CIT 2006 - WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION

TUESDAY, MAY 30, 2006

Universal Design of Instruction, Part B: Creating Accessible Content w/ Dreamweaver and Adobe Acrobat

Instructors:
Norm Coombs, CEO
Equal Access to Software & Information (EASI)

Sharon Trerise
Coordinator of Accessible IT
Northeast ADA & IT Center
Cornell University

Time: 1:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Location: Fenton 2162
Rating: Introductory
Platform: PC
Cost: $35

This workshop is for instructors, web developers, instructional design staff and anyone else creating web content who want to make their materials universally accessible to all students, including students with disabilities. Both Adobe and Macromedia have made strides in improving the accessibility of online content created with their products, Adobe Acrobat and Macromedia Dreamweaver. This workshop will give you a hands-on opportunity to develop accessible web content using these software tools.

Adobe Acrobat:

This workshop offers an opportunity for lively discussion around such questions as:

1. Under what circumstances is PDF format appropriate and beneficial?
2. Does 'Accessible PDF' meet accessibility standards for online content?
3. Are there other alternatives to creating accessible PDF?

Learn the steps needed to create an accessible PDF file the hard way and the easy way. And learn about the challenges that still remain in this process.

Dreamweaver:

You will also learn about the features available in Dreamweaver that can make the process of creating accessible content much easier. Macromedia has taken care of the nitty-gritty coding needed to make data tables accessible. It also provides similar features for ensuring that images, forms and other content that you create with Dreamweaver generates accessible HTML code. In hands-on practice you will learn how to turn on these Dreamweaver accessibility features and employ them appropriately to generate universally accessible online course content.

About the Instructors:

NORMAN COOMBS, Ph.D. is professor emeritus from the Rochester Institute of Technology where, in the mid 1980s, he played the key role in initiating their distance learning program moving online. In the past 2 decades, he estimates that he has taught some 5,000 students in at least 40 countries teaching online for RIT, New York School for Social Research, San Diego State University, the University of Washington and for EASI (Equal Access to Software and Information). Coombs has received several awards for this work including the 1990 New York State CASE Teacher of the Year Award. Coombs has lectured on distance learning across the US as well as in Canada, England, Ireland, Austria, Switzerland, Hungary and Turkey. Besides his interest in the unique potentials for developing new learning paradigms, he has had a special concern in making online fully accessible for students with disabilities. He says that "Distance learning provides the potential to create the most level learning space in history for users with disabilities."

SHARON TRERISE is the Coordinator of Accessible Information Technology at the Northeast ADA & IT Center which is a grant funded project within the Employment and Disability Institute at Cornell University. In this role, she provides information, training and technical assistance to educational entities regarding best practices and techniques for ensuring that information technology used in education is accessible to people with disabilities. After earning her bachelor and masters degrees from Cornell University, Sharon worked in the technology field for 20 years, providing a range of services from technical support and training to software development and network administration. She has also completed additional course work in assistive technology and universal design. Sharon’s varied work experiences include K12 and higher education institutions as well as Fortune 500 companies and non-profit organizations.

Brought to you by The Northeast ADA & IT Center, Cornell University