VIRTUAL/COMPUTER ACCESSIBILITY AWARENESS BULLETIN

Chances are you know or have seen someone in a wheelchair at work, in public, at school or church.  Years ago, getting around for people in wheelchairs was much more difficult than it is today, thanks to the advent of special design features in sidewalks and curbs, which allow independent access in moving across streets and parking lots, getting into and out of most buildings, etc.  The last 20 years, lots of major advances have been made in accessibility for the disabled that is at least in terms of physical access.

The blind too are able to do many more things with modern technology.  Many use guide dogs that are trained by very knowledgeable experts in travel and mobility.  Numerous others use very durable and much longer lasting white canes that are light years ahead of those designed 25 years ago.  Clearly the blind and other disabled citizens are able to do many things on their own with the aid of various assistive technologies that are specific to their situational needs.

There is however a very nasty secret that has been kept from most mainstream citizens, even people who should know better sadly are uninformed of a significant accessibility issue that threatens the very ability of blind and other disabled workers to live freely in society.  This issue is in a form of accessibility that is not noticed when your sitting in a restaurant or walking down the street.  This particular accessibility issue is electronic in nature and is what I refer to as virtual accessibility.

Many people have the mistaken belief that due to computer advances; the blind surely can have any job they want given that almost any employment situation will require some use of a computer.  In a proper world of computer design this would be so, however nothing could be further from the truth.  This document will briefly outline some personal experiences with corporate computing systems and recommend things that need to be done.  I cannot do this alone; it must take the action of thousands and thousands of concerned citizens.

The story of your writer is that of many typical blind adults who are today’s 30 something.  I grew up in a time when getting a mainstream education was more accepted in the public schools, so I was exposed to the same conditions and expectations as my sited peers through high school and on into college.  In 1997, I completed a Bachelors Degree at Texas A&M and began looking for work.  While the job search took some time, the first go around was not too difficult, as in the late 1990s; many companies still used older DOS databases.  I would take a job working in customer care and earn a promotion in just over a year to account coordinator.  A sudden layoff in early 2002 was a shock, but I figured given my work history with my previous employer, getting a job would be a piece of cake.

The truth only then began to reveal itself.  Four different times between March of 2002 and December of 2003, I was flatly told by perspective companies that due to the inability to make their computer systems work with screen reading software, I would not be offered a job.  Finally at the beginning of December 2003, Affiliated Computer Services would hire me, only to try and lay me off two weeks later because of similar computer system issues.  This ultimately did not happen, because the company probably realized it would be in major trouble with the government had it proceeded with termination.  Reasons unrelated to technology would later result in the shut down of the facility I worked at.

For over two years, from October 2004 to October 2006, I looked for and interviewed for jobs.  In the fall of 2006, Fidelity Investments called, they wanted to hire me but they said I could not start the training November 6 because they could not get two software components at work to properly function with the screen reading technology.  By the middle of January 2007, with Fidelity making no effort to give me the job I was very qualified for, I applied to graduate school.  In March 2007, I was accepted into Texas State University and now I am working on a Masters in Education while working as a part-time grad assistant.

Even major universities are not free from such problems.  At TX State, we have a program used for payroll purposes called SAP; it is a web-based portal where the hourly employees enter their time card information.  Unfortunately the blind director at Disability Services, just as in my case, cannot fill out the electronic time cards, because the program is completely inaccessible.  The screen reader cannot detect any of the information that would otherwise tell you what box you’re entering data in.  This program for me is minor and so getting assistance would not be a huge problem, but what about a person who is blind that wants to work in payroll?  Any other agency that uses this program is using a technology that a blind person cannot use, thus they cannot do their job, and thus they are not given the job.

Virtual accessibility is no different than physical accessibility.  If a company told a person in a wheelchair that due to a lack of accessible ramps or elevators, they could not be hired because they could not get to their office, a suit worth millions would be filed and hundreds of lawyers would be ready to take the case.  If a person were denied a job due to sexual orientation or ethnicity, those same lawyers would be lined up for blocks.  Could I get any of five agencies to take my case with Fidelity?  Obviously, the answer was no.

Lawsuits are not the answer, but the law needs to recognize that telling a person they cannot have a job due to a limitation in a computer program that is the fault of the designer, is no different than telling the perspective employee he or she cannot have the job due to a failure on the part of a construction company in constructing a building with no physical accessibility.  Almost any computer program used for customer service, accounting, payroll, and any number of other office and organizational needs can be accessible to the blind, if and only if the program is built with basic windows code and tested to insure its usability.

There are two main causes of these problems that must be address.  First, let’s look at the design and how that is handled.  Many organizations do not build their own software, rather they outsource to a third party who builds the product to specific needs of the given client.  Unfortunately, the software builders are competing based on lowest bid, so whoever can produce what a company wants for the least cost is awarded the bid.  In practice, this is all well and good but when awarding a bid means the software designer has not budgeted for accessibility, is the business really making itself look good?  Yes the odds are maybe one in several hundred thousand, that a blind applicant will apply for and want to work for you, but where is all of your business ethics when your hiring not based on capability but access to technology or in this case, the lack there of?  Businesses, all organizations, have to start mandating that in order to receive the bid to build a software platform, the company building the software must be aware of and eventually test the final product to see that it can be utilized by the blind and other disabled users.  Even in cases where companies build their own software, money must be set aside for testing such accessibility needs.

Second, let’s look at awareness itself.  Often times, people just deal with problems by hoping they will go away.  The 72% of the blind who are unemployed will not go away.  As long as they are not working, the taxpayer, who helps them live on a shoestring budget each month from Social Security, is supporting them.  I’ve been one of those people during my time of unemployment.  The problem is that the agencies that serve the blind are not talking to organizations to create this awareness.  Furthermore, there is not nearly enough communication among the various technology-based organizations.  Additionally, due to corporate secrets and trade patents, none of the major companies designing programs seem willing to make themselves available to the assistive technology community so that a true alliance of accessible software creation can exist.

What this ultimately takes is a four-pronged effort.  The agencies that serve the disabled and the blind in particular, must speak up about these issues and must support efforts to fund awareness campaigns.  Second, companies must recognize that denying employment based on a computer is just as unethical as denying employment based on gender or ethnicity.  Third, software and hardware designers must be taught to always think accessibility when designing a new program or device.  It is much easier to build something that properly works with screen readers and other assistive technology from the ground up, than it is to try and retrofit an existing piece of software.  Fourth, all parties, companies, software designers, service agencies, and the blind themselves must pressure law makers to make access to technology a required part of ADA.  Imagine a blind person in a wheelchair having the right to access his office, only to be denied the right to work because his computer cannot read the information properly he needs to do his job.

Here is where you can help.  It is my desire, to at some time during 2008, be it late in the spring, the summer, or the fall, to have a significant symposium that deals with the issue of technology and accessibility in the work place.  It must bring together thousands of representatives from governments of all levels, public and private companies, universities, and other organizations around the United States and the world.  While ultimately I do not yet know if such an event would be held on a university campus, at a major hotel, or by a very sophisticated teleconference, there is an absolute if not dire need for very frank and immediate discussions about these issues.  If discussions and workgroups are not created to directly focus on this issue, it will surely get only worse, and create an entire class of unemployed citizens that are out of work due to the equivalent of a security firewall.

If you have ideas or thoughts, please email me at tx1996aggie@gmail.com and I sincerely ask that you share this with anyone and everyone you know, privately, professionally, and elsewhere.

Sincerely,

Reginald E. Deal