Thursday, May 19, 2022 marks the eleventh anniversary of Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD), the annual worldwide event to raise awareness about digital accessibility.
Online and in-person events will be held around the world as people gather to talk, learn, and share how inclusive design and accessibility in digital products can create a more inclusive world for everyone.
Digital accessibility is a part of everyone’s life, whether you use a phone, tablet, laptop, or other digital device to interact with friends, family, customers, and organizations.
I’ve been participating in GAAD since 2012, I hope you’ll join me this year at one of the GAAD events!
If you’re a user experience professional, designer, developer, programmer, content strategists, digital marketer, project manager, or anyone who helps create digital products, you’ll find a slew of GAAD events to help you learn how to make your product more accessible and usable by people with disabilities.
What is Global Accessibility Awareness Day?
From the first event in 2012, Global Accessibility Awareness Day has expanded to a global celebration held the third Thursday in May to raise awareness of digital accessibility.
The idea of Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD) launched with a blog post by Joe Devon in 2011, when he suggested accessibility needed to go mainstream.
Jennison Asuncion read Joe’s blog post and contacted Joe to discuss how they could make that happen.
Eight months later, the first GAAD was held in May 2012.
The idea spread quickly throughout the web community over the years, as organizations schools, companies, and individuals planned events and activities to raise awareness about digital accessibility.
In 2015, GAAD was moved to the third Thursday in May. With the COVID pandemic in 2020, many events moved online.
I organized the first GAAD Detroit in 2014 and held events for our Detroit community through 2017.
In 2022, there is a mix of virtual and online GAAD events.
Get Involved
I’ve searched the dozens of activities listed on the Global Accessibility Awareness Day site (144 events and activities as of May 16, 2022) and found a range of bootcamps, panel discussions, online challenges, courses, and Twitter chats.
Here are three online GAAD activities that caught my attention.
1. Incorporated Accessibility Skills Into Your Hiring Process: A Teach Access Panel Discussion
Join Teach Access for a one-hour online panel discussion on recruiting and hiring practices. The discussion will focus on benefits of hiring staff with accessibility knowledge and skills to help you build accessibility capacity.
Moderated by Samantha Lynch Johnson, Electronic Information Technology Accessibility Coordinator at University of Southern California, the panelists include hiring managers, job seekers, and educators:
- Cyndi Wiley, Digital Accessibility Lead and Assistant Professor, Iowa State University
- Brittni Wendling, Digital Accessibility Specialist and Graduate Student, Iowa State University
- Meenakshi Das, Software Engineer, Microsoft
- Carrie Farber, Director of Accessibility, Walmart eCommerce
The event is free and will be held on Zoom; pre-registration for the hiring panel discussion is required.
2. Accessibility Awareness with Molly Watt (YouTube Videos)
To celebrate Global Accessibility Awareness Day 2022, Nexer Digital accessibility consultant Molly Watt filmed a video about accessibility for every day this week to raise awareness.
In each short video (the first one is three minutes long), Watt discusses the top five accessibility issues in 2022 and the impact the issues have on users.
Each video is captioned and includes a transcript in the video description (nice touch, I’ve not a fan of YouTube’s scrolling transcript).
I am passionate about it because I have a disability myself.
I am deafblind. I rely on technology to access day to day life, whether it be booking a train ticket, whether it be reaching out to communicate with someone.
These things are incredibly important. And there are still many things that I cannot access as someone who is quite, I’m not the technophobe, shall we say.
3. Global Accessibility Awareness Day Virtual Event
The four-hour virtual Global Accessibility Awareness Day event hosted by Digita11y Accessible kicks off with a keynote presentation by Jennison Asuncion.
Co-founder of GAAD, Asuncion will discuss the meaning and intention behind GAAD and the importance of global accessibility.
An open Q & A session will follow his keynote.
Additional sessions for the day include:
- Inclusive Design: Why Utilitizing Users with Disabiltiies Creates Better Digital Experiences by Phil Yatvin, Senior Director of Business Development at The Chicago Lighthouse and Ben Chargot, DAX Project Coordinator at The Chicago Lighthouse
- Accessibility and Usability Work Together to Make Things Better by Beth Somerfield, Digital Accessibility Specialist at Anthro-Tech and Andrew Skinner, Digital Accessibility Specialist at Anthro-Tech
- Accessible Procurement by Kara Zirkle, Accessibility Educator and Consultant at Dell Technologies
- Accessibility ‘Silver Bullets’ by Bob Dodd, Director of Delivery at Digita11y Accessible
The virtual event is free; pre-registration for Digita11y Accessible GAAD event is required.
Summary
Global Accessibility Awareness Day is open to everyone who wants to learn about digital accessibility.
It’s a great opportunity to learn how to improve accessibility in your work and personal life as well as meet and network with others interested in raising accessibility awareness.
Can’t make it to any GAAD events?
If you use a mouse, unplug it and only use the keyboard to navigate websites for the day. You’ll be amazed at what you discover you can and can’t do on a website.
Which GAAD events do you plan to attend?
Photo credit: Nick DeNardis
