Design PowerPoint Templates for Accessibility This course is designed to help students become familiar with the PowerPoint layout, placeholders, and the many benefits of designing for accessibility. In addition, students will learn how to apply the 508 requirements and use the built-in Microsoft Accessibility Checker.

How to use ART During this demo, we will introduce the enhanced Accessibility Requirements Tool (ART), a step-by-step guide to help you easily identify relevant accessibility requirements for Information and Communication Technology (ICT) from the Revised 508 Standards, and incorporate them into your procurement and contracting documentation. GSA’s IT Accessibility Program developed ART as part of its mission to provide technical assistance to federal agencies, to improve compliance with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act. Use ART to buy and build technology that’s accessible to all.

Section 508: Testing Tools & Microsoft Ease of Access Center During this session you will learn about several free testing tools that you can use to ensure your ICT products are Section 508 Compliant. We will give an overview of Microsoft’s Ease of Access, JAWS and NVDA, the Color Contrast Analyzer, ANDI, and Microsoft Accessibility Insights. Please see the PPT presentation to download these tools in advance if you would like to follow along.

Remediation: The Next Step in an Effective 508 Program

Section 508: Common Issues for Documents

Testing for Compliance: A Comparison of Tools and Methods Applying both automated and manual testing methods is necessary to meet 508 compliance - but where to begin? What tools and methods to choose? In this session, ONRR will present what they've learned from applying a variety of both automated and manual testing methods ; the methodology and advantages of each tool, what each one does not detect, and how they have incorporated the results into their Agile development cycle to make improvements to their websites.

Creating Accessible PDF Documents with Signatures Learn how to make your PDF forms Section 508 conformant using Adobe tools.

Accessible Customer Experience & Shared Services

GSA General Update Gain insights into the Government-wide IT Accessibility Program's achievements over the past year and get a glimpse of what the future holds - and how you can be part of our success.

User Research and Personas for BARD Mobile The National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled's BARD Mobile apps provide access to tens of thousands of books to patrons with disabilities including blindness, low-vision, cognitive, and print disabilities. Over the last 3 years, a cross-department team at the Library has conducted user research and developed personas to improve BARD Mobile and other NLS services. In this presentation, we will present the resulting persona and talk about what we learned about the diverse needs of NLS patrons.

Using USWDS Critical Checklists to Develop Accessibility Skills Across Government Teams In this session, members of the U.S. Web Design System core team will share plain-language checklists they're developing for checking the accessibility of individual components (the building blocks of websites). They'll show how any agency team — technical or not — can use these checklists to perform baseline manual accessibility testing (like keyboard testing, screen reader testing, mobile testing, and zoom magnification testing) on their own sites. They will also describe their iterative design and development process for these checklists, including content development and UX research.

Shared Services Canada - Update on our Accessible ICT Procurement Pilot

Applying Radical Participatory Design in the Context of Digital Accessibility

Improving Digital Accessibility: A year long strategic plan to improve the accessibility of digital products

Accessibility in Procurement Procurement plays an integral role in Accessibility. There are many people passionate about accessibility in procurement but just don't know where to start. Mr. Proctor developed a guide that helps to bridge that gap by putting passion into practice and moving beyond "ticking a checkbox."

AI-generated Alt-text: The future of Image Accessibility? What happens when you ask a robot to write your alt-text? Can commercial products available today do a competent job? We tasked several mass market AI computer vision models with writing quality alt-text for different types of images commonly found on federal websites. Then we compared the output from computers, experienced alt-text writers, and inexperienced alt text writers. Who did it best? Attend this session to learn what worked, what didn’t, and what surprised us. (No prior AI knowledge required.)

Should You Compromise on Your Greatest Abilities When You Have a Disability? The career journey of one individual from linguist to accommodations specialist.

A Retrospective on the Annual Section 508 Assessment Did the depth of detail in the Section 508 Assessment criteria catch you off guard? Listen to how one agency seized this assessment as a chance to enhance the quality of the products they procure, create, and employ.

An Overview of New Web Accessibility Requirements from WCAG 2.2 and 2.1 WCAG 2.0 Level AA became the web accessibility requirement under Section 508 in March of 2017. WCAG 2.1 became a finalized standard in June of 2018. The Europe Union has been using WCAG 2.1 for five years. WCAG 2.2 is on the cusp of release. If your agency is using only WCAG 2.0 Level AA to audit your web properties, what accessibility features are you missing? Bruce and Rachael will explore and answer this question by reviewing the Success Criteria added in WCAG 2.1 and 2.2.

Cultivating & Managing an Inclusive Culture