Thank you to all who attended the Diversity Forum, Accessibility in Art Libraries! Below are some notes and links to learn more about our featured speakers, some resources they recommend, and others shared by session attendees. If you haven’t already, let us know your thoughts on the Diversity Forum via this feedback form: bit.ly/DiversityForum2021

FACTS:

• Disabled people are the largest minority group in the United States, composing a reported 26% of the population. This number is higher in communities of color.

• Libraries across the United States are being sued by disabled patrons for failing to meet ADA accessibility standards. This list includes the Free Library of Philadelphia and the Queen Public Library

• Disability access in libraries is frequently targeted towards patrons and neglected at the level of staff and faculty hiring and retention

THE PROBLEMS:

• Physical Inaccessibility: These are structural issues that prevent disabled people from fully accessing libraries. These include placement of stairs, lack of ramps, turnstiles, hostile architecture, poorly planned stacks, and inaccessible stalls.

• Intellectual Inaccessibility: These are barriers to clear understanding or full participation for intellectually disabled and neurodivergent people, including signage that fails to use plain language, stigmatization of stims, overly complex forms, etc.

RESOURCES

From Our Speakers

Cyree Jarelle Johnson & Shannon Finnegan:

• www.cyreejarellejohnson.com

• https://shannonfinnegan.com/ 

• https://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/ 

• https://alt-text-as-poetry.net/ 

• HEARD on Instagram: “There has been a huge increase in online movement organizing, education, and information sharing in response to COVID-19.” 

From Forum Attendees

Accessible Buildings:

• https://www.wellcertified.com/ 

• https://www.stalled.online/standards

Disability in Canada

• The Visible Minority Population with a Disability in Canada: Employment and Education 

Accessible Design

• Color Contrast Checker - TPGi 

• How It Works - Google Slides Accessibility - GrackleDocs 

• Coblis — Color Blindness Simulator – Colblindor 

• Reimagining Access: Inclusive Technology Design for Archives and Special Collections 

• AccessText Network: Home 

• tota11y Chrome plugin

• Microsoft accessibility insights

• Bookmarklets from Paul J. Adams 

• Web developer toolbar

• Color contrast analyzer 

• ChromeLens

Accessible Libraries

• Accessibility And Academic Libraries: A Comparative Case Study

• Bookshare | An Accessible Online Library for people with print disabilities 

• Library Futures: Championing the Right to Equitable Access to Knowledge 

• AccessText Network

Accessible LMS

• D2L | Creators of the Brightspace Learning Management System Software (LMS Software)