Jennifer Sutton wrote:
>
> What concerns me about webpage designers, though, is that they make
> conscious decisions *assuming*, for example, that "oh, blind people
> don't care about the info that I'm putting here." That seems dangerous to
> me, but it's more a matter of attitudinal awareness than web page design,
> in some ways. When off-the-shelf web-designing tools help to promote
> access, that will be very helpful. It seems to me that it's a matter of
> ethics, so it's rather complicated,
> but it seems to me that it's less complicated when it comes to
> commerciall sites.
Yeah, no disagreement there. I suspect that most often there isn't even the
conscious reflection on the possibility that blind people even might be
trying to access pages.
Someone else, off the list, has pointed out to me that the law (in the UK)
may tighten up the access issue in the very near future. This will mean that
Universities and other will need to take more care in allowing amateurs, like
me, to set up web pages. What is the legal position in the States on this?
>
>
>
> I am interested, though, in your question about making
> university-based web pages accessible to people with learning
> disabilities. Why wouldn't you, since people with learning disabilities
> might (are?) students there? Shouldn't those students have access to that
> information?
Hmm. Maybe this was lost in the trans-Atlantic translation. In the UK
'learning disabilities' generally refers to what you might call mental
retardation or intellectual impairment rather than, say, dyslexia. Is that
what you meant or am I misunderstanding you? There aren't any students here
with learning disabilities (in the UK sense). If anyone has other knowledge
please let me know.
best wishes
Murray
--
=================================
Murray K. Simpson,
Department of Social Work,
Frankland Building,
The University of Dundee,
Dundee DD1 4HN,
United Kingdom.
http://www.dundee.ac.uk/socialwork/mainpage.htm
http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~mksimpso
tel. 01382 344948
fax. 01382 221512
e.mail [log in to unmask]
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