Advancing Learning 2018

The CODE Book is Fanshawe College's comprehensive resource guide designed to support faculty with the development of new courses and the revision of existing courses. Based on the principles of universal design for learning (UDL), The CODE Book encourages faculty to develop accessible course materials with the support of the built-in accessibility tools in Microsoft and Adobe software. Therefore, The CODE Book, at over 260 pages and filled with templates, worksheets, diagrams, key-boxes, and internal navigational links, had to be made accessible in the same way.

In this session, I will share my experiences with ensuring The CODE Book achieved the same accessibility standards as it promoted to its readers. Those experiences include the technical and institutional challenges I encountered throughout the process and the interactions I had with faculty and staff that led me to uncover opportunities for expanding, yet simplifying, resources and training to support those faculty and staff as they develop their own accessible course materials. The goals of this session are to INSPIRE a dialogue about those challenges and opportunities to bring accessibility to the forefront of course design instead of addressing it as an afterthought.