Career Trek: Digital Accessibility

Digital accessibility touched my life soon after I lost the low vision I’d been using since birth.

I learned JAWS for Windows rather quickly after switching from a Mac to using a Windows-based PC full time. I could use the productivity apps that mattered for university—Word, Excel, e-mail, web-browsing and a calendar.

The real accessibility struggle started when I tried using JAWS with Software Audio Workshop Plus (SAW)—a PC-based multitrack audio editor we used at university. SAW was far from accessible as its controls were not seen by JAWS in its off-screen model (a database of all of the on-screen elements such as buttons and text fields).

JAWS had a powerful scripting language built into it. I attempted teaching myself how to script JAWS to work with SAW, but my high school level programming knowledge made this much more difficult. I did however learn about window classes, control types and functions—all useful building blocks to understanding digital accessibilitY. 

 

Accessibility for  Protools

After using JAWS to successfully start my radio career at CHRY, I went back to Ryerson to focus on digital accessibility in a Master of Arts program for media production. At the time, the coveted holy grail of accessibility in the sight loss community was ProTools—a Mac-based digital audio workstation (DAW)—the gold medal industry standard for working in audio production.

In late 2009, ProTools was totally unusable by a screen reader user with the only accessible buttons being Close, Minimize and Zoom. Blind audio engineer Slau Halatyn started “the ProTools Petition” which received over 1200 signatures. Slau  presented this to Avid on behalf of blind engineers, educators and enthusiasts around the world who saw ProTools as an  equalizer that could give blind people employment opportunities in the audio and music industries.

I was one of the first to test the new accessible ProTools in an academic setting. My thesis—VoiceOver in the Control Room: Usability of ProTools recording software by the blind using a screen reader—focused on examining whether a blind engineer could completely use the program in its entirety without sighted assistance to not only produce audio, but produce something of major label quality that would stand up against a modern pop or rock recording.

My thesis involved recording, editing and mixing a five-piece Toronto rock band, all while keeping notes on the accessibility of each of the main activities within ProTools. During my thesis, I learned even more about accessibility and usability as a whole as well as user experience and software design. 

 

Accessibility for  VOD

After leaving school, I had a sneaking suspicion my future was going to involve digital accessibility a fair bit. I took another basic programming course through iTunes U and picked up even more fundamentals of how computer programs were constructed from the ground up. This gave me enough knowledge to venture into the startup world where I could speak to the accessibility of video-on-demand (VOD) platforms like the one I was building. Building TellMe TV required me to communicate the ideas about accessibility to engineers. Through this process, I developed more familiarity  with concepts like HTML 5, ARIA, mobile accessibility and the world of accessible media players.

 

My work for TellMe TV got the attention of the Ryerson DMZ. Startups there wanted to know how to make their digital offerings and products accessible to the widest variety of users. This led me to develop a TEDx Talk called Design the Inclusive experience which I delivered for Ryerson in 2014 at the Royal Ontario Museum.

 

 

Accessibility for Ontario

My unique knowledge and experience caught the attention of the  Government of Ontario. In 2016, I was invited to sit on a committee to review the information and communications standards for the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA). This is legislation enacted in 2005 that mandated a fully accessible Ontario by 2025 in key sectors such as customer service, information, communications and education. Standards written in the early 2000s hadn’t caught up with the explosion of mobile technology as well as new types of information systems that were now on the market such as touch-screen kiosks, SMART devices such as thermostats and innovations in web technology. After much consultation and debate, we agreed to an updated standard in 2018. 

Amidst all of this, I was being tapped to review the accessibility of websites, mobile apps and other digital products by various companies, usually after I complained about not being able to use their service. Some of the changes I requested made their way into business planning software, a popular dating site and a local cable provider’s set-top box.

By the time TellMe TV and my work with the Government of Ontario was winding down, I joined CNIB and found myself wearing my accessibility advocacy hat once again as we built Venture Zone Game and CNIB Market. I was also taking an accessibility-first approach to building MenuVox—my latest startup.

 

Accessible Education

My latest accessibility work has been with Edsby—a K-12 learning platform. Edsby needed help in ensuring its web-based app was accessible to students, parents and teachers. Much of this work involved testing and reporting on the operability and perception of web components such as radio buttons, text fields and links. Often, the fixes involved simple changes to making web code more robust. I took a task-based approach to Edsby, mapping out the user journey through various activities and ensuring users could interact with the necessary components along the way. This culminated in a demo video Edsby has running on their site—showing off the accessibility of the platform.

 

Developing My Skill

Today, I work as the digital accessibility lead at Tangerine—one of Canada’s leading digital banks. I work with designers, developers, business analysts and other accessibility professionals to ensure the Tangerine app and website are fully accessible. A part of this work involves improving my knowledge about digital accessibility. Since starting at Tangerine, I’ve enrolled in the excellent digital accessibility courses from Deque (pronounced ‘Dq’) University. I am steadily working towards a certified professional accessibility core competency (CPACC) designation, having completed 3 exams and nearly 3 dozen courses in everything from document accessibility to customer service for people with disabilities. After this, the goal is to receive a designation as an international accessibility professional.

 

How I Adapted

Not every screen reader user can be an accessibility expert. Most screen reader users use their assistive tech to accomplish some other goal such as writing documents or tracking expenses in a spreadsheet. Others, like myself, want to know how the machine works and how we can make better software usable by more people. 

I learned the basics of programming in languages like Python, Java and Swift and understand how the building blocks of programs such as variables, arrays, strings, objects, functions, libraries and so on, fit together to make an application. In addition, I learned the fundamentals of how HTML works as well as how to speak to engineers about the type of behaviour I want specific websites to exhibit.

I also became familiar with the role accessibility plays in agile methodology. This is how most programming shops are set up today. Accessibility is best when it is thought of in the concept and design stage of a program or feature, not bolted on at the end to appease a tiny customer segment and avoid a law suit.

One of the most important things I did was become familiar with my assistive technology. Today’s off-the-shelf software builders often include accessibility as part of their packages, but it’s up to the screen reader user to know how to use this powerful tool at their fingertips. In addition to navigating efficiently and quickly with VoiceOver, I learned how to use its additional features such as hotspots, web spots, activities and custom gestures. In the case of desktop software, I made a point to teach myself the keyboard shortcuts in each program so I spent less time hunting around the screen and more time getting work done.