The Future of Accessibility in International Higher Education

Proc. of Education and Information: …, 2005

Academic degree programs suffer from many accessibility issues that risk to impair the right of study. The first limiting factors concern economic and logistic problems: students could not afford paying for tuition, fees, accommodation and they have to find a difficult tradeoff between study, work and personal needs. Disabilities give rise to further barriers against access to higher education. Web-based distance-learning provides a partial answer to the above problems, but it implies, in its turn, digital divide issues. In addition, linguistic diversity, policy constraints and information asymmetry limit the global accessibility to crossborder education. In this paper we present a web-based worldwide campus model conceived to grant global accessibility to academic degree programs. We present the model, we discuss its application to an undergraduate degree program in applied computer science, and we point out its benefits and drawbacks in terms of accessibility.

This book is a comprehensive reference source for the latest scholarly material on emerging methods and trends in disseminating knowledge in higher education, despite traditional hindrances. Featuring extensive coverage on relevant topics such as higher education policies, electronic resources, and inclusion barriers, this publication is ideally designed for educators, academics, students, and researchers interested in expanding their knowledge of disability-inclusive global education.

Lecture Notes in Computer Science (including subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics), 2013

Higher education institutions (HEI) and students are highly dependent of information systems, implemented as web applications. Students must be able to access this applications, thought accessible web interfaces, in order to perform their academic activities. This paper presents an overview of a typical set of web applications used by students and the main concerns regarding accessibility compliance. The analysis was conducted using the systems at the University of Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro.

In higher education and technology-enhanced learning environments, there is an increasing need for faculty members, instructional designers, and other learning professionals to be aware of and to use technologies and other learning and teaching tools that are accessible to all students, regardless of disability or other additional need. In this study, we evaluated our experience in training faculty members and eLearning professionals in accessibility and universal design principles, and we investigated the impact of these training workshops on the professional lives of faculty and eLearning professionals, as well as the impact on the overall quality of the University's course design and instructional materials. The aim of this study was to best address the specific needs of faculty and eLearning professionals in a wide variety of discipline areas, such as Veterinary Medicine, Business, Computer Science, Mathematics, and Liberal Arts and Sciences. Overall, our training analysis is aimed at empowering faculty and eLearning professionals to effectively create and deliver more universally designed instruction. As such, the ultimate beneficiaries of our study will be the students, who will have access to more accessible educational materials created according to universal design principles.

Higher education worldwide is facing unprecedented challenges - the dramatic rise of college tuition, rapidly increasing demands for accountability, and a complex society that demands college graduates with even more skills and capacities. To understand how higher education can effectively address these challenges, this chapter investigates the economic and social benefits of higher education and what it means for the future of accessibility in higher education. Utilizing Critical Interpretive Synthesis (CIS) and signaling theory, a comprehensive search of the literature selected 60 peer-reviewed journal articles and twenty-five books published between 2000 and 2016. The findings suggest that student expectations for a college degree tends to be very instrumental and personal, while higher education purpose of undergraduate education tend towards highly ideal life- and society-changing consequences. Eight recommendations for teacher-scholars, policymakers, and campus leaders are proposed. The ultimate goal is to help make colleges skills and degrees more accessible for students.

ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing, 2016

As Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) become more diffuse, developers and designers need to consider a growing diversity of users including people with disabilities and aging populations. As a result, computing education needs to respond by providing students opportunities to learn about accessibility and designing for inclusion. This article presents results of a qualitative research study of practices in teaching accessibility in university-level programs in the US. The study included interviews with 18 professors from some of the top universities in the US and a content analysis of syllabi and other teaching materials. Using the pedagogical theory of authentic learning and elements from the 21st Century Skills framework, we found that instructors emphasized the need for students to develop awareness and understanding for a diversity of ICT users through multiple different experiences; experiences that included research projects that directly involve users with disa...

Pedagogika

This paper reports on a capacity-building project in higher education known as DARE (Developing programs for Access of disadvantaged groups of people and Regions to higher Education), as viewed through the lenses of Hanan Alexander’s pedagogy of difference, Uri Bronfenbrenner’sbioecological theory of human development, and Chris Argyris’s concept of action science. The project is funded by the European Commission’s Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency. Following a literature review, the report analyzes data drawn from documents, observations, and focus groups to explore how and why policies addressing accessibility to higher education for disadvantaged groups are implemented in different international contexts. Influenced by international initiatives, DARE has provided material, conceptual, professional, and collegial resources to have an overall positive effect on advancing access to and inclusion in higher education for minorities, students with disabilities, and wo...

Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Software Development For Enhancing Accessibility and Fighting Info-Exclusion (Dsai 2012), 2012

This paper describes the successful experience carried out by professors of the CETTICO research group of the Technical University of Madrid to incorporate accessibility in the curricula of higher education in ICT in Spain. The paper covers the legal requirements to include accessibility in curricula in Spain, the courses and modules that we have been teaching through the years and the teaching techniques and tools that we have been using.

White paper sponsored by the Online Learning Consortium. https://olc-wordpress-assets.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/2018/06/Access-and-Accessibility-in-Digital-and-Online-Learning-Issues-in-Higher-Education-and-K-12-Contexts.pdf Accessibility in K-12 and higher education is becoming an increasingly complex terrain to traverse as schools increase online materials and instructional delivery options. This white paper provides an overview of critical terms, legal precedents, and other considerations for course designers, instructors, and administrators as they work to improve the educational experiences of learners with disabilities. Key questions around accessibility include the following: 1. How do national laws that govern disability access apply to online courses? 2. What case law exists to guide online course design and delivery in various educational settings? 3. What issues emerge regarding online course access that might be unique to higher education and to K-12 settings? What issues are shared? 4. What support do online course designers need in order to generate accessible courses for learners across the life span (from K-12 to higher education)?

2019