The Accessibility Journey: From Publisher to Student

Institutions of higher education have a legal and moral obligation to support the information needs of those in their community—whether student or faculty—to provide access to content regardless of individual ability or need for accommodation. They are required to provide access to information resources that are as close as possible to those resources provided to individuals who do not experience those impairments. But what goes into making an ebook, a textbook, or other course materials fully accessible? The path from publisher to student includes an entire ecosystem of content creators, distributors, learning management systems, and university mediators. A considerable amount of coordination is required from multiple parties to ensure the smooth journey of accessible materials from creation to consumption, especially in higher education where the content can be more complex and is often delivered through an LMS. This presentation will bring together a major academic publisher, an accessibility organization, a leading etextbook seller, and a university that is already incorporating fully accessible content into its classroom and libraries to discuss successes and challenges in current efforts made to bring fully accessible content to higher education institutions.