Tina
I am a web accessibility specialist working in the schools sector (and a bit in FE/HE) and have a bit of experience in the legislative side of accessibility. In response to your question at the end of your posting about the legislative drive the definitive law in England/UK is The Equality Act 2010 which can be found at:
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/contents
this does not mention web accessibility directly but the statutory and non-statutory guidance at explains that web services are covered within the meaning of the Act:
http://www.equalityhumanrights.com/advice-and-guidance/new-equality-act-guidance/
and
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/publications/equalities/equality-act-publications/equality-act-guidance/
Further (mainly process) guidance is available from the BSi in there Web Accessibility Code of Practice (BS8878) which can be bought from:
http://www.bsigroup.com/
and the more technical aspects of delivering accessible websites can be found on the W3C WAI WCAG 2.0 website at:
http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG/
And finally I can recommend an article (written by my wife so I suppose I should declare an interest!) in the January 2012 edition of .NET magazine (just published last week) on the 10 principles of inclusive content. Well worth a read and recommended by the editor.
Hope that helps. Don't hesitate to contact me if you need more.
Richard Everett
The Old Coach House
Rear of 9 High Street
Stevenage
SG1 3BG
P: 01438 215 447
M: 07766 611 826
E: [log in to unmask]
On 14 Dec 2011, at 11:38, Tina Lowe wrote:
> Hi all
>
> I hope you are all well?
> I work in UCD, (University College dublin) and have been appointed Disability Access Officer for the University. My role is unique amongst my fellow third level institutions in that the work of accessibility is carried out by staff in disability support Services in the other third level institutions unlike where I work - I have been given the sole responsibility of driving the accessibility work in my university. I realise that local authorities in Ireland have been working in the area of accessibility for several years now and have done considerable work in this area to date as have many of the other universities who have also been working on providing the compliance under the disability Act 2005. However, my query is in relation to the terms used for personnel who work in this area, specifically if the personnel in the Uk or other jurisdictions apart from the republic of Ireland are working in the area of accessibility solely or if their roles are included in other roles? I am asking this as I have been requested to research into what other third level institutions outside the republic of Ireland are doing in this area and if they have dedicated stand alone units who work on accessibility and if so what are their titles of their roles? I know that there are many boroughs in the UK who have personnel working in the area of universal access and design and so my question is this - is there a similar picture in higher education?
>
> My questions specifically are related to universities outside the republic of Ireland, can you tell me please to those members on the list from the UK and other areas do you have dedicated roles in your universities or institutions of higher education for staff working in the accessibility area?
>
> In Ireland for example, we have dedicated Disability Officers working in Disability support Services, they are not working in the area of accessibility as such but rather work in the area of academic supports for students with disabilities. In the institutions of higher education there are Access Officers who work in the area of student support for under represented students i.e. mature students, students with disabilities , students from socio-economic disadvantage, again they do not work directly in the area of accessibility, however, in some cases, both the role of Disability Officer and Access Officer may have accessibility areas tagged onto their existing roles. In my University, my role is now solely responsible for accessibility, which would be similar to roles in local authorities or local boroughs - my title is Disability Access Officer and the title of personnel working in local authorities in the republic of Ireland is Access Officer. So my first question is - in the Uk do you have disability support Services in universities as stand alone services or do you have an all encompassing equality driven service? Secondly, do you have the role of Disability Access Officer or personnel working in accessibility in universities? If there are personnel involved in higher education in the area of accessibility are they working in Universal Access and design? If so are they called for example Universal Access and Design Officers or are there other titles used?If they do not work in a stand alone service in the area of accessibility, how do the universities carry out the accessibility requirements and what is the legislation that drives this work in the UK?
>
> Many thanks for your assistance with my questions.
> Kind regards
>
> Tina Lowe
> Disability Access Officer
> Access & Lifelong Learning
> Level 1
> James Joyce Library Building
>
> Ph: 01 7167564
> Fax: 01 7167503
> http://www.ucd.ie/openingworlds/
> ----------End of Message----------
> Run by SURFACE for more information on research, consultancy and the distance taught MSc. in Accessibility and Inclusive Design programme visit:
> http://www.surface.salford.ac.uk
> Archives for the Accessibuilt discussion list are located at http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/accessibuilt.html
----------End of Message----------
Run by SURFACE for more information on research, consultancy and the distance taught MSc. in Accessibility and Inclusive Design programme visit:
http://www.surface.salford.ac.uk
Archives for the Accessibuilt discussion list are located at http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/accessibuilt.html
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