Events

Digital Accessibility Workshop with Henley Editorial and Design Team

On 16 October, a technical online accessibility workshop that looked at colour accessibility and PDF remediation was conducted for the Henley Editorial and Design team. Using Adobe Acrobat Pro software we remidiated existing content at the workshop. A big thank you to Edith Rigby, Head of the Learning and Development Hub , who organised the session. It is best to make the source cocument accessible rather than trying to remediate content.

Digital Accessibility Training with Student Services Team

Two online digital accessibility training sessions on 11 September and 11 October was conducted for the Student Services team. Altogether 196 colleagues participated in the sessions. A huge thank you to Dr. Paddy Woodman who organised the sessions. These sessoions were lively with many questions about scanned dcouments, complex tables accessibility, image alternative text and other relavent topics.

Digital Accessibility Training with Techinical Services Team

Following up our initial conversation about digital accessibility with the Diversity and Inclusion group of the Technical Services team, on 10 August 2023 a TechNet Session was organised by Dr Karen Henderson, Director of Technical Services for the team to engage with a digital accessibility training. The session was well attended despite it being the summer holiday season. We discussed practical tips to make content more accessible. Screen captures of navigating inaccessible content with screen reader demonstrated how inaccessible content could be to an assistive technology user. This was a great opportunity to increase accessibility awareness among the Technical Services colleagues who are working in various parts of the University.

Digital Accessibility Stall at Summer Teaching & Learning Event

On Thursday 13 July 2023 at the University Summer Teaching and Learning Event we had a digital accessibility stall. Attendees at the event, from various schools, departments and functions talked to us about digital accessibility challenges they face. It was a great opportunity to promote digital accessibility and the event was a grand success.

Digital accessibility stall at the Teaching and learning summer event for 2023. A blue retractable pullup roll banner and various posters are displayed. On a table there are more posters and a computer monitor.

Digital Accessibility Session with Finance

This hands on workshop was conducted 19 June 2023 as a face to face event. The finance team was introduced to assistive technology and good practice to make sure content we create works for everyone. They also explored the WebAIM Colour Contrast Checker and explored how to make colour coded information more accessible. Creating accessible PDFs was another topic we explored.

nine staff members from University of Reading Finance taking part in an accessibility workshop

Three Horizons of Accessibility - Resilient Digital Inclusion

Thursday 25 May 12:30-13:20

Hector Minto, Director of Accessibility, Lead Technology Evangelist at Microsoft, presents an online session titled Three Horizons of Accessibility - Resilient Digital Inclusion.

The talk is open to all staff and is on the importance of digital accessibility to organisations and individuals, including some advice on accessible practice.

This event is part of a programme of activity in the university's Look Again campaign, highlighting the importance of creating digital content that works for everyone, regardless of ability, and providing some useful tips on how to do it. It is focused around Global Accessibility Awareness Day on 18 May 2023.

Digital Accessibility for Health and Safety Services

This session was conducted on 22 May 2023 as a face to face event.

We discussed how to make tables more accessible and more importantly how we can make the colour coded institutional risk register more accessible. Other topics we discussed included accessible documents, web pages and presentations.

Digital Accessibility: Learn Tips and Ask Questions

Monday 22 May 2023, 12:30-13:20

This session is part of our Global Accessibility Awareness Day (18 May 2023) celebrations and open to all staff at University of Reading. Join us to learn tips to make your content more accessible and ask questions from the panel members. The panel consists of colleagues from across the University who have been active in the digital accessibility work.

Dr. Tharindu Liyanagunawardena, Digital Accessibility Officer
Jem McKenzie, RUSU, Inclusion & Communities Officer
Prof. Richard Mitchell, Department of Computer Science and an accessibility champion
Prof. Yota Dimitriadi, Chair of the Staff Disability Network
Maria-Christiana Papaefthimiou, CQSD TEL

Look Again: Digital accessibility campaign

A new campaign this month is asking colleagues to take another look at digital content they create to make sure it is accessible to all, regardless of ability.

Get tips in interactive articles and webinars, grab a sticker to help remind you to use them, and read personal experiences of colleagues and students to help you look again at content from the perspective of users with accessibility needs. More on the Staff Portal (login required) or Look Again.

Is your content accessible? get tips at rdg.ac/digi-access and rdg.ac/lookagain

Digital Accessibility Session with the People Development Team

This session was conducted on 3 May 2023 as a face to face event.

We discussed accessibility in document creation and the need to get accessible content when external teams/trainers are delivering sessions. Working with the People Development team we are now offering two Digital Accessibility sessions on 18th May under their initative Learn at Work Week.

Digital Accessibility Session with the Governance Team

This session was conducted on 17 April 2023 as a face to face event.

We discussed accessible document creation and how these get transferred across to PDFs if they are correctly created. The team highlighted the importance of accessibility awareness raising accross the institution as many people from various areas submit documents to the governance team.

Digital Accessibility Session with the Vice Chancellor's Office Team

This session was conducted on 27 March 2023 as a hybrid event with most of the team present with us at Whiteknights house and a few joining online.

We discussed accessible document creation and how these get transferred across to PDFs if they are correctly created. The team suggested having a guide on creating accessible emails and we are going to create a new resource to include tips taking this feedback.

Accessible Colour & Content Conversation with Creative & Print Studio Team

This event was conducted on 7 February 2023 as a hybrid event with most of the team present with us at London Road campus but some joining online.

Creating accessible PDFs from InDesign and making content accessible and visually appealing were interesting and engaging discussions. The University of Reading provides access to LinkedIn learning content and Creating Accessible PDFs by Chad Chelius is a wonderful resource. This course goes into all the details of making accessible PDFs from Word, PowerPoint and Adobe InDesign.

Title slide Accessible colour and content by Dr Tharindu Liyanagunawardena

Digital Accessibility Conversation with the Technical Services Team

This event was conducted on 1 February 2023 as a face to face session to start the digital accessibility conversations with the technical services team. We had a Braille Labeler, Cambridge simulation gloves and Optima Simulation Specs as artefacts in the session.

The technical services team invited us to present in their Summer learning sessions where we will be running a few hands on workshops. We are now looking forward to working more closely with the technical services team to make thier content more accessible.

Digital accessibility at University of Reading presented by Dr Tharindu Liyanagunawardena and Miroslava Flimelova

Digital Accessibility at the Institute of Education's Staff Day

This event was conducted on 5 January 2023 as a face to face event. We presented the session together with the Technology Enhanced Team to help our colleagues at the Institute of Education (IoE) to create accessible content.

A rich discussion took place where it was identified that some templates (for example the one used to plan teaching sessions by student teachers) may not be as accessible as they could be. We are now looking into these so that we can make them more accessible.

digital accessibility using blackboard ally presented by Kim Coles senior TEL advisor, Tharindu Liyanagunawardena digital accessibility officer and Maria Papaefthimiou Senior TEL advisor

Accessibility Workshop with Student Engagement Team

This event was conducted on 22 November 2022 as a face-to-face workshop with the Student Engagement team.

This workshop was designed to help understand the basic digital accessibility concepts and how to apply them in day-to-day document creation.

Participants trying Cambridge Simulation Gloves

Participants were introduced to: Digital Accessibility, Assistive Technologies, Current legislations relating to accessibility, Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, Accessible colour, Accessible document structure, Accessible audio and video, Accessible tables, Accessible links, Checking for accessibility, and Web Accessibility Evaluation.

If you are interested in an accessibility awareness event for your School, Department or team, please get in touch WebAccessibilityTeam