Expectations for providing accommodations

- [Instructor] I realize that there are a lot of people out there wondering, am I required to do this? Do I have to make all of my learning content accessible to everyone? Now, I want to start out by saying that I do have some concerns with this. One is that I hope it doesn't hold people back from creating their own learning resources. I'm talking about the go-getters who like to create their own resources from scratch and use different tools that they learn about to create them. Well, there are more responsibilities for you now. You have to make sure that what you're creating is accessible to all. The good news, however, is that there are a ton of tools that are adapting to this, including accessibility features that allow you to create accessible content. Now, I do think that you're required to do this. Making sure that all of your learning content is accessible to everyone is important for many reasons. First of all, from an ethical standpoint, I feel that striving to make sure everyone has an equal opportunity to access content is the right thing to do. In many cases, there are legal requirements to make resources, including digital ones, accessible to all. And also, most of the things that are done to make learning accessible is helpful to everyone. Making things more structured, clearly labeled, and more accessible will make it easier for all students. The purpose of this course is to give an overview of accessible learning, including why it's important, things that need to be considered, and some examples. This course is not legal advice though. Legislation about making sure that your resources and website are accessible to everyone is somewhat of a gray area and is constantly evolving. It's going to be different depending on where you live. In the United States, we have the Americans with Disabilities Act, which prohibits discrimination against individuals with disabilities in all areas of public life, including jobs, schools, transportation, public and private places that are open to the general public. If you work for a federal government agency in the United States, you're legally required to make sure that your resources, including digital resources, are accessible by all. Not doing so can result in a lawsuit. Recently, there have been an increasing number of lawsuits regarding digital accessibility for the websites of private organizations. Instead of asking, do I have to do this, it will be much easier to start asking, how do I start doing this? It's easier to make things accessible now, rather than going back to change everything later; and ignorance, isn't an excuse. I highly recommend that you make accessibility for all a priority when creating content or learning resources.