You often hear others talk about accessibility, but you’re not quite sure how to put it into practice (or maybe you just haven’t had a chance). These Accessibility Bites sessions are for you!
Join your host Helena Prins and facilitator Josie Gray in Zoom for one or all of the five 30-minute sessions taking place on the last Thursday of every month except December.
Session 1: Assistive Technologies
Our first drop-in session is designed to explore the assistive technologies and customization options available in the digital tools educators and staff often use. The goal is to explore these tools and identify what might make your work easier.
Schedule:
- 10 minutes: Demonstration of some of the assistive technologies and customization options available in some of the popular digital tools we use. These include:
- Text to speech (your device reading aloud text on the screen)
- Speech to text (your device writing down what you say aloud)
- Customizing visual displays (dark mode, high contrast, enlarging text size, readability tools)
- Automatic captioning
- 10 minutes: Everyone can try out different tools on their device. Your host and facilitator will be available for questions.
- 10 minutes: Everyone will come together to reflect on how it went, share their own experiences and tips, and ask additional questions.
Register now!
Learn more and register for other events in the series.
You often hear others talk about accessibility, but you’re not quite sure how to put it into practice (or maybe you just haven’t had a chance). These Accessibility Bites sessions are for you!
Join your host Helena Prins and facilitator Josie Gray in Zoom for one or all of the five 30-minute sessions taking place on the last Thursday of every month except December.
Session 2: Image Descriptions
This is a short drop-in session that will allow you to practice describing images. If you share images through documents and publications, social media, digital interfaces, or presentations, this session is for you.
What to bring: Any images you want to make accessible — preferably ones you use in your work. We will also have images to practice with if you don’t have any.
Schedule
- 15 minutes: Presentation on key things to keep in mind when you describe images. This includes:
- Who image descriptions are for
- When and when not to describe an image
- What to describe and how to describe it
- How context factors into image descriptions
- Examples of good and not-so-good image descriptions
- 10 minutes: Everyone works individually to describe their images. Your host and facilitator will be available for questions.
- 5 minutes: Everyone will come together to reflect on how it went and ask additional questions.
Register now!
Learn more and register for other events in the series.
This notice is to inform you that this session will be recorded, archived, and made available publicly on BCcampus.ca. By participating in this session, you acknowledge that your participation in this session will be recorded and the recording will be made available openly.
Are you interested in creating a safer learning experience for your students before the course even begins? The syllabus (or course outline) is often the first point of contact learners have with their instructor and the course content. By applying trauma-informed principles, syllabi can provide the opportunity for educators to begin relationship-building with learners as well as offer suggestions and information vital to their success.
This FLO MicroCourse consists of required (and recommended) readings, video lectures from your instructor and daily forum posts. The course will culminate with a final assignment where the participants will interrogate and edit a syllabus (ideally one from a course they teach) and provide and receive feedback from their participant peers. The time commitment for this course is 2-3 hours per day. We have two optional synchronous sessions planned that we encourage participants to attend:
- Session 1: October 30, 2023, 5:00–6:00 p.m. PT
- Session 2: November 3, 2023, 10:00 to 11:00 a.m. PT
These sessions will be recorded and shared with participants in the course.
Learning Outcomes
Upon successful completion of this course, participants will:
- Explore a variety of areas within a syllabus that may be suitable for using a trauma-informed approach
- Assess and amend their own syllabus to align with trauma-informed perspectives
- Provide and receive feedback on their own and other participants’ syllabi
Facilitator Biography
Matty Hillman (he/him/his), MA (CYC), is a child and youth care instructor at Selkirk College in the beautiful Kootenay region of B.C., the traditional territory of the Sinixt People. His research interests include sexual violence prevention and response on post-secondary campuses, trauma-informed teaching, and community mental health literacy. As a muralist, he is especially interested in the intersection of youth work and public art, exploring the opportunity these complementary practices create for empowerment, community building, and social justice advancements. Readers may contact Matty at mhillman@selkirk.ca and access his full bio at http://selkirk.ca/faculty/matthew-matty-hillman.
Register now!
These sessions will be recorded and shared with participants in the course.
Save the date!
The user experience for education technology has greatly evolved in the past few years, thanks to the pivot to online learning brought about by the pandemic. A range of hybrid approaches now exist for content delivery, and many more instructors than ever before are using technology to both assess and increase student engagement and accessibility. Learners’ actions, expectations, and goals have also evolved, leading to new opportunities and challenges for integrating edtech into learning. 
The Educational Technology Users Group (ETUG) Fall Workshop will meet online and examine these changes and the evolution of the edtech user. Presentations will focus on how student expectations have changed and how instructors can address them. The workshop will also look at faculty expectations when it comes to technology and the institutional support (e.g., teaching and learning centres, libraries) required to meet these expectations.
Registration and a call for proposals will be announced soon. In the meantime, save the date!
You often hear others talk about accessibility, but you’re not quite sure how to put it into practice (or maybe you just haven’t had a chance). These Accessibility Bites sessions are for you!
Join your host Helena Prins and facilitator Josie Gray in Zoom for one or all of the five 30-minute sessions taking place on the last Thursday of every month except December.
Session 3: PowerPoint Slides
This is a short drop-in session where we will explore how to design and remediate presentation slides so they are accessible. We will talk about design considerations unique to slides for teaching both online and in-person and how you can create accessible content in PowerPoint.
What to bring: A slide deck you want to make accessible — preferably one you use in your work. We will focus on Microsoft PowerPoint, but you can bring in Google Slides too. We will also have a PowerPoint presentation to practice with.
Schedule:
- 5 minutes: Presentation to highlight some key things to keep in mind when you review your slides.
- 20 minutes: Everyone works individually on their own slides to identify and fix accessibility errors. Your host and facilitator will be available for questions.
- 5 minutes: Everyone will come together to reflect on how it went and ask additional questions.
Register now!
Learn more and register for other events in the series.
This notice is to inform you that this session will be recorded, archived, and made available publicly on BCcampus.ca. By participating in this session, you acknowledge that your participation in this session will be recorded and the recording will be made available openly.
You often hear others talk about accessibility, but you’re not quite sure how to put it into practice (or maybe you just haven’t had a chance). These Accessibility Bites sessions are for you!
Join your host Helena Prins and facilitator Josie Gray in Zoom for one or all of the five 30-minute sessions taking place on the last Thursday of every month except December.
Session 4: Social Media
This is a short drop-in session where we will talk about accessibility considerations across social media platforms. If you use Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, or TikTok, these considerations will apply.
What to bring: A device you can use to access your social media accounts (mobile or computer is fine). These can be your personal or professional accounts.
Schedule:
- 10 minutes: Presentation to highlight some key things to keep in mind when you create and share social media posts. This includes:
- Hashtags
- Emojis and special characters
- Images and GIFs
- Videos
- 10 minutes: Everyone works individually to explore accessibility on the social media platforms they use most. Your host and facilitator will be available for questions.
- 10 minutes: Everyone will come together to reflect on how it went and ask additional questions.
Register now!
Learn more and register for other events in the series.
This notice is to inform you that this session will be recorded, archived, and made available publicly on BCcampus.ca. By participating in this session, you acknowledge that your participation in this session will be recorded and the recording will be made available openly.
You often hear others talk about accessibility, but you’re not quite sure how to put it into practice (or maybe you just haven’t had a chance). These Accessibility sessions are for you!
Join your host Helena Prins and facilitator Josie Gray in Zoom for one or all of the five 30-minute sessions taking place on the last Thursday of every month except December.
Session 5: Word Documents
This is a short drop-in session where we will explore how to create accessible content in Microsoft Word.
What to bring: A document you want to make accessible — preferably one you use in your work. We will focus on Microsoft Word, but you can bring a Google Doc or webpage too. We will also have a Word document to practice with if you don’t have anything.
Schedule:
- 10 minutes: Presentation to highlight some key things to keep in mind when you review your documents.
- 15 minutes: Everyone works individually on their own document to identify and fix accessibility errors. Your host and facilitator will be available for questions.
- 5 minutes: Everyone will come together to reflect on how it went and ask additional questions.
Register now!
Learn more and register for other events in the series.
This notice is to inform you that this session will be recorded, archived, and made available publicly on BCcampus.ca. By participating in this session, you acknowledge that your participation in this session will be recorded and the recording will be made available openly.