1. Lessons Learned Building an Internal Digital Accessibility Consultancy at Yale
Michael Harris, Accessibility Engineer
Michael Vaughn, Associate Director of Digital Accessibility
Michelle Morgan, Digital Accessibility Specialist

2. Agenda Overview of Yale’s journey to build a consultancy
Describe the role and scope of the ITS Digital Accessibility team within Yale
Explain approaches to supporting staff in roles including developers and content creators
Explain approaches to supporting faculty and students
Challenges we’ve faced

3. Why take action?
Opportunity to determine your institution’s process and timeline
Commitment to diversity and inclusion
Manage risk

4. Areas of Focus Fixing things in priority order (Remediation)
Building a procurement process (Procurement)
Governance, decision making, and policy (Governance)
Building a sustainable program (Program)

5. Timeline
FY15
Investigate how others address the challenge, reach out to peers, release a survey, and begin to grow expertise. Start working with OGC and Provost’s Office. Do initial review of scope. Begin to form governance groups.
FY17
Engage with vendor for significant discovery exercise, ramp up remediation, and grow expertise. Begin working closely with Procurement. Write policy.
FY13
Create a user experience team, including a leader with some experience with accessibility
FY19
Finish hiring team, continue remediation, mature training and support program to be fully operational.
FY14
Grapple with and estimate the scope of challenge and start to build cross-campus connections.
FY16
Propose a 3 year funded project. Get started with high- priority remediation using operational capacity. Formalize governance.
FY18
Release policy. Begin to hire team, continue remediation, spread expertise beyond the core group. Finalize Procurement process.

6. Areas of Focus 1
Remediation
Procurement
Governance
Program

7. Areas of Focus 2
Remediation
Procurement
Governance
Program

8. Areas of Focus 3 Governance Remediation Procurement Program
Policy Roles & Responsibilities Information Technology Services and other Yale website development providers: Assure that University Websites they develop or procure comply with this Policy.
Lead Administrators: Help promote awareness of and support for this Policy.
Resource Office on Disabilities: Facilitate individual accommodations for current or prospective Yale students with disabilities.
Office for Equal Opportunity Programs: Facilitate individual accommodations for current or prospective Yale employees with disabilities.
Office of Procurement: Assure that contracts with Suppliers seeking to develop or provide University Websites hold Suppliers accountable to the Standards.
ITS Digital Accessibility Team: Provide information on accessibility standards and best practices. Track remediation of reported accessibility problems. Track accessibility language in contracts, including roadmaps and dates for follow-up with suppliers. Track accommodation plans for University Websites that do not comply with the Standards.
Accessibility Steering Committee: Provide oversight of accessibility efforts, including ongoing review of the Policy and procedures and any proposed updates or revisions. Review requests for Policy exceptions and determine appropriate disposition.
Site Owner: Assure that University Websites for which they are responsible comply with this Policy.
Remediation
Procurement
Governance
Program

9. Areas of Focus 4
Remediation
Procurement
Governance
Program

10. Agenda 1
Overview of Yale’s journey to build a consultancy
Describe the role and scope of the ITS Digital Accessibility team within Yale
Explain approaches to supporting staff in roles including developers and content creators
Explain approaches to supporting faculty and students
Challenges we’ve faced

11. Client Expectations What Content Editors Ask For:
“Is there any training for this? What are the steps as we create new content?”
“I was asked to change the link text on [website] … I don’t believe [it is] accessible… Please let me know if my thinking is correct.”
What Developers / Site Owners Ask For:
“We have a couple apps … ready for review … when would be a good time to meet and review the site?”
“Could you do a quick ADA review on the page and let us know if anything needs to be modified?”

12. Setting Appropriate Expectations for Developers / Site Owners
When someone asks for our help:
“What is your plan to manage accessibility risk?”
“Who maintains the product’s front-end? When does development and maintenance happen?”
“What front-end expertise does the maintainer have? What accessibility expertise?”
“What accessibility work have you already done?”

13. Helping Developers Help Themselves
Before coming to us, developers should have resolved everything from an automated scan.
Developers should fill out an accessibility QA checklist themselves.

14. Support for Content Editors
Already Present:
Half-day training workshop: headings, reading level, links, images, tables
Best Practices on Accessibility Website
In Progress
Video version of training
Enterprise Scanning

15. Support for Developers / Site Owners
Already Present:
Monthly Trainings
Best Practices on Accessibility Website
Checklists / Self Service Evaluation
In Progress
Developer and Designer Bootcamp
Style / UI Guide (Bootstrap 4)
Enterprise Scanning

16. Agenda 2 Explain approaches to supporting faculty and students
Overview of Yale’s journey to build a consultancy
Describe the role and scope of the ITS Digital Accessibility team within Yale
Explain approaches to supporting staff in roles including developers and content creators
Explain approaches to supporting faculty and students
Challenges we’ve faced

17. Diversity & Inclusion Web Accessibility Policy
April 10, 2018 Statement from President Peter Salovey, “Creating a More Accessible Yale”
Office of Diversity and Inclusion
“The Office of Diversity & Inclusion (ODI) collaborates with departments and individuals across the Yale campus to promote a respectful, accessible and inclusive community for all Yale employees.”

18. Yale by the Numbers Number of faculty and staff: 14, 159 School
Number of Students
Number of Faculty
Yale College
5,446
1,092
Graduate School Arts
& Sciences
2,890
Share with Yale College
Medical School
& Public Health
844
2,574
School of Management
826 94
Divinity School
351 81
Art & Architecture
316
151
Drama
199 92
Forestry & Environmental Science
302 74
Nursing
356 88
Music
193 73
Law
684
164
12,407
4,483
Staff Position
Number of Staff
Managerial & Professional
4,589
Clerical & Technical
3,923
Service & Maintenance
1,164
9,676
Number of faculty and staff:
14, 159

19. Building a Distributed Support Network
Train-the-Trainers Model
Workshops
Updates and Communications
Monthly Best Practices Meetings
Building roadmaps to accessibility that are general enough to offer guidance but tailored to local needs
Meeting Faculty Where They Are

20. Collaborations with Other Stakeholders
Libraries
Scanning services
Course Reserves
Resource Office on Disabilities-ROD
Student Accessibility Aide
Partnering with Student Tech Collaborative for AT needs
Center for Teaching and Learning
Graduate Teaching Fellows and Postdocs
New Faculty Orientation
Faculty Course (Re)Design Institute
Graduate Writing Center
Academic Strategies

21. Faculty Engagement
Canvas Drop-In Hours and LMS/Course Site Accessibility
Syllabus Workshops
“Beyond” Accessibility- ESL, Research and Grant Requirements
Roundtable Discussions

22. Agenda 3 Overview of Yale’s journey to build a consultancy
Describe the role and scope of the ITS Digital Accessibility team within Yale
Explain approaches to supporting staff in roles including developers and content creators
Explain approaches to supporting faculty and students
Challenges we’ve faced

23. Challenges We didn’t know what we were doing We ruffled feathers
We dealt with many, many stakeholders
Trying to be helpful without owning the problem

24. Questions?