U of A Partners' Toolkit Assists Faculty in Creating Accessible Online Courses

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A Braille output device.

As campuses across the country moved classes online at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Partners for Inclusive Communities developed a toolkit called Designing an Accessible Online Course to help with the transition.

It was a huge hit with non-profit organizations and higher education institutions.

The mission of Partners for Inclusive Communities is all about including people with disabilities in community life, so the organization had a variety of resources on a website called Explore Access: Tools for Promoting Disability Access and Inclusion. But the Partners' toolkit for designing accessible online courses during the pandemic exceeded the reach of all other resources.

The toolkit received 11,897 visits between March 15 and April 30. The link was shared by 137 organizations on their websites. Sixty-seven of the organizations were colleges and universities located in 31 states and three Canadian provinces. 

"This toolkit was on our list of possible projects and when I realized what a daunting challenge was ahead for both disability resource providers and faculty to move courses online and the barriers that could result for students," said Melanie Thornton, coordinator of access and equity outreach for Partners for Inclusive Communities and creator of the toolkit. "It seemed the perfect time to move this up to the top of our list. The viral sharing of it has really caused me to think about how, when and where we share our products and how to better capture, not just the numbers, but the impact our products are having."

Thornton said the toolkit has been well received by faculty and disability resource professionals. Since many schools and universities will be delivering some classes online this fall, or a blend of in-person and online, the toolkit remains a helpful resource. It continues to receive multiple visits.

It's also winning awards. The toolkit was named a 2020 Evidence-Based Practices Exemplars Competition award winner from the national Association on Higher Education and Disability.

Thornton said she's received a variety of positive comments from those who downloaded the toolkit, including this one: "This is a good overview of accessibility challenges and how to better address them. Many of these things I had not thought about and/or did not know the tools existed. As a result of using this toolkit I plan to make changes to my documents and slides."

Thornton said she's pleased the Partners' toolkit is helping faculty and disability resource professionals create more inclusive online instruction for students with disabilities.

"Most importantly, I hope the availability of this resource has resulted in fewer barriers for at least some of the students with disabilities who have had to move so rapidly to an online environment," she said.

Partners for Inclusive Communities is the University Center of Excellence for Developmental Disabilities Education, Research and Service for the state of Arkansas. The organization is administratively located in the University of Arkansas' College of Education and Health Professions and has a main office in Little Rock.