Lessons Learned in AccessComputing
The UW has received NSF funding for three consecutive grants (CNS-0540615, CNS-0837508, and CNS-1042260) that support the nation-wide AccessComputing alliance. Project activities have led to sustainable structures and practices that make computing disciplines more welcoming and accessible to people with disabilities, including post-9/11 veterans. Project outcomes benefit society by making computing opportunities available to more citizens and by enhancing computing fields with the talents and perspectives of people with disabilities, as well as increasing participant success in college, graduate school, and careers.
Although project efforts are ongoing, it may be beneficial to others to share a few of the things we have learned thus far:
- Motivational activities can recruit students without initial interest, and comprehensive preparation and retention interventions produce more positive outcomes than isolated efforts.
- There is a need for more leaders and role models with disabilities in computing fields.
- The representation of students with disabilities in computing majors and degree completion decreases in higher education levels.
- Institutional change is needed to make computing departments both welcoming and accessible to students with disabilities.
- Change is needed to make IT positions in industry more welcoming and accessible.
- Cooperative efforts between organizations focused on computing and those focused on disability yields positive outcomes.
- New activities benefit from facilitation by trained staff and funding for initial activities on which institutionalization of these practices can build.
- Students with disabilities face a variety of challenges when transitioning to higher levels of education, as evidenced by low success rates.
- K-12 schools and outreach programs need help in making computing classes more inclusive to students with disabilities. Mainstream computing courses rarely include accessibility/disability topics.
- Alliances for women and minorities are not always aware of how to effectively recruit and support participants with disabilities.
The Empowering Blind Students in Science and Engineering (EBSSE) workshop was held June 1-3, 2014 at a conference center near the UW. The workshop brought together three different groups of people to foster mentoring and networking among blind students studying science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). The first group consisted of eighteen blind students in STEM fields who came from seventeen universities and one high school in twelve different states. The second group consisted of sixteen blind mentors, some with PhDs, who are successful blind professionals working in STEM fields. The third group consisted of eight local leaders in industry, education, and government who attended for various lengths of time. The leaders participated in mentoring and listened to the successes and challenges of the blind students and mentors. A total of forty-four people, thirty-five of whom were blind, participated in the workshop.
My name is Daniel Seita, and I am a first-year computer science PhD student at the University of California, Berkeley. I am working with Professor John Canny on machine learning and human-computer interaction research. I expect to stay at Berkeley for at least six years to form a strong research record before going out on the job market. My career goals are to become either a professor or a research scientist.
I had the privilege of attending the 16th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2014), which was held in Rochester, New York, on October 20-22. It was a remarkable conference in a number of ways. There were about 170 attendees, which may be a record attendance for the conference. The technical program was excellent with interesting talks, many poster and demos, and a reception with technical exhibits at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf at Rochester Institute of Technology. The 2014 SIGACCESS Award for Outstanding Contributions to Computing and Accessibility was awarded to Vicki Hanson who gave a fascinating talk titled 鈥淐omputing and Humans,鈥 which highlighted the impact of technology on people with disabilities.
Jonathan Lazar; professor of computer and information sciences, director of the Undergraduate Program in Information Systems and director of the Universal Usability Laboratory at Towson University, earned AccessComputing鈥檚 Capacity Building Award.
AccessCS10K (#NS-1440843, now, AccessCSforAll) is a new NSF-funded program with the goal of increasing the participation of students with disabilities in Exploring Computer Science (ECS) and Computer Science Principles (CSP). It is a collaborative effort of the UW with PI Richard Ladner and Co-PI Sheryl Burgstahler and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, with PI Andreas Stefik. There are two principal objectives to reach our goal:
Last December, students participating in code.org鈥檚 Hour of Code could choose an accessible tutorial for the first time. Hour of Code is designed to provide a short introduction to programming to K-12 students and has had millions of participants since 2013. This year, the Hour of Code included a tutorial that utilizes the programming language Quorum. The tutorial is accessible for the visually-impaired and works with screenreaders.
Did you know that the searchable AccessComputing Knowledge Base includes over 480 articles each as a questions and answer (FAQ), case study, or promising practice? These short articles are used to increase the capacity of postsecondary institutions, precollege educators, projects that broaden participation in computing, and industry to fully include individuals with disabilities in computing fields.