1. Mission Impossible?
Creating and Providing Accessible Alternative Formats for Schools with Limited Resources
Connie’s Intro: “This is Agent Philpott and I am Agent Steele, Connie Steele. We do not like our students shaken or stirred… so we try to provide them accessible course materials in a reasonable amount of time.”

2. Your Mission, Should You Choose To Accept It, will be learning various ways to…
Decide what file formats to provide to students
Procure PDF’s and other files from a variety of sources, such as publishers, book consortiums, etc.
Make forms/Documents/PDF’s/PowerPoints Accessible
Deliver Accessible Alternative Formats to students
Help students download and utilize the materials provided
Find and decide what apps to suggest to students who need to utilize their Accessible Alternative Formats
Your Mission, Should You Choose To Accept It.... will be learning various ways to…
1) Decide what file formats to provide to students
2) Procure PDF’s and other files from a variety of sources, such as publishers, book consortiums, etc.
3) Make forms/Documents/PDF’s/PowerPoints Accessible
4) Deliver Accessible Alternative Formats to students
5) Help students download and utilize the materials provided
6) Find and decide what apps to suggest to students who need to utilize their Accessible Alternative Formats

3. The Right format for the job

4. Decoding Accessible Alternative Format (AAF) Accommodations
In higher education disability services, students are generally approved for Accessible Alternative Formats of their course materials, due to barriers associated with limited mobility or print disabilities, like low vision, learning disabilities, and ADD/ADHD.

5. How many students is your college currently providing AAF to?
What AAF are you providing to your students?
What applications are you using?
Information Scan…

6. Accessible Alternative Formats:
“Accessible” PDF’s
Edited Word DOCX
EPub
Audio (Audio books)
Braille
Large Print
Here are some examples of various AAF:
- “Accessible” PDF’s (Headers? navigation? Can you copy/paste text?)
- Edited Word DOCX
- EPub
- Audio (Audio books)
- Braille
- Large Print
Each of these have their pro’s and con’s and you will not find a format that will meet every students’ needs.

7. Things to consider…
What disability related barriers does the student have?
What devices does the student have access to? (PC, Mac, Smartphone, Pad)
Is the student tech savvy?
What is the student’s budget?
Are there any AAF related applications the student is already comfortable using? Formats?
Things to consider when working with a student who needs AAFs…
1) What disability barriers does the student have?
2) What devices does the student have access to? (PC, Mac, Cellphone, Pad)
3) Is the student tech savvy? OR What is the student’s technological comfort zone.
4) What is the student’s budget?
5) Are there any AAF related applications the student is already comfortable using? Formats?

8. PDF’s: Why are they important?
PDF’s are often the building blocks for creating AAF and, for some higher education institutions with limited resources, the end-all-be-all alternative formats that are given to students.

9. Acquiring PDF’s
Now we will go through ways of obtaining these building blocks.

10. The Search is on! Request from publisher directly
Accesstext Network (ATN)/Publisher Look Up
Bookshare
OpenStack
Obtain hard copy then cut and scan
Google Search
Your college’s library
There are many ways that you can acquire PDFs, such as
Requesting PDF’s from the publishers – You can do this by contacting a publisher directly through ing them or filling out request forms from their website. Pro/Con
2) Accesstext network's Resource center is a great way to search for PDFs. According to ATN, it is a resource for “service providers, students, faculty, and publishers find the products, services, and up-to-date accessibility information they need… it is available to everyone. No membership required!”
3) Bookshare (explain process converting it to doc/ include CAT and Prof link)
4) OpenStack – Great for finding general education books (Bill & Melinda Gates)
5) Buy book/cut chop (print shop)/scan (check to see if your school has a heavy-duty scanner before taking it on yourself)
6) Google Search
7) Your college’s library – look it up through your own account & get a library contact person
(We have links on the slides at the end of this presentation.)

11. Let’s get technical!

12. Creating Accessible Course Content
Center for Educational Access resources that
Accessible Course Materials and Content
Microsoft Word documents - WebAIM 
PowerPoint Accessibility - WebAIM
PDF Accessibility Overview - Adobe
Creating Accessible PDFs - Adobe
PDF Accessibility - WebAIM
Candace: I encourage everyone to visit the Center for Educational Access’ “Understanding Accessibility” webpage that we developed for faculty. If you scroll down just a bit, you will find a section called “Creating Accessible Course Content”. This area has links to websites that give basic information and tips on how to make course materials accessible, like PDFs, Word Docs, and PowerPoints. Let’s take a look at a few of the links! (I have all of the links that we will be looking on the slides at the end of this presentation.)

14. How do you deliver files?
School dropbox system
File sharing websites (Dropbox.com)
In person (disc or flash drive)
Use anything different?
School dropbox system - UofA has Downloads are only available 10 days and it has limited tracking ability. (Tracking if a student has downloaded their materials can be very important)
In person (disc or flash drive) UofA rarely
Dropbox.com (can see if student has DL, 30 days available, deletes at end of semester)
Flash drive (gives flash drives RW-Gold for students not registered and registered, case-by-case with registered)
Reasons why - flash drive (limited internet access, do not have their own computers, technology proficiency: limited)

15. Figuring out your students level of Technological Independence and Process Planning
Tier one (Highest Significant need - visual, mobility, learning)
Tier two (Supportive Aid - ADHD, Anxiety (mental health, easily fatigued, audio learners) = Some one-on-one tech help accessing materials and general tech campus resources
UofA - shows students basics in AT meeting
In a perfect world, students who need AAF would all put in their requests in enough time to process before the semester starts, but they often do not. Sometimes it is a good idea to go ahead to acquire their booklist and work ahead.

16. Apps that you suggest student to use?
Central Access Reader
Text to speech for Mac and iOS?
Balabolka
Natural Reader
Adobe - Free DL Text-to-speech (show example of use) View –
ReadOutLoud
ReadWrite
Consider text to speech apps (everything you giving, should be copy/pasted into CAR? (PDF) or dropped in CAR (Word doc X files)
Screen readers (send a sample to student and find out what issues they are coming across)
Converting Bookshare to a word doc
NWACC - Read & Write Gold for Campus (11e) (Institutional on UofA & UCA)
Bookshare - Break them into chapters (aids navigation brief review/grammar/spell check, change font sizes
Access BB and review handouts for accessibility (Adobe Acrobat/ Read Write Editing)

17. References Creating Accessible Course Content:
Accessible Course Materials and Content -
Microsoft Word documents - WebAIM -
PowerPoint Accessibility - WebAIM -
PDF Accessibility Overview - Adobe crobat-xi-pdf-accessibility-overview.pdf
Creating Accessible PDFs - Adobe - accessible-pdfs.html
PDF Accessibility - WebAIM -

18. References Acquiring PDFs:
Accesstext Network “Accessible Textbook Finder”

19. References https://snow.idrc.ocadu.ca/node/127
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