publications.
The EPUB 3 Community Group is free to join and open to anybody. You can learn more and sign up at:
https://www.w3.org/community/epub3/
Benetech has added two new publishers to the pilot program certifying the accessibility of books and have thus far inspected 30 EPUB books. Here are our current findings:
Based on our review of a broad sample set of publisher files reviewed in the pilot to date, the current average score is 63% and we are observing the following trends:
1. Lists are generally well constructed with a current average of 86%
2. Tables present a challenge to publishers and fail on an average of 55%
3. General accessibility which includes styling, navigation, metadata, etc. is also very poor with an average score of 60%
4. Image accessibility including alt-text, longer descriptions when needed and decorative designations where appropriate is currently averaging 47%
The results thus far provide terrific insight into concrete places for improvement and next steps. Stay tuned for news about upcoming activities in this new certification arena!
DIAGRAM will be hosting a brand new webinar on March 15th at 11:00 a.m. Pacific Time. Andreas Stefik of the University of Nevada Las Vegas, Sina Bahram of Prime Access Consulting and Richard Ladner of the University of Washington will be presenting on accessible coding and computer science. Details and registration information coming soon!
The DIAGRAM General Advisory Committee held their first meeting of 2017 which opened with the introduction and welcome of the newest committee member, Patricia Snyder. Attendees were updated on one of DIAGRAM’s newest projects the Registry Repository of Accessible Images (RRAI) as well as on the progress in the Born Accessible arena including the recent publication of the EPUB 3.1 specification family, the IDPF and W3C merger and Benetech’s work on accessibility conformance review. The bulk of the discussion focused around the upcoming DIAGRAM Report which will examine new and upcoming technology that will likely have an impact on people with disabilities. Those technologies consist of:
- Coding/computer science
- Machine learning
- Speech recognition
- Personalized learning
- Multimedia interactives
- Multi modal user interface and tactiles
- Video
- Artificial intelligence –which we grouped up into machine learning
- 3D printing
- Robotics
- Gaming
- Haptics
- Gesture recognition
- Augmented reality
- Emotion detection
- Sonification
It was a lively meeting and more detailed accounts of each project discussed will be given in our next newsletter so make sure to check back!
On January 5th 2017 the IDPF released the latest EPUB 3.1 specification and a new Accessibility 1.0 Conformance and Discovery Specification which for the first time finally draws a line in the sand on what makes an EPUB book accessible at a baseline. This specification along with its accompanying EPUB Accessibility Techniques document will help publishers and authors to create truly accessible publications. Not only does this specification help the publishers with creating accessible materials but also will help everyone Find Accessible EPUBs with the new accessibility metadata that must be added to these books in order for them to be certified as being accessible. I was fortunate to be a part of this historic moment as co-chair for this accessibility task force who helped create this accessibility specification, and a big thank you to all those who contributed in making this happen.
While the Content Working Group has not met yet this quarter, that hasn’t stopped them from being productive. The group is currently working hard to migrate the HTML version of the Accessible Image Sample Book to the DIAGRAM website so that it can be linked to the DIAGRAM Image Description Guidelines. This will hopefully make both resources easier for everyone to use. Special thanks to Kimi Sugeno and Joshua Tallent for spearheading this project. The Content Working Group is looking to meet in late March to discuss next steps and implementation of new content for the Accessible Image Sample Book. Exciting things are afoot!
It’s a busy time for the Developers Working Group and the Drag and Drop sub-group. Both are gearing up for the second annual DIAGRAM hosted code sprint at the CSUN conference, this year in partnership with Macmillan Learning. Several members of both groups will be working alongside developers from all over the world to explore challenges and hopefully prototype solutions to interactive learning mechanisms such as interactive charts and graphs.
- DIAGRAM Community members Richard Ladner and Andreas Stefik will be presenting a pre-symposium session at the SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility in Seattle Washington titled Making K-12 Computer Science Accessible on March 8th from 8:30am – 5:00pm. To register visit https://catalyst.uw.edu/webq/survey/blaser/316570
- Charles LaPierre will be at eBookCraft in Toronto on March 22, 2017 to present a session titled “In the Trenches with Accessible EPUB – Tales from the Publishing Front Lines” which will review the findings from a Benetech Pilot program, which are informing a certification process that will be widely adopted by the publishing industry.
- George Kerscher will be giving the Key Note address, titled “Ushering in the Born Accessible Era” at a NFB hosted a one-day training seminar, eBooks and EPUB Accessibility. The event takes place in Baltimore, MD on Thursday, March 23, 2017 and will focus on how to create and implement accessible EPUB 3 in a variety of different settings. Brad Turner and Sue-Ann Ma will also be in attending.
- George Kerscher and Charles LaPierre spoke at the Digital Book World in New York on Jan 17th, 2017 in a presentation titled “It’s Not Rocket Science, and You’re Closer Than You Think”.
A big thank you to all of you who sent us articles to be included in this edition of “What We Are Reading” Please keep them coming! You can send them to info[at]Diagramcenter[org] or to me directly at amayaw[at]benetech[dot]org.
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Day and Time set for the annual DIAGRAM Office Hours
- Thursday, March 2
- 5:00 – 7:00pm Pacific Time
- Manchester Grand Hyatt Hotel, DIAGRAM Hospitality Suite
A DIAGRAM Center tradition at CSUN, the Office Hours event is a great time for DIAGRAM community members to grab a snack, have a drink, catch up with friends face to face, make new connections, exchange ideas and share work. We’ll even have tables set up for anyone who feels like doing an impromptu demo.It’s a lot of fun and we hope you’ll join us!
Office Hours with the DIAGRAM Center at CSUN 2016
Of course, there is also another DIAGRAM Center tradition at CSUN. We won’t know the exact suite number until we’ve checked in, at which point we will send out an email to those of you who have expressed interest in stopping by. So please let us know if you are interested in coming and/or if there is someone you think we should be sure to include. Email us at info[at]diagramcenter[dot]org and we will make sure you are on the event notification list. We are looking so forward to CSUN and can’t wait to reconnect with as many of you as possible!
DIAGRAM Interactive Code Sprint at CSUN
Accessible Math Sprint at CSUN 2016
The DIAGRAM Center is thrilled to announce that we will be hosting a one-day code sprint in partnership with Macmillan Learning on Tuesday, February 28th in San Diego. Following on the successes of last year’s math-focused code sprint, which brought together over 20 participants from the accessibility community, the DIAGRAM Center is excited to continue this open source, community-driven tradition with a second-annual event targeting challenges and solutions related to interactives. For instance, we’ll look at developing ways to support various drag-and-drop scenarios, interactive tables/charts, and further progress in digital math solutions. At the end of the day, we hope to ignite collaborative momentum towards developing at least one new tool aimed at making it easier, faster, and cheaper to interact with digital content.
Sessions that are explicitly about DIAGRAM or DIAGRAM products:
Thursday, March 2, 9:00 am PT – Balboa C, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Sue-Ann Ma, DIAGRAM Center; Lisa Wadors Verne, Benetech and Sina Bahram, Prime Access Consulting
Learn how to use the Repository-Registry of Accessible Images (RRAI), a collaborative web-enabled collection, to eliminate redundancies in the production of alternate formats in STEM.
Slide Deck: Accessible Image Repository_CSUN 2017
Thursday, March 2, 2:20 pm PT – Mission Beach C, 3rd Floor, Between Harbor and Seaport Towers
Presenters: Lisa Wadors Verne and Robin Seaman, Benetech
We are in a golden age of digital information. Unfortunately, students with disabilities are often at a disadvantage because educational content is often not accessible.
Slide Deck: Create, Build, Find and Buy Accessible
Friday, March 3, 10:00 am PT- Golden Hill AB, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Charles LaPierre, Benetech; Ginny Grant, Bookshare; Sue-Ann Ma, DIAGRAM Center and Volker Sorge, MathJax Consortium, Progressive Accessibility Solutions
Learn about the latest advances in research, standards, and tools, all in efforts to provide more personalized access to digital mathematics.
Slide Deck: CSUN2017_Accessible Mathematics
Friday, March 3, 2:20 pm PT – Balboa AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Richard Orme and George Kerscher of DAISY Consortium and Amaya Webster, Benetech
Digital publishing should mean regular books can be inclusive. Come and learn how to tell which reading systems are accessible (and legal) for everyone.
Slide Deck: Accessible reading solutions from mainstream publishers
Friday, March 3, 3:20 pm PT – Balboa AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: George Kerscher, DAISY Consortium; Charles LaPierre, Benetech and Rachel Comerford, Macmillan Learning
Publishers can now claim conformance to WCAG 2.0. “Certified by Benetech” guarantees the conformance claims are true. The process follows the approved EPUB Accessibility Standard.
Slide Deck: CSUN2017-EPUB Certification – Kerscher LaPierre Comerford
Sessions hosted by DIAGRAM community members related to DIAGRAM’s goals:
Wednesday, March 1, 9 am PT – Mission Beach C, 3rd Floor Between Harbor and Seaport Towers
Presenter: Joshua Miele, Smith-Kettlewell
We will discuss overTHERE, a free iOS app for blind pedestrians that uses audio and gestural feedback to accurately pinpoint nearby businesses and other places.
Wednesday, March 1, 10 am PT – Gaslamp AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Rick Johnson and Chris Auclair, VitalSource Technologies; Amy Salmon and Andre Lukatsky, Tech for All
This presentation provides information on how VitalSource developed a robust, interactive, and accessible EPUB3 experience with interactive activities that work in different environments.
Wednesday, March 1, 11 am PT – Ocean Beach, 3rd Floor, Between Harbor and Seaport Towers
Presenters: Taliesin Smith and Clayton Lewis, University of Colorado
With a study of 12 users, we examine strategies for making an interactive science simulation accessible using descriptions accessed via a screen reader and keyboard.
Wednesday, March 1, 11 am PT – Balboa C, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Jason White and Mark Hakkinen, Educational Testing Service
We explore the interplay of sensory and cognitive issues in the design of accessible user interfaces, then examine their implications for research and standards development.
Wednesday, March 1, 11 am PT – Hillcrest AB, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Quentin Christensen, Michael Curran, James Teh and Reef Turner, NV Access
An overview of recent developments concerning the popular, free NVDA screen reader, plus an introduction to some exciting new NV Access products and projects.
Wednesday, March 1, 11 am PT – Golden Hill AB, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Geoff Freed, WGBH National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM)
NCAM participated in the DoT’s Advisory Committee on Accessible Air Transportation. Learn how the committee is solving the problem of inaccessible in-flight entertainment and communication.
Wednesday, March 1, 3:20 pm PT – Balboa AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Sina Bahram, Prime Access Consulting and Andreas Stefik, University of Nevada, Las Vegas
Quorum now supports physics and has an accessible visual editor. This enables students with disabilities to create engaging, complex, and accessible games, accessibly.
Wednesday, March 1, 4:20 pm PT – Balboa AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Ed Summers, SAS
Join a blind data scientist for a demonstration of SAS statistical analysis software that is free for students of all ages.
Thursday, March 2, 8:00 am PT – Balboa C, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Wendy Holden, Central Washington University
The Central Access Reader is a free text to speech program and a useful tool for producing accessible STEM content.
Thursday, March 2, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm PT – Regatta A/B room
SAS will present unprecedented access to data science and data visualization and participants will have a chance to experience the technology themselves during a hand-on data lab. To attend please register in advance by emailing email accessibility@sas.com
Thursday, March 2, 10:00 am PT- Mission Beach C, 3rd Floor, Between Harbor and Seaport Towers
Presenters: Luis Perez, Inclusive Learning Consultant and Yue-Ting Siu, San Francisco State University
This session will focus on tools and strategies for developing successful online communities of practice for assistive technology professionals and inclusive educators.
Thursday, March 2, 10:00 am PT- Gaslamp AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Rachel Comerford and Kelly Lancaster, Macmillan Learning
Is technical compliance the ultimate goal for educational materials? We share insights from testing products with screen reader users for usability, not just compliance.
Thursday, March 2, 11:00 am PT- Mission Beach C, 3rd Floor, Between Harbor and Seaport Towers
Presenters: Steve Noble, University of Louisville;Shari Butler and Su Park of Pearson; Cricket Biddleman and Edgar Lozano
Online testing environments for ELA and mathematics tests will be discussed, with a focus on usability testing with students with visual and learning disabilities.
Thursday, March 2, 11:00 am PT -Balboa C, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Steve Landau, Touch Graphics, Inc.
Touch-responsive, 3D printed models of animals bring universal access to zoos and aquarium exhibits. This presentation explains how these exhibits were fabricated and programmed, and how Touch Graphics is working with museums to add multi-sensory displays that invite every visitor to touch, listen and learn.
Thursday, March 2, 1:20 pm PT – Gaslamp AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Mark Hakkinen, Cary Supalo and Carlos Cavalie, Educational Testing Service
Consistent pronunciation and presentation of content by Text to Speech Synthesis can be achieved if AT were to support the Speech Synthesis Mark Up Language.
Thursday, March 2, 1:20 pm PT – Seaport Ballroom F-Deque, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Glenda Sims Deque and Jim Allan
The next version of WCAG is being drafted right now! The W3C Low Vision Task force has been researching user needs and writing proposed WCAG 2.1 success criteria and sufficient techniques. Come see what is proposed for low vision in WCAG Next.
Thursday, March 2, 2:20 pm PT- La Jolla A, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Bryan Gould and Geoff Freed, WGBH National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM)
NCAM is developing CADET (Caption and Description Editing Tool), free, downloadable caption-authoring software that enables anyone to easily produce high-quality, web-ready caption files.
Thursday, March 2, 3:20 pm PT- Mission Beach C, 3rd Floor, Between Harbor and Seaport Towers
Presenters: Larry Goldberg, Yahoo; Mary Bellard, Microsoft; Kate Sonka, Michigan State University; Jeff Wieland, Facebook
The Teach Access Project: tech companies and universities collaborating to expose ALL students in relevant majors to the fundamentals of accessible design and development.
Thursday, March 2, 3:20 pm PT – Seaport Ballroom H-Microsoft, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Elise Livingston and Seth Fox, Microsoft
Microsoft Office helps users create accessible content using the accessibility checker along with emerging image recognition technology.
Thursday, March 2, 4:20 pm PT- Cortez Hill AB, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Jeanne Spellman, Paciello Group; Shawn Lauriat, Google; Andrew Kirkpatrick, Adobe; Michael Cooper, W3C
Learn the goals, process and priorities of the next major upgrade to accessibility guidelines after WCAG 2.1. Get the latest status and opportunities to contribute.
Friday, March 3, 8:00 am PT- Balboa AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: BJ Epstein, Greg Kehret, Frank Welte of LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired; Jerry Kuns and Theresa Postello
Learn best practices of how to design, use, and teach tactile graphics in this presentation and hands-on demonstration, based on the authors’ expertise and experiences.
Friday, March 3, 8:00 am PT- Golden Hill AB, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Gian Wild, AccessibilityOz Inc
Covering the accessibility issues of each of the four main social media sites (Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn).
Friday, March 3, 9:00 am PT- Balboa AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: John Gardner, ViewPlusTechnologies Inc. and Volker Sorge, Progressive Accessibility Solutions, Ltd
Developing software for fully automatic creation of accessible SVG diagrams.
Friday, March 3, 10:00 am PT- Ocean Beach, 3rd Floor, Between Harbor and Seaport Towers
Presenter: Shaun Kane, University of Colorado Boulder
Smart garments offer new possibilities for assistive technology. We reflect on the evolutionary trajectory of this area and identify future directions for assistive wearables.
Friday, March 3, 10:00 am PT – Balboa AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Eric Hansen, Mark Hakkinen, Jason White and Carlos Cavalie of Educational Testing Service
We report on the usability of a web-based tool for sonification of numerical data tables for screen reader users in realistic science assessment tasks.
Friday, March 3, 11:00 am PT – Balboa C, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Rick Johnson, VitalSource Technologies, Inc.; George Kerscher, DAISY Consortium and Benetech and Jonathan Thurston, Pearson
Accessibility leaders will discuss the challenges of implementing accessibility standards to create an end-to-end solution for students and will highlight recent steps toward that goal.
Friday, March 3, 2:20 pm PT- Golden Hill AB, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Michael Cooper and Judy Brewer of W3C and Andrew Kirkpatrick, Adobe
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1 builds on WCAG 2.0 to provide updated guidance that reflect technology changes and new needs.
Other sessions of possible DIAGRAM interest:
Wednesday, March 1, 9 am PT – Old Town AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Dana Marlowe and Sharon Rosenblatt, Accessibility Partners
A presentation of case studies on how museums both big and small can implement accessibility for their patrons with disabilities.
Wednesday, March 1, 9:00 am PT – Golden Hill AB, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Lainey Feingold, Law Office of Lainey Feingold and Linda Dardarian, Goldstein, Borgen, Dardarian & Ho
Join two internationally recognized disability rights lawyers for a fast-paced review of digital accessibility legal settlements, court cases, laws and regulations. Web, mobile, kiosks, and more.
Wednesday, March 1, 10 am PT – La Jolla A, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Abraham Glasser
An evaluation of Automatic Speech Recognition services showed that there was a relationship between ASR accuracy and readability levels by IBM Watson and Microsoft Azure.
Wednesday, March 1, 2:20 pm PT – Old Town AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Gareth Ford Williams and Nigel Megitt, British Broadcasting Corporation
Over 100 years of learnings from key research into the readability, legibility and accessibility of fonts are explored in this presentation.
Wednesday, March 1, 4:20 pm PT – Balboa C, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Jennifer Gauvreau, Michael Bennett and Elizabeth Whitmer, CGI
CGI will explore potential accessibility barriers with charts, graphs, and interactive dashboards and share practical lessons learned in designing and developing inclusive data visualization solutions.
Wednesday, March 1, 4:20 pm PT – Old Town AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Atsushi Imai, Japan Broadcasting Corporation (NHK)
At present, audio description services are mainly for pre-recorded programs, such as dramas. We propose a new audio description service for live TV sports programs.
Thursday, March 2, 10:00 am PT- Golden Hill AB, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Lisa Seeman, IBM Corporation, and facilitator of WCAG‘s Cognitive Accessibility Task Force
IBM is getting ready to address new success criteria in WCAG 2.1 for people with cognitive disabilities. What tools will be useable by all?
Thursday, March 2, 11:00 am PT – Balboa AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Chaals McCathie Nevile, Yandex and Léonie Watson, The Paciello Group (TPG)
What does it take to make SVG accessible? How accessible can SVG be today?
Thursday, March 2, 1:20 pm PT- Balboa AB, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Ken Perry and Jeanette Wicker of American Printing House for the Blind and Venkatesh Chari, Orbit Research
The Graphiti™ is a dynamic multilevel tactile touch display that allows students and adults to access a wide variety of on-screen graphics by touch.
Thursday, March 2, 1:20 pm PT- Balboa C, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Michael Kolitsky, nextgenEmedia
iPad or iPad Pro audio buttons located directly beneath complex image tactile template regions provide one-to-one link between audio information and tactile location being touched.
Thursday, March 2, 1:20 pm PT- Golden Hill AB, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Lisa Seeman, IBM Corporation, and facilitator of WCAG‘s Cognitive Accessibility Task Force, Maureen Kraft and Will Scott, IBM
Thursday, March 2, 3:20 pm PT- Seaport Ballroom G-Google, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Caile Collins and Noah Wang, Google
Learn about improvements and innovations in automatic closed captioning.
Thursday, March 2, 4:20 pm PT- Mission Beach C, 3rd Floor, Between Harbor and Seaport Towers
Presenter: Jeff Witt, Fidelity Investments
We present practical design and implementation guidelines toward universal usability for charts, including palette design, keyboard interaction, and markup. Related usability research is discussed.
Friday, March 3, 9:00 am PT- Seaport Ballroom A-SSB Bart, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Chris Lane and Nat Tarnoff of SSB BART Group
Review the architecture of Angular 2 applications, and explore the use of Components, basic unit testing with Karma, and end-to-end testing with Protractor.
Friday, March 3, 10:00 am PT – La Jolla A, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Julie Grisham, Sandy Watson, Levon Spradlin, Anthony Fernando and Corey Fauble of Pearson
An open discussion on the evolution of accessibility needs for deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals and how needs change when moving from K-12 to postsecondary education.
Friday, March 3, 10:00 am PT- Seaport Ballroom A-SSB Bart, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Mark Barlet, AbleGamers Foundation and Jessie Hall, SSB BART Group
From AAA titles to indie studio releases, look at game companies doing accessibility right. Delve into best practices, relevant legislation, and trends in the industry.
Friday, March 3, 10:00 am PT – Seaport Ballroom H-Microsoft, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Saqib Shaika and Anirudh Koul, Microsoft
When we think about sound, we generally assume it needs to be heard. How can we make the auditory world more inclusive for people who are Deaf or hard of hearing? Drop by our talk to find out how AI and visualizations can help convey the meaning of sounds.
Friday, March 3, 11:00 am PST – Ocean Beach, 3rd Floor, Between Harbor and Seaport Towers
Presenter: Larwan Berke
To compare methods of displaying speech-recognition confidence of automatic captions, we analyzed eye-tracking and response data from deaf or hard of hearing participants viewing videos.
Friday, March 3, 2:20 pm PT – Seaport Ballroom A-SSB Bart, 2nd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenter: Alistair Garrison, SSB BART Group
ML/NLP is all over the news. Let’s look at how we can use it to make accessibility testing faster and easier for QA teams.
Friday, March 3, 3:20 pm PT – Hillcrest CD, 3rd Floor, Seaport Tower
Presenters: Jason Carroll and Martin McKay, Texthelp
This session will focus on and demonstrate various examples of cloud-based technologies that can support a wide range of learners in reading, writing and math.
As 2016 comes to a close, we are pausing to look back at all we’ve done together in the last year and to celebrate all those who were instrumental in making it happen. Here are just a few highlights from the last twelve months, which encompassed the conclusion of Year 1 of our five-year award from the Department of Education:
Strides for Accessible Math
The Accessible Math Code Sprint hosted by the DIAGRAM Center in partnership with OERPUB and OpenStax and co-sponsored by the Shuttleworth Foundation took place in late February at the 2016 CSUN conference in San Diego, CA. Twenty-two developers from all over the world volunteered to spend a day hacking digital solutions to issues around accessible math.- Following the sprint, DIAGRAM launched a project with Volker Sorge on related work to enhance his open source math Speech Rule Engine so that automated text transcription of math can be more versatile to support varying user needs.
- We released Math Support Finder, an online resource to help people navigate the complex world of assistive technology for math and find the combination of tools that meets their needs. Special thanks to Sina Bahram who helped with the development of the tool this year and to Aaron Page, Marlene Zente, and Derek Reimer all of whom helped identify which tools worked.
Big Wins in Accessibility Standards and Guidelines
- In May, Charles LaPierre, Technical Lead for DIAGRAM and co-chair of the W3C Accessibility Task Force, announced that the group had published the Accessibility Note “Digital Publishing and Accessibility in W3C Documents.” This document addresses what is missing from WCAG in terms of digital publishing needs, provides guidance on resolutions, outlines future work such as assessments, mathematics etc., and points to relevant work outside of the W3C that they should be aware of such as Diagrammar.
- This year also saw the expansion of the partnership between Benetech and DAISY through two new collaborations, the community management of the reading system testing group, and the start of development on a baseline accessibility checker for publishers so they can take another step toward realizing the dream of “born accessible” content.
DIAGRAM’s 3D Tactile Standards Working Group published a guide to printing braille with 3D printers. Special thanks to Mia Lipner and Jim Allan who have both chaired the working group and to the members of Lighthouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired in San Francisco and Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired, who participated in testing to determine the best practices for the 3D printing of braille.- The team at WGBH’s National Center for Accessible Media, Bryan Gould, Madeline Rothberg and Geoff Freed, released three new DIAGRAM reports, including an update to our series on image description metadata, rounding up the latest in standards and recommendations.
New Tools and Resources
- A new prototype of a Registry-Repository of Accessible Images (RRAI) was released in alpha for testing. With technical development led by Sina Bahram and key content supplied from DIAGRAM partners APH, LibraryLyna, and OpenStax, we have begun to do user testing and will be building it out further in 2017.
- We also began work on the first DIAGRAM Report, an interactive report that we will publish annually beginning in 2017, which will identify and examine emerging technologies and their impact on students and teachers, with a special focus on areas of enormous opportunity for students with disabilities and different learning needs. We have received great feedback from you all on potential areas to explore and are both grateful for your contributions and excited to dive in and learn about new innovations for accessible education.
A Growing Community
- We now have 96 members of the various DIAGRAM committees
and working groups, and many others in the broader community all contributing their expertise and passion to advancing accessible education. We are grateful to our wonderful working group co-chairs, whose expertise and energy continue to be invaluable. Of special note is the new working group we added this year: the DIAGRAM Developers Working Group, which provides insight on technical solutions and has already given rise to a subcommittee focusing on ways to make drag-and-drop accessible.
As you can tell, it has been a busy year and there is even more in store for 2017, so stay tuned to learn about other projects we have in the works. In the meantime, thank you to everyone for your continued participation in our community. (If there are any highlights we missed or names we should have mentioned above, please let us know.) We are truly humbled and thankful to be surrounded by so many amazing people. We wish you very happy holidays and a terrific new year!
Warmly,
All of us on the DIAGRAM team at Benetech
This time of year we like to look back and reflect on all the things that we are grateful for here at DIAGRAM and one of the biggest things is the tremendous community we have. We are in awe of each and every one of you and the work that you do. That’s why the community spotlight is one of our favorite sections and we are looking forward to highlighting everyone over the course of our award. If you or someone you know has something special coming up, let us know so we can include it in upcoming issues. Similarly, if you would rather not be featured, just let me know. You can email me at amayaw[at]benetech[dot]org.
Spotlight on Kimi Sugeno
Kimi comes to DIAGRAM with a background in publishing, specifically digital content management and workflow creation for digital book production. Kimi is the newest member of the DIAGRAM content working group and is already instrumental in furthering the group’s work through her continued help with the HTML migration of the Accessible Image Sample Book. While anyone who knows Kimi is aware that she is an expert when it comes to content management, project management, and workflow, few are privileged to the fact that she enjoys scuba diving, especially off Hawaii’s Big Island. Welcome, Kimi! We are very excited to have you as part of our community.
Benetech CEO and Founder Jim Fruchterman was awarded an honorary doctorate from Northern Illinois University. Laurie Elish-Piper, the dean of the NIU College of Education, said of Jim, “Mr. Fruchterman is truly a model of innovation, social justice, and interdisciplinary problem solving.” NIU President Doug Baker talked about the privilege of recognizing Jim, saying, “…He applies his skills in engineering and physics to discover, develop and deliver technology that helps people around the world to lead better and more productive lives, and he has accomplished this in a selfless way.” Jim was nominated by Gaylen Kapperman, a professor emeritus in the Department of Special and Early Education. Jim received his honorary doctorate on December 12, 2016, at the graduate school commencement ceremony. Congratulations to Jim!