4

As with all materials used for education and information, it is important that OER be compliant with the American Disabilities Act (ADA).  The ADA is a comprehensive civil rights law that was enacted to protect individuals with disabilities from discrimination (ADA, n.d.). Compliance with ADA is an area that can always be improved. Use of OER gives creators a unique opportunity to create materials that are ADA compliant upon creation.

At the time of this publication, there are no precise set of rules and guidelines for web accessibility. Upon its creation in 1990, the ADA required that public businesses remove all access barriers that would prevent any patron from using those businesses or services.  At that time, the internet was still in its early years, and the ADA did not include information on the use of the internet. However, it was announced in 2010 that the Department of Justice (DOJ) planned to update Title III of the ADA act to include website accessibility (Department of Justice, 2010).  The DOJ planned to “establish requirements for making the goods, services, facilities, privileges, accommodations, or advantages offered by public accommodations via the Internet . . . accessible to individuals with disabilities.” (Federal Register, 2015).

A ruling on how websites should handle accessibility, along with guidelines, was expected to be released in 2018.  However, in December 2017 the DOJ withdrew the rulemaking notice for websites to be in ADA compliance (Federal Register, 2017). Additionally, in February of 2018, Congress passed the ADA Education and Reform Act, that made it more difficult for differently-abled people to sue businesses for accessibility discrimination (Ballesteros, 2018).

Therefore, there is still a need for best practices in the development of OER to make them more accessible to everyone.  The World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.0 AA) can be used as a best practice guideline for providing ADA compliance. WCAG has 12 guidelines under four categories that are testable for materials on the internet to evaluate if they are accessible.  They provide an exhaustive list of ways to provide accessibility, including text captioning for all photos and machine-readable text (World Wide Web Consortium, 2018).

There are other programs that can be used on a more rudimentary level to check for accessibility, including Microsoft Word, dynomapper.com, A11Y Compliance Platform, Accessibility Viewer, and more. In the spirit of sharing and education, as well as OER, it is important for users and creators to provide accessibility to those who have a need.

Quotable Quotes

“Creative Commons helps you legally share your knowledge and creativity to build a more equitable, accessible, and innovative world. We unlock the full potential of the internet to drive a new era of development, growth, and productivity (Creative Commons, n.d.).

Did you know?

Digital OERs can be personalized for different learning experiences.  This allows students to learn at their own pace, but also allows for instant access to information. OER can be downloaded and modified by the instructor for different teaching and learning purposes and goals (Pinto, 2015).

Additional OER Resources

OER website ADA compliance checklist

https://webaim.org/standards/508/checklist

Site for creating ADA compliant math tools

http://diagramcenter.org/accessible-math-tools-tips-and-training.html

Resource for creating accessible OERs

http://udloncampus.cast.org/page/media_oer_creating#.W03qcNJKiUm

Creating accessible digital content

https://oer.galileo.usg.edu/accessibility.html

OER flowchart

https://www.saddleback.edu/uploads/library/oer_flow-chart_where_to_begin.pdf

References

1.Americans with Disabilities Act. (n.d.).  Information and technical assistance on the Americans with Disabilities Act. Retrieved from https://www.ada.gov/index.html.

2. Ballesteros, Carlos. (2018). House votes to gut the Americans with Disabilities Act to nip “abusive lawsuits.” Newsweek. Retrieved from https://www.newsweek.com/house-republicans-americans-disabilities-act-civil-rights-808106.

3. Creative Commons. (n.d.). What we do.  Retrieved from https://creativecommons.org/about/.

4. Department of Justice. (2010). Advance notice of proposed rulemaking: Accessibility of web information and services of state and local government entities and public accommodations. Retrieved from https://www.ada.gov/anprm2010/web%20anprm_2010.htm.

5. Federal Register. (April 2015). Protecting and Promoting the Open Internet. Retrieved from https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2015-04-13/pdf/2015-07841.pdf

6. Federal Register. (December 2017). Nondiscrimination on the basis of disability: Notice of withdrawal of four previously announced rulemaking actions. Retrieved from https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2017/12/26/2017-27510/nondiscrimination-on-the-basis-of-disability-notice-of-withdrawal-of-four-previously-announced.

7. Pinto, J. (2015). 5 facts everyone should know about open educational resources.  Retrieved from https://www.curriki.org/5-facts-everyone-should-know-about-open-educational-resources/.

8. World Wide Web Consortium. (2018). Web content accessibility guidelines. Retrieved from https://www.w3.org/WAI/standards-guidelines/wcag/.