So my fiancé is a PhD student. That fact is only relevant in that it’s my main source of information about processes at various academic institutions. While he is a student and works for only one university, he is on projects with other universities, and regularly reviews papers for journals.

There are times he shows me or tells me about websites, surveys, graphs, or practices that clearly violate current accessibility standards. At times he has mentioned this to the people in charge of these items and he frequently gets the response along the lines of “I don’t think people with visual impairments will use this.”

As someone who strives to ensure accessibility practices are followed, this response makes me frustrated. But, rather than having this be a series with me venting about these transgressions, I’d like to take this time to give a brief overview on how academic faculty and staff (or other researchers) can build accessibility practices into their workflow and why they should.

This series is going to focus on a few main problems with accessibility in academic research, but by no means are they they only ones. If you’re curious about other accessibility considerations, take a look at Anne Gibson’s Alphabet of Accessibility on the Pastry Box Project; it’s fantastic.

Continue reading “Accessibility in Academic Research: Using Color” →