Washington, DC-On Tuesday, February 7, Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) convened a hearing to examine access to education through the deployment of accessible technology.
Harkin chairs the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, which convened the hearing entitled "The Promise of Accessible Technology: Challenges and Opportunities." It focused strongly on the importance of accessible technology and how the issue impacts K-12 and higher education.
Witnesses who spoke at the hearing included: Eve Hill, Senior Counselor to the Assistant Attorney General, Civil Rights Division, Department of Justice; Mark Riccobono, Executive Director, Jernigan Institute, National Federation of the Blind; Dr. John B. Quick, Superintendent, Bartholomew Consolidated School Corporation in Columbus, Indiana; and Mark Turner, Director, Center for Accessible Media, Accessible Technology Initiative, California State University (CSU).
The hearing was broadcasted live online at www.help.senate.gov. Real-time captioning and sign language interpreters were provided.
In her opening comments, Eve Hill acknowledged:
"We are at a critical juncture for people with disabilities and technology. As we come to realize anew each day, the pace of technological change is amazing; what appeared impossible just years or even months ago is now commonplace. Advancing technology can open doors for many people with disabilities and can provide the means for them to move closer to the goal of full, equal, and truly integrated access to American life. But cutting-edge technological advances will leave people with disabilities behind if the entities that develop, manufacture, and offer technology do not make their products and services accessible."
In her testimony, Hill discussed how enforcement of these laws by the Department of Justice has resulted in public entities, public accommodations, and some technology developers and manufacturers taking new approaches to technology accessibility. She noted how the Department of Justice's work, along with that of the Department of Education, is making a difference in education for students with disabilities. Hill's testimony at the hearing also addressed the importance of internet access for people with disabilities in the education context and beyond, and discussed the Department of Justice's rulemaking activities on the accessibility of information on the web, as well as rulemaking activities of the Access Board, the Department of Transportation, and the Federal Communications Commission. She also spoke of how the Department of Justice's enforcement efforts are helping to ensure that other types of technology enhancements continue to improve the lives of people with disabilities across a variety of activities, as Congress intended in enacting the ADA.
Also providing testimony at Tuesday's hearing was Executive Director, Jernigan Institute, National Federation of the Blind, Mark Ricobono. During his testimony, he called for a new paradigm of accessibility, one in which there is mainstream accessibility from the beginning instead of being retrofitted to make accommodations. He stated, "There are two central elements to making education accessible to all students. The first is access to educational facilities....The second is access to information."
At the hearing, his recommendations for federal policy included:
- Stronger oversight and accountability in government
- Strong, functional, and rigorously enforced standards
- Projects to collect, develop, and disseminate best practice tools
- Improved protections against inaccessible technology in education
- Deepening awareness and expertise among IT professionals; and
- Strengthening nondiscrimination protections under the law
Third to provide testimony at the hearing was Dr. John Quick, Superintendent of the Bartholomew Consolidated School Corporation (BCSC). He provided an overview of the school system's implementation of a Universal Design for Learning (UDL) program and its use of accessible technology to improve the learning of all its students.
He described the diverse student population in the school system and how it worked to address the student's learning needs. In 2008, the school system made a decision to use UDL across all its programs as the framework to design all instruction and curriculum in the district. The school system found this framework has helped uphold the expectation that all learners will achieve to their highest level. He also discussed how using UDL has advanced the school system's educational outcomes.
Quick described how UDL serves as a framework to make learning environments accessible to all students. He also detailed UDL's three overarching principles: engagement, representation, and action/expression and how they create an accessible learning environment.
Quick states that because the BCSC population is diverse, it recognizes the need to create flexible learning environments which are standards-based and use accessible technology when appropriate. BCSC's teachers use the framework of UDL as a decision-making tool to help them determine what strategies, accessible technologies, and methods they will use to help students achieve the goals of the lesson. During his testimony, he described how having the appropriate technology for a student helped curb behavior problems and facilitated learning.
Also providing testimony at Tuesday's hearing was Mark Turner, Director of the Center for Accessible Media at California State University (CSU). His remarks focused on the issues faced by postsecondary institutions as they work to ensure that technology used to deliver educational programs and services are usable by all students, staff, faculty, and members of the public regardless of disability.
Turner discussed CSU's commitment to excellence, its commitment to equal opportunity, and the diversity of CSU's disability community. He also detailed how technology is fundamentally changing the educational landscape, while making the argument that Educational technology adoptions can either improve or worsen accessibility issues for students as well as institutions.
The CSU system is a model of accessibility, not only in providing accommodations for students with disabilities, but because CSU officials work to ensure that underlying technologies and systems are accessible. Turner also spoke about CSU's successful efforts to work with Apple to transform its iTunes U into an accessible offering and the challenges yet to be met in convincing Google to fully address access to Google Apps. He also made clear that CSU's job would be easier if federal (and state) governments would live up to their obligations to purchase and use technologies that are accessible to people with disabilities. Section 508 is a federal law that requires this, but as Turner noted, governments don't require technology vendors to validate their claims regarding accessibility and no performance testing is done.
Turner stated that CSU campuses commonly hear from technology vendors that other customers including Federal and State government entities across the country are adopting products despite the presence of accessibility barriers, suggesting that Section 508 implementation is insufficient to drive market changes.
Turner went on to suggest federal entities be charged with ensuring that Section 508 procedures are revised to more adequately address accessibility including:
- Validating product accessibility documentation;
- Conducting conformance testing prior to adopting high-impact products; and
- Sharing test results with other government and education entities to reduce redundant efforts.
Through Turner's testimony, CSU also asked that Congress require recipients of Federal grant funds to ensure that technology products developed as components of these grants conform to Section 508 standards and urged the Department of Justice to send a "Dear Colleague" letter to the 100 largest IT vendors, reminding them of the importance of ensuring that their products are accessible to people with disabilities.
Finally, CSU also strongly supported the recommendations from the AIM Commission report18 including revising the scope, effectiveness, and function of the Copyright Act as amended (Section 121, the Chafee Amendment) to broaden the definition of individuals eligible for specialized formats, and authorizing the United States Access Board to establish guidelines for accessible Instructional Materials that will be used by government, the private sector, and postsecondary institutions.
