PAC Remix 2024 - IHE Accessibility in OER Implementation Guide
Overview
In this section, you and your team will engage in a Landscape Analysis to uncover key structures and supports that can guide your work to support Accessibility in OER. You may or may not answer all of these questions, but this is an offering.
Section One: Landscape Analysis for Accessibility in OER in Local Context
In this section, you and your team will engage in a Landscape Analysis to uncover key structures and supports that can guide your work to support Accessibility in OER. We encourage to explore some of the questions from each category. You may or may not answer all of these questions, but this is an offering. We ask that you complete Parts One, Two and Six of this Section.
Part One: Initial Thoughts
What is your team's initial goal for this series?
The redesign of two courses (ARTS 1304 and ENG 2322) OER with accessibility in mind.
Part Two: Introductory probing questions:
What does accessibility look like in our organization? How do we measure accessibility?
Physical accessibility is addressed via campus-level committee. We have a DSS office which handles course accommodations for students and distributes/communicates those to instructors.
We also currently assess accessibility issues in electronic environments (Canvas courses) in a limited form, via the APPQMR process/rubric (which the district has trained a number of faculty in already), but we do not have a standardized approach to OER.
What does OER look like in our organization? How do we measure access to OER?
At PAC in recent years, we have leveraged institutional funding to support a multi-year/multi-level training program for faculty who wish to incorporate OER into courses or author their own OER.
We currently track faculty who have been trained in OER, as well as courses which are coded for OER in Banner; I do not believe we have developed a universalized metric for assessing access beyond these.
Part Three: Clarifying questions for accessibility:
What are the organizational structures that supports accessibility?
DSS office and a campus-level accessibility committee. Teaching and Learning Center (TLC) sometimes takes up some of this conversation, as does district-level faculty development.
Who generates most of the accessibility structures/conversation in our organization?
The DSS office and the Teaching and Learning Center.
Where do most educators get support with accessibility?
The most visible place for instructors to see accessibility support is often the letters of accommodation that DSS sends out as a means of accommodation at the beginning of each semester. However, we can do better – adopting Universal Design as a faculty-led pedagogical stance could stave off access issues before they begin.
What content areas might have the largest gaps in access to accessibility?
Potentially all of them. Our indtended goal is to raise awareness among faculty and provide guiding resources.
Part Four: Clarifying questions for OER:
What is our organizational structure that supports curricular resources?
We have a College Curricilum Committee that oversees the implimentation of Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC) and district procedures.
What is our organizational structure that supports OER?
We have a college advisory committee and a campus-level OER team.
Who generates most of the curricular resources in our organization?
Faculty have enthusiastically embraced OER at our campus, and almost 70% have received training to select or generate OER. A large proportion of these faculty are actively using OER. This is complemented by department-level support.
Where do most educators get support with curricular resources?
See previous answer.
What content areas might have the largest gaps in access to curricular resources/OER?
Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math.
Part Five: Clarifying questions for Faculty learning and engagement:
What Professional Learning (PL) structures have the best participation rates for our educators?
Faculty development sessions are offered through the PAC Teaching and Learning Center. There are also some department-level faculty development sessions, but these are uneven across departments. (For example, our English department hosts a series of Teaching Circles each year that have high participation rates. Not every department does this.) We also have a very well-attended, multi-session Faculty Symposium every year that frequently focuses on teaching issues.
What PL structures have the best "production" rates for our educators?
Professional development offerings that are developed by faculty for faculty have the best production and retention rate at Palo Alto College.
What incentive do we have to offer people for participating in learning and engagement?
OER Professional Development courses offer within Canvas (paid incentive)
- Introduction to OER (1.17 WLU)
- OER for the Zealot (2.34 WLU)
- OER for Textbook Publication (3.0 WLU)
Who are the educators that would be most creative with accessibility and OER?
The PAC OER Advisory Committee will begin discussing developing professional development accessibility courses. We expect some of our early adopters to be the most creative with this aspect of OER.
Who are the educators that would benefit the most from accessibility and OER?
All educators and students will benefit from accessibility and OER.
Part Six: Final Probing questions:
What is our current goal for Accessibility in OER and why is that our goal?
- Create Accessibility professional development course: Modules: Empathy, Usability, Accessibility
- Incorporate Universal Design into our “OER for Textbook Publication” course so that textbook authors do not have to go back and retrofit their work – but design these textbooks with accessibility in mind from the start.
- Create Accessibility Review Committee for OER produced at PAC, to support goal #2 and add oversight/a “second set of eyes.”
Who have we not yet included while thinking about this work?
- Student feedback regarding the completeness of accessible resources.
What barriers remain when considering this work?
- Funding for additional professional development
- Faculty feeling “overwhelmed” by taking on access work
- Limited prep time, administrative expectations vs. actual faculty workload
What would genuine change look like for our organization for this work?
- Embrace of Universal Design at the Course/Department level when working with or planning OER, plus committed institutional support ($$) for faculty development toward this purpose, and to compensate faculty for time/labor.
- Perhaps an additional position in the organizational chart – like a Director of Universal Design? Housed in TLC? DSS Office? (There are several options that would make sense.)
Section Two: Team Focus
Identifying and Describing a Problem of Practice
The following questions should help your team ensure that you are focusing your collaboration.
What is your Team’s specific goal for this series? You may consider using AEM Quality Indicators for Creating Accessible Materials to help add to or narrow your work.
What other partners might support this work?
What is your desired timeframe for this work?
Development during Summer 2024, plan to run Fall 2024
How will you include diverse voices and experiences in this work?
Please create a Focus Question that explains your goal and provides specific topics that you would like feedback on. This is what you will share in your breakout groups for feedback.
How do we receive feedback from students effectively? Focus primarily on students enrolled on at the college level (excluding ECHS).
(Save for during March 14th's session.) What feedback did you receive from another team during the March 14th Implementation Session?
Section Three: Team Work Time and Next Steps
Sharing and Next Steps
What was your redefined goal for this series?
What does your team want to celebrate?
What did your team accomplish? Please link to or attach at least one resource you have created/adapted.
What are your team’s next steps?