2023 Accessibility Bites Series (Sep. 28, 2023 to Feb. 29, 2024)

Accessibility Bites is a five-part series hosted by BCcampus on the last Thursday of every month at 12:00 PM PT from September to February (except December). These are the topics that will be covered at each 30-minute session:

• September 28, 2023: Assistive technologies
• October 26, 2023: Image descriptions
• November 30, 2023: PowerPoint Slides
• January 25, 2024: Social media
• February 29, 2024: Word documents

Each drop-in session is designed to give you the opportunity to practice and explore a different aspect of digital accessibility that is relevant in an education context. Each session will have a short lesson, time to practice on your own (you're welcome to bring your own materials to practice on), and then an opportunity to share and ask questions.

Join your host Helena Prins and facilitator Josie Gray online in Zoom for one, or all, of the Accessibility Bites sessions.

Facilitators:

Host: Helena Prins (she/her) is an advisor on the Learning and Teaching team at BCcampus.

Facilitator: Josie Gray (she/her) is the manager of Production and Publishing at BCcampus.
 

Click "Register" to sign up for one or all of the sessions in this series.

Session Details:

Session 1:  Assistive Technologies 

September 28, 2023 from 12:00 to 12:30 PM PT

This is a short drop-in session designed to give you an opportunity to explore the assistive technologies and customization options available in the digital tools educators and staff often use in our workdays. The goal here is to give you an opportunity to explore these tools and to identify what might make your work easier. 

Schedule:  

10 minutes - Demo on some of the assistive technologies/customization options available in some of the popular digital tools we use. This will include: 

• Text to speech (your device reading aloud text that is on the screen) 
• Speech to text (your device writing down what you say aloud) 
• Customizing visual displays (dark modes, high contrast, enlarging text size, readability tools) 
• Automatic captioning 

10 minutes - Everyone can go and try out the different tools on their device.  Your host and facilitator will be available for questions.  

10 minutes - Everyone will come back together to reflect on how that went, to share their own experiences/tips, and to ask any additional questions. 

Session 2: Image Descriptions 

October 26, 2023 from 12:00 to 12:30 PM PT

This is a short drop-in session that will allow you to practice describing images. If you share images (whether that be through documents and publications, social media, digital interfaces, or presentations), this session is for you! 

What to bring: 

Any images you want to make accessible – preferably ones that you use in your work. (We will also have ones to practice on if you don’t have anything).

Schedule: 

15 minutes – presentation on key things to keep in mind when describing images. This will include: 

• Who image descriptions are for 
• When and when not to describe an image 
• What to describe and how to describe 
• How context factors into image descriptions 
• Examples of good/not so good image descriptions 

10 minutes - Everyone works individually to describe their images. Your host and facilitator will be available for questions. 

5 minutes - Everyone will come back together to reflect on how that went and to ask any additional questions.  

Session 3: PowerPoint Slides 

November 30, 2023 from 12:00 to 12:30 PM PT

This is a short drop-in session where we will explore how to design and remediate presentation slides so they are accessible. We will talk about design considerations that are unique to slides (whether you’re teaching online or in person), as well as how accessible content can be created in PowerPoint. 

What to bring:

A slide deck you want to make accessible – preferably one that you use in your work. We will focus on Microsoft PowerPoint but you can bring something in Google Slides too if that's what you have. (We will also have a PowerPoint presentation to practice on if you don’t have anything). 

Schedule:  

5 minutes – A presentation to highlight some key things to keep in mind when reviewing your slides. 

20 minutes - Everyone works individually on their own slides to identify and fix accessibility errors. Your host and facilitator will be available for questions. 

5 minutes - Everyone will come back together to reflect on how that went and ask any additional questions. 

Session 4: Social Media 

January 25, 2024 from 12:00 to 12:30 PM PT

This is a short drop-in session where we will talk about accessibility considerations that are applicable across social media platforms, so if you use Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, or Tiktok, these considerations will apply. 

What to bring:  

A device that you can use to access any of your social media accounts (mobile or computer is fine, and these can be your personal or professional accounts) 

Schedule:  

10 minutes – A presentation will highlight some key things to keep in mind when creating and sharing social media posts. This will include: 

• #Hashtags 
• Emojis and special characters 
• Images and GIFs
• Videos 

10 minutes - Everyone works individually to explore accessibility on the social media platforms they use most. Your host and facilitator will be available for questions. 

10 minutes - Everyone will come back together to reflect on how that went and ask any additional questions.  

Session 5: Word Documents 

Feb 29, 2024 from 12:00 to 12:30 PM PT

Title: Accessibility Bites: Make Your Word Documents Accessible 

This is a short drop-in session where we will explore how to create accessible content in Microsoft Word. 

What to bring:  

A document you want to make accessible – preferably one that you use in your work. We will focus on Microsoft Word but you can bring something in Google Docs or a web page too if that's what you want to work on. (We will also have one to practice on if you don’t have anything). 

Schedule:  

10 minutes – A presentation will highlight some key things to keep in mind when reviewing your document. 

15 minutes - Everyone works individually on their own document to identify and fix accessibility errors. Your host and facilitator will be available for questions. 

5 minutes - Everyone will come back together to reflect on how that went and ask any additional questions.  

Click "Register" above to sign up for one or all of the sessions in this series.