In an increasingly digital world, the importance of accessibility reaches beyond the physical, according to Dr. Katherine Schneider, a retired clinical psychologist and professor emerita of UW-Eau Claire. 

After the publication of The Spectator’s article on physical accessibility, Schneider reached out to share her perspectives on less obvious forms of accessibility. 

Schneider is blind and uses screen readers to navigate the online world. She explained that people with disabilities experience the digital world in vastly different ways than others, and must consider many more factors. 

She cited finding menus, identifying resources in the library, determining degree requirements, and searching the schedule for the Celebration of Excellence in Research and Creative Activity (CERCA) as examples of instances where accessibility must be considered. 

While these resources were accessible, Schneider said some were excessively difficult to navigate with a screen reader. 

For example, the comical names for meal categories on Sodexo’s page rendered navigation confusing, according to Schneider. She said simple decisions, like being clear in wording, alphabetizing items, and placing the search bar on the upper left corner of a site makes a difference, while being easy to implement. 

Schneider is an advocate for digital accessibility for those with blindness and low vision and has worked with Anna Zook, arts librarian and assistant professor at UW-Eau Claire, on such issues. 

Zook said she and Schneider had collaborated to review the Wisconsin Public Library Consortium’s app Libby when it was slowly replacing Overdrive a few years back. They went through the app, documenting all accessibility issues and sharing them with the app developers.

Zook frequently works with digital accessibility with her work at McIntyre Library. She detailed how the library has added new accessibility tools, such as Orcam pens, to its physical collection. 

Additionally, she shared that there is an initiative to install at least one computer on campus with Job Access With Speech (JAWS), a highly effective screen reading program, in the near future. 

“Not only does this kind of accessibility and this kind of software support people who are blind and low vision,” Zook said, “It also supports people who have neurodiversity. Maybe it’s a student who’s tired, maybe it’s a student who is dyslexic, maybe it’s a student who just enjoys hearing it out loud.” 

To supplement the current lack of this resource, Zook often assists students in finding other accessibility related tools like alternative screen reading programs and image description generators, such as one developed by Arizona State University. 

“We also work to provide content that has accessibility built in with captions where we can and we do have some services with the voice track,” Zook said.

She also brings her knowledge of digital accessibility into education.

“So even this semester, I’m teaching a one-credit IDIS (Interdisciplinary Studies) course, and we had a unit last week about digital accessibility,” Zook said. “The students had to complete the assignment where they created a document that had alt text added to an image and then their headings and text were a screen reader.”

McIntyre Library does have a page on accessibility put together by Kate Hinnant and Roxanne Backowski. 

Lily Eisele, a third year organizational communications student and Personnel Director for the Student Senate who advocates for accessibility on campus, has ideas for how education on digital accessibility can be improved on campus. 

Eisele said that, according to the Services for Students with Disabilities (SSD), not many faculty members opt to complete the training on accessibility that is available. 

“I would love to see more department heads and UW colleges pushing those resources because, again, they aren’t hard changes to make,” Eisele said. 

She also shared that SSD has digital training available which can help professors go beyond what is required by law. 

Senate has undertaken one such initiative, according to Eisele.

On April 15, 2024, Student Senate passed a resolution to ensure that “all future materials produced and displayed on the UW-Eau Claire Student Senate website page will use the OpenDyslexic font.”

Eisele described how the simplification of slides and other educational materials are low-effort on the part of creators, but can profoundly improve the experiences of students.

“When you make something more accessible for one group of people, it doesn’t take away the accessibility from a group of neurotypical people or people who don’t have that disability,” Eisele said. 

Josh Bauer, digital accessibility coordinator and user experience architect, shared his experience with sharing knowledge regarding accessibility.

“I started to put together, with the accessibility work group, a sharepoint website that includes information on accessibility,” Bauer said. 

This webpage, according to Bauer, will be available soon. However, there are resources that are currently available. Bauer shared that Learning and Technology Services (LTS) has training available on how to implement accessibility into Microsoft products. 

“Digital accessibility touches everything in the university. It’s not just the website, it’s not just making sure that documents and materials are accessible,” Bauer said. “It’s also … our core mission as a university is to make courses accessible to students as well, remove barriers for students in the classroom.”

Schneider shared a similar sentiment and said that blind people must consider how to physically navigate new spaces without accessible maps and finding films with audio descriptions to enjoy. 

“The library just published a little bookmark about 300 games. How many of those are accessible to me?” Schneider said. “Were they marked with a star if there were any that were accessible? Because, you know, blind people like to play games, too.” 

Such changes are not only in the hands of the university, according to Schneider. For instance, each year on Global Accessibility Awareness Day, McIntyre Library shares a social media post encouraging users to consider a new aspect of accessibility. Zook said that in the past they have encouraged students to use alt text in their social media posts, or to attempt reCAPTCHA exercises through audio. 

Schneider said she encourages people to add more description to their social media posts.

“Accessibility is everywhere, and … everybody can help, even if you’re not designing a web page. You’re probably posting something on social media,” Schneider said. “And when you post on social media, instead of just posting a picture and saying ‘Wow look at this,’ put ‘Wow, look at this chocolate cake I baked.’ Yeah, I still can’t see it, but at least I know what you’re happy about.”

Eisele also shared her hopes for engagement on campus. 

“If people want to join the Neurodiversity Alliance club on campus, we’ve only just started … this year, and are looking to have more members and that includes anyone with ADHD, autism, dyslexia and other neurodiversities, because the more community that we have, the more powerful our voices are,” Eisele said. 

Bauer, Eisele, Schneider and Zook are all united in their work to spread knowledge around accessibility on campus, hoping to equip people with the information needed to create a truly inclusive environment. 

“People can read an article and say shame on the university or shame on, whatever, and just keep walking, but they can do something,” Schneider said.

Crist can be reached at [email protected].