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Accessibility Challenge: Content/A Way for Everyone to Level-up

Michele Thornton

Oswego

2023

$24,928.00

Project Abstract:

The need to create accessible digital materials became blatantly evident when the COVID-19 pandemic shifted nearly all learning online in 2020 and early 2021. Inspired to create professional development that was sensitive to our campus needs at a challenging time, the Oswego campus Workgroup on Accessibility Practices created an intervention in the form of a 10-day accessibility challenge. To keep participants motivated and engaged, a 10-
Day Accessibility Challenge was designed with self-determination in mind. Challenge-type interventions can reach diverse constituencies, build greater familiarity and utilization of existing resources, and increase participant confidence around their ability to contribute to a culture of accessibility and inclusion. Although the challenge was successful, we find that shifting the campus culture toward accessibility and inclusion is an on-going process. To do so requires that we commit both time and tangible resources to increasing knowledge and implementation of accessibility principles. This proposal seeks to support the development of an asynchronous course that learners across the campus and SUNY community can access year-round, rather than just during sporadic periods of professional development.