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Disability Inclusion · Foundations
Find the barriers hiding in rooms, documents, meetings, videos and emergency plans, and fix the ones you own before anyone has to ask.
45–55 minutes · 4 lessons · Voluntary learning
Tell accessibility by design from individual accommodation, then look at the building and the emergency plan the way a person who cannot take the stairs or hear the alarm would.
Make the documents you already write usable by screen readers, magnifiers and tired human beings: real text, headings, alt text, descriptive links, contrast, proper tables and plain language.
Learn the four principles behind every digital accessibility standard, the difference between automatic and accurate captions, and the settings and habits that make a virtual or hybrid meeting work for everyone.
Walk through a meeting invitation, a web form, a PDF, a training video and a community event; find the barriers, pair each with a fix, and decide what you own and what to route.
Take the next document, invitation or form you would have sent as usual, run it through the checks in this course, fix what fails, and change the template so the fix stays.
Most of the barriers a disabled person meets in a workday were created by ordinary staff doing ordinary tasks: saving a scan as a PDF, booking the room upstairs, leaving captions off, writing a notice nobody can follow. This course shows you where those barriers hide and how to remove them at the source. You will learn the difference between accessibility by design and individual accommodation, the handful of checks that make a document, a meeting or a video usable by everyone, and how to walk through your own work and spot what would stop someone. None of it requires special software. All of it requires looking.
Design first, accommodate second. Real text, real headings, captions on, a room with a way out.
Catch the common barriers in everyday work before they reach a person, and route the rest with an owner and a date.
Walk five real items from your unit through the checks this month, fix what you own, and send the rest to their owners in writing.
Participation and course completion in this program do not count toward DHS-required training credits unless management, a director, or DHS leadership expressly approves an exception.
Plain explanation of what web accessibility is and whom it serves.
The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines and the perceivable, operable, understandable and robust principles.
Federal guidance on accessible documents, presentations, video and meetings.
Accessibility standards for buildings, facilities and information technology, including the ADA Standards for Accessible Design.
Guidance on writing for the reader: action first, short sentences, familiar words and clear structure.
Definition of disability inclusion and strategies for accessible, welcoming programs and meetings.