We will be having a discussion about incorporating captioning into your web production process. Several web folk have generously agreed to share how they caption their videos. Captioning will undoubtably be part of the new ADA requirements, due sometime in 2012, so this is a great way to get up to speed.

Hope to see you there!

Scott Williams

To get to 818, as you exit the south building elevator on the 8th floor, turn left to go through the double glass doors. Turn left and go all the way to the end of the hall to the last door on the left. This is the administrative suite. The conference room is the first room on the right (there are 2 doors to the room and the 2nd one is usually the one that's open.

Patty Bradley

There will be no May WAWG meeting because of Enriching Scholarship. There are two accessibility-related workshops being offered this year that you might wish to sign up for:

Web Accessibility Jam (https://www-a1.lsa.umich.edu/es_conf/app/DisplaySession.asp?sessionid=4001)
Patty Bradley, Scott Williams, Patricia Anderson, Suzanne Chapman
Is your unit's website accessible to people with disabilities? Does it meet web accessibility standards? If you don't know, attend this panel discussion to learn quick and easy ways to evaluate your website for accessibility, meet the UM Web Accessibility Coordinator and learn about important web accessibility resources. Panel participants are Patricia Anderson, Patty Bradley, Suzanne Chapman, and Scott Williams. Participants are invited to submit your site ahead of time to es10-waj@umich.edu.

Creating Accessible Word and PDF Documents (https://www-a1.lsa.umich.edu/es_conf/app/DisplaySession.asp?sessionid=4004)
Scott Williams
There are three good reasons for making your Word and PDF documents accessible: it's the right thing to do, it's the law, and federal agencies and research sponsors are now rejecting documents that are not Section 508-compliant. PDF accessibility is a straightforward process if addressed at the authoring stage.This workshop explains what the Section 508 requirements are, how to create a structured MS Word document that can be used to create an accessible PDF, and what Microsoft Word add-ins are necessary. An accessibility checklist and links to online resources will be provided.

Patty

Patty Bradley

Mike Elledge, Assistant Director of the MSU Usability & Accessibility Center will present "WCAG 2.0, Part II." A video of part I of his talk (August 4th) is still available on the WAWG CTools site.

Please have your WCAG questions ready.

-Patty

Instead of a speaker, we will have a group discussion. The following issues have been suggested. We'll see how many we get to, and how many evolve into future meeting topics:

-share what email lists and tools we use to stay up to date on accessibility

-use of color in accessibility

-problems with Google's accessibility

-invisible disabilities and their needs in web accessibility

Patty Bradley

Gonzalo Silverio, Lead Graphical User Interface Programmer with the Digital Media Commons will present on ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications).

Our guest speaker will be Nick Wilcox, Assistive Technology Trainer at the Ann Arbor District Library. Nick is a user of adaptive technology, and will share with us the typical things that make it difficult for him to browse the web. He will also share the techniques and strategies he uses in finding information and navigating the web.

This special meeting time is to accommodate Nick. In November we will be back to our regular time of 1:00-2:30.

However, we will meet in room 806 S. Hatcher from now on due to recurring scheduling problems in 100 N Hatcher. Enter the building via the south side and take the elevator up to the 8th floor. Go through the double glass doors and it's straight ahead.

-Patty

Meetings are held on the first Tuesday of each month from 1:00-2:30.

Thanks, Patty

Mike Elledge, Assistant Director of the Usability & Accessibility Center at Michigan State University (and former UM Accessibility Specialist) will talk to our group about WCAG 2.0. Please have your questions ready.

The talk will be video-recorded for those of you unable to attend, although I do hope to see a good crowd there to welcome Mike.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

-Patty

"People have become more aware of accessible design in real life architectural spaces, designing spaces to make them easy to use for persons with and without disabilities or special needs. There is also a trend over the past fifteen years to keep in mind designing web sites to be accessible. An area that is often still neglected are video games and 3d virtual worlds, which present some unique challenges to the designer committed to accessibility. This presentation will describe some of what is happening in Second Life with the engagement of the special needs communities with the programmers and developers from Linden Labs, with a focus on lessons learned and best practices."

Please contact Patty Bradley-Diehl (pattyb) with all questions. See you there.

I am very pleased to announce that the University has finally hired a Web Accessibility and Adaptive Technology Coordinator: Scott Williams. Scott started his new position yesterday and an "official" announcement is forthcoming. He was a Web Production Manager for Michigan Marketing and Design prior to taking this new position.

During our June meeting Scott will speak about his plans and vision for the position. He will also be very interested in hearing your ideas.

Patty Bradley-Diehl