1. Synchronicity: How three offices in a large community college joined forces to overcome the accessibility behemoth! Maureen Madden, Northern Virginia Community College Robert Brown, Northern Virginia Community College Joan Ehrlich, Northern Virginia Community College Gladis Gonzalez, Northern Virginia Community College

2. Presenters Maureen Madden, Extended Learning Institute (ELI), Instructional Designer & Accessibility Liaison. Robert Brown, Web Services and Digital Media (WSDM), Instructional Technologist Specializing in Digital Media. Joan Ehrlich, Disability Support Services (DSS), Coordinator, Interpreter Services Office. Gladis Gonzalez, Disability Support Services (DSS), Caption & Alternate Text Coordinator.

3. Session’s Goal Outline workflow developed to assure that instructional materials for students and resources shared with the public are fully accessible to all.

4. Session’s Objectives Identify need for workflow. Determine materials that must be accessible and department responsible. Research tools and software. Provide information, training and technical support. Explain need to communicate and document.

5. Organizational Chart

6. Northern Virginia Community College Northern Virginia Community College (NOVA) Opened for classes 50 years ago in 1965. One of 23 Colleges in the Virginia Community College System (VCCS). Includes six campuses, two centers and extended online learning community. Third largest Community College in United States with an enrollment of over 76,000. Serves a varied population that includes dual enrollment students, veterans, non-native speakers, senior citizens and students with disabilities. Participates in a guaranteed admission program to more than 40 area colleges and universities when students meet agreement requirements.

7. Need and It’s the Law Need quickly became apparent as students needing accommodations contacted DSS or disability counselors. ADA and Section 504 requiring equal access to online materials - videos, podcasts, PDFs, forms, websites, etc. It’s the law and the right thing to do!

8. ELI - Background Offering distance education for 40 years. Online learning using Blackboard & proctored assessments. Offers and supports multiple start date online courses for a variety of degrees and certificates. Awards 43 total degrees and certificates completely online. FA14. o Approximately 475 courses. o About 1100 sections. About 600 faculty – full-time & adjunct. Participates in Shared Services Distance Learning (SSDL) program with other VCCS Colleges.

9. ELI - Roles Instructional Designer & Accessibility Liaison (1). Started January 2014 as a two-year assignment that has been extended indefinitely. Duties include, but not limited to: o Review online courses and materials used. o Update courses and edit materials where needed. o Provide face-to-face training, online tutorials and printed job aides. o Research. Instructional Designers & Design Support Staff (9). Disability Counselor (1). Student Support Staff (5). o Assist with transcribing videos, creating accessible exams, communicating students’ needs, and more. o Support synchronous online events using CART.

10. ELI – Work Flow Determine timeline – immediate or future. Collaborate with DSS. o Determine responsibility. o Review materials. o Take action. Document need and actions taken.

11. ELI - Reactive Process for Online Courses ELI student needing accommodations or assistance contacts DSS or Disability counselor. If student is deaf, set up captioning for scheduled synchronous Collaborate sessions and send instructions to professor. Check course materials and assignments. o Review publisher online learning materials, private/personal web pages, YouTube and other videos, podcasts, handouts, articles, etc. o Provide captions, transcripts, alt-text, long descriptions, etc. where needed. o Include instructions for students for making their submissions accessible for group & collaborative assignments. o Collaborate with professors(s) and/or instructional designers to revise or find replacements for inaccessible required and optional resources or assignments. o Create accessible versions of exams, either online or hard copy, and adjust individual student time limits and proctor directions as needed. Update currently running courses & template sites. Document changes made.

12. ELI - Proactive Process for Online Courses Instruction, workshops, tutorials, brown bag sessions & job aides for: o Faculty. o Instructional Designers. o Librarians. o Instructional Module. o Anyone. Seek accessible materials for new and revised courses. Check high enrollment courses.

13. WSDM - Background Part of NOVA’s office of Marketing and Communication. Develops and maintains NOVA’s website, along with other electronic media and coding development. Also develops and maintains mobile sites, mobile apps, social media, digital signage and other digital media including videos.

14. WSDM - Roles Produce and coordinate digital media for NOVA. Produce and coordinate accessible videos for NOVA’s YouTube and iTunes University channels. Collaborate with DSS on captioning the numerous videos placed in the NOVA channels after simultaneously establishing the need.

15. WSDM – Work Flow Contact DSS and provide URL links to videos needing transcription. Once transcripts are provided, utilize YouTube’s closed captioning software to create closed captions for NOVAaccess YouTube videos. Also can utilize transcripts directly along with MacCaption software to produce closed captions for NOVA iTunes U videos.

16. DSS – Background Disability Support Services assists in NOVA’s commitment to insuring all students have an opportunity to pursue a college education regardless of the presence or absence of a disability. No academically qualified student with a disability shall be denied access to or participation in the services, programs and activities of the College.

17. DSS – Counselors Disability Services Counselors at each of 6 NOVA campus and ELI. Report to Dean of Student Services. Variety of roles: o Academic advising. o Approve accommodations. o Teach Student Development courses. o Proctor tests. o And more.

18. DSS - Accommodations Process Students meet with a counselor to self-report and review their documentation. Counselor approves accommodations for classroom, testing, and other areas. Student receives a Memorandum of Accommodation (MOA) from the counselor. Student is responsible for providing MOA to Instructor.

19. DSS - Examples of Accommodations Alternate format of materials. Note-takers & reader/scribes. Captioning of real-time and recorded media. Extended time and quiet location for testing. Assistive Technology. o Read&Write. o Zoom Text. o Assistive listening devices. o Livescribe pens.

20. DSS – College Staff Liaison between campus disability services counselors and Associate VP of Student Services. Provides support, information and training to counselors, faculty and staff. Arranges opportunities for collaboration among counselors. Offers support, information, training and equipment to students.

21. DSS – College Staff Roles Full-time. Director of Disability Services. Interpreter Services Coordinator. Assistive Technology Coordinator. Staff Interpreters (3). Part-time. Computer Operations Technician (deaf). Trainer Instructor (blind). Trainer Instructor – Captioning Coordinator. Free-lance interpreters (30-40). Work-study – transcriber.

22. DSS - Work Flow Collaborate with campus departments & faculty. Transcribe or caption documents, audio recordings, and videos that need to be made accessible. Review online courses and materials. Support WSDM’s mission to make website content accessible. Provide interpreters or live-caption services. Provide assistive technology to students as required.

23. DSS - Reactive Process for Campus Requests Students needing accommodations or assistance contact DSS or Disability counselor. Interpreters or captioning service are provided as needed. Appropriate assistive technology is made available on a case by case basis including learning materials in an alternative format. Transcribing and captioning completed as needed.

24. Progress Since March 2014, ELI, WSDM & DSS have… Reviewed more than 35 online courses. Identified over 500 videos & podcasts that need transcripts &/or captioning. Some as short as 5 minutes but many between 45-60 minutes. Time to complete projects determined by sound quality, subject matter vocabulary & terms, and speakers’ accent &/or pronunciation. Created multiple tutorials for captioning YouTube videos, using Captioning, creating accessible Word & PDF documents and PowerPoint presentations.

25. Transcripts & Captions NOVA YouTube o Create new captions & upload to NOVA YouTube o Edit auto captioning or create transcript. NOVA iTunes U o Obtain transcript files from YouTube or create transcript file. o Use MacCaption to complete captioning process. Videos – transcripts & captions. o Transcribing takes at least 3 times the length of the video depending on quality of video and terms used. o When using an accurate transcript, captioning takes 15-30 minutes to sync and time stamp a 3 minute video. o Various captioning tools are available.

26. Tools Camtasia – Screen recording & video editing. Camtasia Caption Maker/ MacCaption – Video closed captioning software. Caption Maker/ MacCaption Equidox™ – Automated PDF Conversion. Equidox™ SnagIt – Image and video screen capture & editing and screen recording. SnagIt DocSoft – Provider of audio video and closed captioning systems using automatic speech recognition. DocSoft

27. Projects – Past, Continuing, & Future Captioning & transcribing: NOVA YouTube. NOVA iTunes U. YouTube. Other course/instructor materials. College events - graduation, guest speakers, etc. VCCS videos. Third-party videos. Edit online forms to make them accessible.

28. What Are We Doing Right? Identified a need and acted on it. Good collaboration. Troubleshoot and problem solve. Act fast. Self-motivated. Work outside job description. “Informal” process works well. One of a few colleges or universities captioning videos on iTunes U. Share knowledge, experience & tools. Provide opportunities to include others. Focus on the process rather than just the technology available. Good at what we do and there is always more to keep us busy. BUT…there is never enough time or money!

29. What’s Next – Proactive & Beyond? Continue to… Review old, new and redesigned online courses for accessibility. Review and update NOVA YouTube and iTunes U materials. Review and update forms and PDF documents for College, campuses and departments. Interact with College TV station to edit captions for extensive library of course videos. Provide training and sharing opportunities Collaborate with each other, offer support and spread the word. Research, attend conferences & webinars, test software, etc. Hope to use new DSS database to track materials/courses already made accessible.

30. It Takes A Village Making the world more accessible, one caption at a time through collaboration, cooperation, communication, and documentation.

31. Contacts Maureen Madden, ELI, mmadden@nvcc.edummadden@nvcc.edu Robert Brown, WSDM, rbrown@nvcc.edurbrown@nvcc.edu Joan Ehrlich, DSS, jehrlich@nvcc.edujehrlich@nvcc.edu Gladis Gonzalez, DSS, ggonzalez@nvcc.eduggonzalez@nvcc.edu