Article Evaluation

My observations of the article " Sovereignty" were,

The definition of the word is, that a state or governing body can have full control over themselves, and they don't have to listen to other countries/sources.

In some areas of the article, important facts aren't cited. I would give this article a "B", because the wording was difficult to understand.

Article Proposals

1.) Global Accessibility Awareness Day, I could add more citations and add references since there are none. I could also add a lot more beef to the article. https://www.section508.gov/content/global-accessibility-awareness-day-2017 GAAD events/activities, Why do we have them? What do they do?

2.) Special Olympics in Great Britain, This article is a little on the short side. I think i could beef it up by putting in some more information on the history/background of Special Olympics. As well as the definition of the topic. http://www.specialolympics.org/Sections/What_We_Do/What_We_Do.aspx

3.) Special education in the United Kingdom, I could add more citations, more history, and update what is already mentioned. compare back then to now. http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ982859.pdf

Global Accessibility Awareness Day

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Global Accessibility Awareness Day is the design, development, usability, and related communities who build, shape, fund and influence technology and its use. It is marked on the 3rd Thursday in the month of May every year. The objective of Global Accessibility Awareness Day is to raise awareness about accessibility. Another goal is to attract attention by way of talking, thinking, and learning though the web, or any other form of technology. Oftentimes people who are interested in creating all the latest technologies, must take into consideration that some people have certain disabilities, but they don't know how to modify their product in a way that will be user friendly for all.Global accessibility awareness day does provide flexibility to host events in any possible size. Activities could showcase how people with disabilities use the web and digital products using assistive technologies.^[1]

Purpose

Some people with visual impairments need screen reading and screens that have the ability to be magnified, whereas people who are hard of hearing or deaf need, all videos to be closed captioned. People with limited mobility, ( even some with a minor injury such as a sprained limb) may need access to a keyboard to control the computer easier, rather than using a mouse.It helps people with disabilities communicate better to the world through the web, and in return, others may learn new ways to connect with the disabled. The bottom line is, software should be user friendly to all. From the words of Tim Berners - Lee " The power of the web is in its universality.^[2]" In other words, We are building a universe that is filling up with technology that connects everyone.However without assistive technology, not everyone has access, and we would not have the ability to work off each others ideas.

GAAD No Mouse Challenge

One of the the events that is used to recognize this special day, is the No Mouse Challenge, held Minnesota in which all employees must continue with their job without the use of a computer mouse for a period of 15 minutes. Instead they must use the keyboard., which in a way is more helpful because the keyboard allows the user to do more commands on the computer. Though, " it may not support assistive technology or accessibility tools.^[3]There are also other challenges that people can do to participate in for Global Accessibility Day, For example, check the elements of your screen and be sure that the elements will be read by the screen readers in the correct order. To do so, disable the page's style sheets and compare the order of elements before and after. Karen Mardahl of Denmark, came up with a series of ideas on how to keep people involved in the GAAD community. For instance, she suggests for designers, developers Etc. to capture a video about what GAAD is all about, or send a transcript. Transport that video or transcript over to Google, Youtube or 3PlayMedia with captions to help spread the word and awareness.^[4]

History: From The Ground Up

GAAD all started in May 2012, when a blog post from Joe Devon, a web developer popped up on the internet, soon after Jennison Asucion, an accessibility professional from Toronto came across the blog unknowingly,. After reading it, the two met and joined forces to create the celebration of Global Accessibility Awareness Day. This idea has grown and developed with a series of international themes. There have been many new events created to celebrate this special day.^[5]

International Events

International Events

There are sixteen countries that sponsor GAAD events annually.

Great Britain: There are 50 staff members of IOSH (Institution of Occupational Safety and Health) that take part in the celebration of Global Accessibility Awareness Day by hosting a conference on digital accessibility, mental health integrated design, and product accessibility. Websites like Facebook, Microsoft, Digital Accessibility Center, Monzo, and PayPal are the main contributors.^[6] In Detroit, Design Before Code is a presentation that conveys the message that designers must consider the needs of all, in order to create a new media platform. This presentation is followed by two speakers, Caitlin Geier and Matt Isner. Geier is a user experience designer at Deque Systems. Isner is a JavaScript Developer at Deque Systems.^[7]

The purpose of this Presentation was aimed at educating web designers about web accessibility. In South Africa they host an event to inform people about how people who are colorblind need color contrast. In addition people with visual impairments need screen texts to be enlarged. Denmark has an event where group of six veterans who all have a variety of disabilities after being wounded in action, They used special equipment to help them go skiing. They are demonstrating these machines at the event "Joining us to show that disability is no barrier to the desire to achieve."

Also in Denmark Siteimprove, Novicell, and LanguageWire host an event on digital transformation. There several guest speakers , Joseph Goodson, a Digital Marketing Consultant, Rasmus Gregers Sørensen, who is the Head of International Customer Success. This goal of this event is to educate business owners on how to build their websites so that that they are user friendly and accessible.

In Ottawa Canada there is an event where the Canadian government stresses that the importance and best practice in GAAD.^[8] In Cliftons Canberra, Australia, hosts a Passionate Product Ownership A Certified Scrum Product Ownership Workshop with Jeff Patton. This workshop is designed to focus on product ownership on the goal of widening successful product outcomes in the market. Furthermore, relying on active involvement of people ranging from UX practitioners, to lead engineers, business analysts, marketing professionals and others; participants will also learn to include good product management, thinking, lean thinking, design thinking and lean UX thinking.this workshop is not just for product owners but, for a more broader groups " that includes UX practitioners, Business Analysts, Lead Developers and Engineers, Scrum Masters and any other role that contributes to making effective product decisions in your organization." ^[9]

New Haven Connecticut's Work Bench program is another international event which is designed to help expose local thinkers to what people are doing and how they are doing it. The reason for this is to get ideas spread about how we could improve how we communicate through the web. The women who seems to be really passionate about this event is Sharon Rosenblatt, because she is a "accessibility professional working to improve the overall experience by a user with disabilities." She believes that "accessibility is a right, and not a ‘nice to have’.As being a member of the Accessibility Partners team for over seven years, her efforts have given manufacturers and developers a chance to see the potential that accessibility has not just those with abilities can work with the newest technology. ^[10]

In London, Bunny Foot is a group that hosts an event that teaches/guides people the basics on how, why and when practical accessibility should be put to use.. The first thing that the people who are participating in it will face is a "screen reader user who will demonstrate how they use this adaptive technology, and will walk through several sites." The next stage is to learn the needs and benefits of people who have trouble using the latest technology. Participants will be shown some of the adaptive software that people with disabilities are using. Most importantly participants will need to know how to assess and test for basic accessibility. When training is complete, people should have a sense of the legal side of accessibility, they should be able to produce accessible contents and have a good understanding of the requirements for making a accessible website.^[11]

In Cary North Carolina hosts an event where two speakers Ryan E. Benson, the lead technical subject matter expert for Section 508 at the Centers for Disease Control. As well as. Liani Yirka, accessibility & inclusion coordinator from the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences come and talk about their experience as experts in accessibility. People that go to the event will learn how to "design and develop empathy through disability simulations and assistive technologies."^[12]