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Dare to Engage! Accessible Tools for Engaging Students

by Wendy Torres

Pages 2 and 3 of 53

Four panel comic. Panel one shows a professor saying " Ok class, don't forget I'll be sending important announcements and updates by email. Student says uh. Second panel: "We don't check email. Can you text us? Or Facebook us?" Third panel professor says " What do you mean you don't check email? It's how grown ups communicate!" Fourth panel shows student saying" Email is like old school." The professor says "You're at the university. It is an old school."
Dare to Engage! Accessible Tools for Engaging Students
Comic by Jorge Cham
MP3 and transcript of book
By Wendy Torres
Coppin State University
Senior Instructional and Digital Accessibility Specialist
Twitter Handle: @Tech_snacks
E-mail: wvelez-torres@coppin.edu
Text version of presentation
Creative Commons License icon, give attribution, can't sell for commercial can remix
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Comic Panel 1
Comic Panel 1
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Is there a "normal"?
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Back to Normal?
Comic Panel 2
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Expectations of students moving forward post pandemic
Comic Panel 3
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They want....
-Options
-Flexible learning modalities
- Mobile
-Social
-Care
Comic Panel 1
Being a student can be complex
image of a multiple words creating an outline of a face mask. Words on the mask include loss, wifi, overwhelmed, busy and access
Image courtesy Monica Hill BBWorld21 Used with permission
Comic Panel 1
Access and Accessibility get used interchangeably when we discuss online content.
They are not the same thing. Having access means the content is available.

Accessibility means that students can engage fully with the content.
Students with disabilities are a vulnerable population in higher education.
19% of students in North America have a disability.
60% to 80% of North American undergrads choose not to disclose a disability.
Comic Panel 1
“Not all students with disabilities choose to disclose,” says Kwong. " But for some students [their disability] is not apparent. Students may not want to disclose a disability due to the stigma attached. And either way, I expect that if they give me homework, that I can actually do it.”
-Improving Accessibility Often Falls to Faculty. Here’s What They Can Do.
When you have inaccessible websites and content, you send a very clear message of exclusion.
"We don’t teach to teach the privileged and the few, we teach to teach all, and if we don’t become accessible, we are not teaching everyone.”
- Lucy Greco
Comic Panel 1
Accessibility
students
Teacher
According to a 2020 Educause Study:
"Among students with disabilities, about a third (32%) said they require accessible content, accessible technologies, and/or technology accommodations for their coursework.

Many students with disabilities do not have positive responses to how their institution supported their need for accessible content and/or technology accommodations."
Comic Panel 2
"Assistive/accessible technology such as captioning and text-to-speech software is important to their academic success, and students with disabilities would like instructors to account for this when developing their courses." -Source