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Message-Id: <3.0.32.20000928181236.00aa8d40@po12.mit.edu> Date: Thu, 28 Sep 2000 18:12:38 -0400 To: sw-access@MIT.EDU From: Kathleen Cahill <kcahill@MIT.EDU> Cc: robertac@MIT.EDU Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Resent-To: swaccess@nemesis.mit.edu Resent-From: Jean Foster <jfoster@MIT.EDU> The Software Accessiblity Team met today for the first time. Attending were: Mary Ellen Bushnell, I/S Training and Pubs. Jeff Harrington, I/S Delivery Jim Repa, I/S Integration Barbara Roberts, Manager of Disabilities Services at MIT Salome Heyward, Legal Counsel on Disability Issues Ginny Williams, I/S Software Release Team Roberta Crumrine, Student Services Information Technology (substituting for Joe Greene, who is out sick) Jean Foster, I/S Academic Computing Kathy Cahill, I/S ATIC lab, Team Leader Members introduced themselves. We read through the charter and examples of software accessibility guidelines that Kathy had brought copies of to the meeting. Barbara talked about what she does in DSO and that software accessiblity problems affect both students and staff. She also talked about policy setting at MIT and ways she is trying to get policies recognized Institute wide. The Academic Council must approve new policies but some policies (like this one) go beyond student-related. Salome discussed MIT's legal responsibilities for providing access to information for students, staff and the general public. Most universities that have adopted software accessibility guidelines use Oregon State's guidelines or the US Dept. of Education's guidelines. These are listed on the Project Notebook Home page at http://web.mit.edu/is/delivery/softaccess/ The Department of Justice, which investigates schools that are not in compliance with disability law, is now paying attention to hardware and software accessibility issues. There have been two types of complaints: 1. Against library systems that are inaccessible 2. Against particular faculty members in departments who utilize software with accessibility problems. (software is used in class or students must access course info with the software) Salome mentioned that there was a letter of finding against the California Community Colleges that spells out college's responsibilities further. She will send us a copy. The DOJ wants universities to have systematic plans in place to make information technology accessible. These plans require that universities include accessibility reviews of software or hardware that is being purchased or that they plan on purchasing. The DOJ has taken the standards for physical access to building and extended the standards to information technology. If universities purchase software or hardware that does not meet accessibility standards, they must pay to have it fixed. If universities complain that it is an "undue burden" -- meaning that the cost is prohibitive, they will not be exempted if there is no accessibility plan in place. Salome feels we have a particular challenge here at MIT because of the historical autonomy of departments and labs. The policies must apply to all parts of MIT or we are not meeting our legal obligations. To satisfy requirements, anything that is new must meet accessibility criteria. Any older technologies require that MIT showed good faith in trying to fix it or fix some of it. Many of the recent rulings by the Dept. of Justice are based on complaints filed by graduate students at various universities who were unable to access the information they needed to because their faculty members were utilizing inaccessible technologies. What makes it more confusing is that many deans and administrators think their software is accessible, only to discover that it is not. Jim asked about specific, task-related pieces of software that one might use on a job, and where does one draw the line regarding levels of access and cost issues. Salome clarified that there are two arenas of accessibility: 1. Information technology for public dissemination for use by everyone at the university. 2. Staff compliance standards -- What does an employee need to do their jobs? In this case, the employee with a disability might need access to particular software, but that doesn't mean all software that a dept. uses has to all be accessible. These are more related to reasonable accommodation. Jean asked about third party software on Athena because not all of it is accessible. Salome responded by stating that a systematic plan must be in place to review accessibility. There is also a hierarchy of accessibility, where you want the most commonly used software to be accessible and work down from there. I/S would probably need to establish a standing committee to review software accessibility. Not all of it has to be accessible but a range of it needs to be so people have choices. The issue of library software also came up and the team agreed that a library staff member should be on the team. Salome also mentioned that there are some federal grants available on working with faculty and information technology issues. Barbara and Kathy will look into that. Salome also talked about Sec. 508 (a federal law) that applies to federal agencies and some public universities (regs. have not been released just yet). It may help in the effort to impress upon vendors the importance of accessibility. Jean suggested that the Usability Team be consulted in testing efforts. We also discussed other points in which to include accessibility issues, such as Procurement, Software Release, and through site licensing/software licensing process. Ginny suggested a ratings and review system, perhaps even a cooperative effort among universities. We also discussed the fact that our team is more of a Delivery team, since we know we are going to move ahead with the project, and we are working on deliverables -- a policy and guidelines. Assignments for next meeting: Mary Ellen, Jean and Kathy will work on wording of a policy Mary Ellen will put together a project notebook on the web (http://web.mit.edu/is/delivery/softaccess) -- it's already up! Ginny, Jeff and Jim will go over the software accessibility guidelines and collate the guidelines that seem more problematic to implement, or that they have questions about. Barbara and Kathy will check out federal grants Salome will send the letter of finding to the team Next meeting is Oct. 12 at 10 AM in N42. Thanks. Kathy Kathy Cahill MIT ATIC lab 11-103 253-5111 kcahill@mit.edu
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