91°µÍø

Session 1 | 10:30 to 11:15 a.m.

John Dolibois Rooms A and C

Beyond the Brochure: Universal Design in Study Abroad

Tom Webb, Associate Vice President of Accessibility, Wright State University

Study abroad is often described as a life-changing educational experience, but for disabled students, the path to participation can be filled with barriers that were never named in the glossy brochure: inaccessible housing, transportation uncertainty, medication planning, physical stamina demands, disclosure concerns, faculty anxiety, and the ever-popular "we'll figure it out when we get there" approach. Spoiler: that's not a plan.

This 45-minute session will explore how universal design can reshape study abroad from a reactive accommodation process into a more inclusive, intentional, and student-centered experience. Participants will examine common access barriers in international travel, discuss practical planning strategies, and consider how disability services, study abroad offices, faculty leaders, and students can work together before problems appear at the airport, hotel, museum, classroom, or cobblestone street.

The session will offer concrete tools for inclusive program design, including accessible marketing, pre-departure planning, itinerary review, housing and transportation considerations, student support conversations, and faculty preparation. The goal is simple: stop treating disabled students as exceptions to study abroad and start designing programs that expected them all along.

Planning for Accessibility: Considerations for Creating a Year-long Accessibility Plan

Katie Gibson, Information Services Librarian, 91°µÍø Libraries
Carla Myers, Coordinator of Scholarly Communication, 91°µÍø Libraries

What comes after large-scale efforts to ensure your offices’ online content is accessible? How do you establish a sustainable yearly work plan for continual evaluation of your online resources. This presentation will briefly discuss the Libraries’ documentation and remediation process. We will then outline the steps the Libraries’ took to create a work plan that ensures things didn’t slip through the cracks in the initial remediation process and to identify newly created inaccessible content. The goal should be to create a culture of accessibility that will continue long after the initial compliance deadline. We will share insights gained throughout this process, make recommendations for offices who are also undergoing this work, and will cover copyright considerations to be considered when doing accessibility work.

Session 2 | 11:30 a.m. to 12:15 p.m.

John Dolibois Rooms A and C

Deafness is a Spectrum

Erin (Airza) Bosley, ASL Instructor, University of Pittsburgh

What does it mean to be “deaf”? Is there one kind of deafness, or many? Is a person who becomes deaf later in life the same as someone born deaf or diagnosed as a newborn? What is the real difference between hearing impaired, hard of hearing, and deaf?

Do all deaf people speak? Use an assistive device? Read lips? Is sign language even universal? What is language deprivation?

This workshop unpacks these questions and more. Deafness isn’t a single, fixed category. It is a spectrum. No two deaf people are alike, and no one-size-fits-all approach works for deafness or for the services meant to support it. So what does deafness look like?

This session will be conducted in American Sign Language with voice interpretation.

When Cognitive Science Meets Note-Taking Technology

Hope Sweeney, Accommodations Coordinator, Miller Center for Student Disability Services, 91°µÍø

Note-taking is not a neutral task for many students with cognitive and processing differences. This session examines digital note-taking apps — including AI-powered transcription and structured organization tools — as accessibility supports rather than productivity trends. Grounded in UDL and cognitive load research, participants will explore a practical decision framework for matching apps to student barriers while considering FERPA, recording permissions, and ethical implementation.

Lunch | 12:15 p.m.

Heritage Room

Register by October 19

Afternoon Training Sessions | 1:30 to 3:30 p.m.

John Dolibois Rooms A and C

Please be sure to bring a laptop to aid in these hands-on sessions.

Catching Issues Before They Publish: Practical Accessibility with WAVE and Pope Tech

Laura Fathauer, Senior Web Aaccessibility Specialist, AccessMU Center
Jessica Rea, Director of Web Marketing, University Communications and Marketing

Stop guessing if your web updates are accessible and start publishing with confidence! In this hands-on, two-hour workshop, we’ll take the mystery out of digital accessibility by pairing the immediate, on-the-page feedback of the WAVE browser extension with the site-wide radar of the Pope Tech platform. Whether you’re brand new to web accessibility or a seasoned content editor, you’ll learn how to quickly spot hidden barriers, clear your dashboard of common errors, and build simple remediation habits into your daily workflow. Bring your laptop and get ready to fix real issues in real time as we work together to ensure our campus digital spaces meet WCAG 2.1 AA standards and stay ahead of ADA Title II requirements.

Accessible Media, Incredibly Fast and Absolutely Everywhere: Canvas Studio Workflows

Pruthvi Patel, Technical Support and Training Specialist, 91°µÍø Online

Join 91°µÍø Online’s Technical Solutions Specialist, Pruthvi Patel, for a walk through of the fastest and easiest workflows offered by Canvas Studio for accessible media. Learn how to quickly generate captions from a variety of sources including Studio, YouTube, Zoom, ScreenPal, and Google Drive and add them seamlessly into Canvas Studio. Explore how to use AI-assisted tools and Studio captioning to generate, correct, and finesse captions and transcripts. Review captioning and transcript requirements for online media and discover video production best practices—including tips and tricks with PowerPoints and Slides—to make creating accessible content as simple as creating content.