Imagining Access >> crip computing

Documenting campus spaces

When it comes down to accessibility and University of Michigan’s campus, “Leaders and Best” is sometimes a misnomer. How might we create digital and physical campus spaces that value the insights disability can bring? Our projects highlighted the weaknesses in accessibility on campus, while the university seems to focus on aesthetics. We usher a call to make more accessible tools and resources for students navigating campus. 

Digitally, in terms of accessibility, it’s important to highlight navigation and adjustability of online features. In many of our access projects, we’ve illustrated a lack of customization of online elements like adjustable text sizes, screen reader accessibility, captioning, and access to maps and information. In order to make campus more accessible, students need access to a variety of resources to aid in everyday ordeals. In this course, we’ve learned that accessibility isn’t just a set of guidelines, but an implementation of creating a more inclusive environment, space, or product to increase productivity. 

Physically, we noticed a large number of issues with narrow passageways, heavy doors, a lack of automated passage, inaccessible and limited gender neutral bathrooms, and a lack of advertisement in favor of accessible spaces. We feel that including more resonant design practices like gender neutral bathrooms, adjustable spaces, and improved table placement can benefit everyone, not just those with disabilities.

Overall, we feel our university has fallen short when facilitating environments that are both productive and inclusive for students and faculty. Accessibility doesn’t have to be costly; instead we can take steps to work with the resources we have.

Accessibility, living, and leisure

Design justice doesn’t mean meeting only the bare-minimum standards of accessibility.  Accessibility and management looks different for everyone, even if they have the same official diagnosis. Every individual’s “standard routine” will look different through different perspectives. Disabled people have interests and want to participate in activities just like anyone else. Accessible living and leisure contribute and correlate to the richness of one’s life through the ability to participate in such desired activities. It’s important to consider the diverse experiences and perspectives of the disabled community and make sure that they are given proper platforms to voice these perspectives. True accessibility is achieved when inclusivity is not an afterthought, but a principle in design and planning.

Disability accommodations and remote learning

Our society has forgotten a lot of the lessons we learned during the COVID-19 shutdowns in 2020. How might we remember and learn from the disability wisdom generated during the pandemic? We suggest:

• Normalizing online resources such as Zoom and asynchronous learning being available.
• Understanding change is ongoing and adopting a flexible mindset
• Bringing mental health accommodations to the forefront 
• We may reflect on the personal social isolation we each experienced during the pandemic to better understand how the current lack of remote options negatively impacts individuals who must stay at home. 
• Respecting immunocompromised people and advocating for collective health within our communities. (Ex: masking and vaccination)

Disability communities and disability media

Disabled people need disability culture. It is imperative that all people can find a community that they belong in. It is crucial that every individual sees themselves represented in media because it can help them to feel understood, comforted, and heard. Unfortunately, disability culture and acceptance is scarce, due to a variety of factors. Stigma, stereotyping, masking, and the societal pressure to seem “normal” or nondisabled may all contribute to this lack of representation. 

Along with underrepresentation then comes misrepresentation. The media we consume tends to reflect the biases, values, and predispositions of those who create it. Empowering voices that can speak accurately, and rewarding those voices, is crucial in the never-ending quest of striving for equanimity within the disabled community. Community and culture go hand-in-hand, both for creating acceptance of disabled people and the acceptance of one’s own identity as disabled. 

Accessing telehealth and mental health services

When it comes down to accessible design, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. In fact, sometimes what one person needs might conflict with what another person needs. This is why it is essential to approach accessibility with flexibility and knowledge on a diverse range of needs. One example of this is how short-term therapy may work for people who need crisis intervention, but not people who want to manage their chronic stress. Another example is having the availability of tools such as closed captions and text readers for people who could benefit. Additionally, financial barriers can prevent disabled students/individuals from accessing mental health services, so class-based accommodations should be implemented. It is also important to expedite the process for gaining access to an initial appointment to ensure students in crisis are not deterred from seeking support. 

Accessibility, apps, and digital platforms

This semester, we spent a good deal of time discussing what Liz Jackson has termed “disability dongles” — technologies and designs that seem feel-good at first glance, but are ultimately useless (and even harmful) to disabled people. The design of disability dongles is often led by engineers or researchers with technical experience but does not treat disabled users as experts, ignoring our/their actual needs. This leads to a disconnect between the actual targets of the product vs. what the researchers think is a customer. Using our developing understanding of disability dongles, we each chose an application or form of technology meant to help disabled people to research in-depth and decide if it was a disability dongle. We observed a range of different products from sign language gloves to wheelchair-accessible vans. While from first glance they seem useful, these technologies often didn’t incorporate the target audience in their research, which caused a slew of problems. The sign language glove was designed with the intention of facilitating real-time communication, but it lacked cost efficiency and primarily focused on hearing people’s communication needs, making it unusable for the active users who would benefit most from it.

We sometimes found it difficult to determine whether or not a design should or should not be considered a “dongle,” but it is very important to consider the humans and intentions behind claimed “accessible” technologies.