Breaking Down Barriers: The Importance of Accessibility in Online Learning

In celebration of Global Accessibility Awareness Day, we sat down with Gavin Henrick, co-founder and CEO of Brickfield Education Labs, to discuss how leveraging accessibility solutions can help organizations and higher education institutions improve learning experiences for everyone.

Q: Why are accessibility tools so critical to online learning?

Gavin Henrick: When learning programs are designed without considering the wide range of experiences and capabilities that exist in the learner population, that will inevitably create barriers for some learners. Accessibility tools break down those barriers. It’s not a learner’s fault if they have dyslexia or are colorblind,  for example. So accessible content and LMS design—with features like audio recordings and high-contrast colors—make it easier for those individuals to gain the same knowledge as their peers without experiencing additional struggle.

Sarah Horton and Whitney Quesenbery posit in their book, A Web for Everyone: Designing Accessible User Experiences, that one’s human ability combined with an environmental barrier equals having a disability. They also say that “disability is a conflict between someone’s functional capability and the world we have constructed.” As learning designers, it’s our responsibility to design accessible platforms and materials that minimize barriers. Accessibility tools help us do that, and they make learning environments more effective and inclusive for everyone.

Alternative content formats are a great example of accessible content benefiting every learner. Your learners with vision impairments may need an audio file option to access the same content that peers without visual disabilities can read as a PDF or online article. Making that content accessible with alternative formats is essential for the learner with a disability, but it also benefits learners who are capable of reading but don’t have the time to do so. Maybe some learners are working long hours, caring for their families, and only have time to focus on their learning while riding the train or driving to the office. In that case, the audio content reduces that person’s stress and improves their learning experience.

When it comes to learning accessibility, the core principle to follow is to reduce barriers to make your content usable by everyone. If you design a world without barriers, you’ll have a more equitable society.

DOWNLOAD THIS RESOURCE TO LEARN MORE | ‘4 Principles for Accessible Design in Digital Learning’

Q: How do solutions like Brickfield’s Accessibility Toolkit make digital learning better for everyone?

GH: Our vision at Brickfield is that someday we’ll live in a world where learning is accessible to everyone by default. We provide an integrated accessibility solution for Moodle™-based learning platforms like Open LMS that helps organizations and institutions improve accessibility and achieve lasting change. The Accessibility Toolkit helps instructors make their course materials more intuitive and accessible, making the learning environment more effective and inclusive for their users.

Of course, creating lasting change doesn’t happen overnight. It takes the right technology, an accurate understanding of accessibility and how to achieve it, and an organizational culture that supports inclusivity. Brickfield offers clients support with all three of these key components. In addition to the toolkit, we provide reporting, auditing, and analysis to help clients better understand the effectiveness of their accessibility initiatives. We also give clients a two-day onboarding process with workshops that cover:

• How to effectively use the toolkit to improve course materials for learners
• Which KPIs can and should be monitored by the system
• How to build awareness among learners and instructors about the importance of accessible learning materials

Our workshops are designed to teach clients how to use the tool while also assisting them in building their culture of inclusivity. Organizations need that culture to prioritize accessibility initiatives.

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Q: What are some specific ways Brickfield’s Accessibility Toolkit helps learners and instructors?

GH: Student users can download their course resources and books in their preferred file format, including text, audio MP3, ePub and Kindle for eReaders, and electronic braille files. Instructors or LMS administrators can use our tool to audit their courses or their entire learning site to see where they can improve ease of access for learners. These accessibility checks point out what aspects of a course can be improved, and instructors can make adjustments from the report without going back into their course editor. Our bulk fix wizards help instructors automate content remediation and make it easier to fix common issues and other accessibility errors.

We also give our clients a lot of training and support to ensure that instructors are comfortable using the tool and understand why accessible materials are so important. We provide access to self-paced digital courses that help clients build their skills in web, multimedia, and document accessibility. More specifically, we guide instructors on how to improve their images, course layouts, media tables, text, and hyperlinks to make these online learning components more intuitive and accessible.

As an additional support layer, we run weekly Zoom-based training workshops, and instructors can sign up to attend relevant workshops that fit best with their schedules. We also offer weekly accessibility training to all of our clients’ staff members. For those looking to enhance their knowledge further, we have asynchronous mini-MOOCs, and instructors can earn digital badges and certificates of completion that demonstrate their knowledge and skills related to accessible online learning.

Q: It’s been one year since Brickfield and Open LMS announced their collaboration. What kind of impact has this partnership had thus far?

GH: Things have been great. Partnering with Open LMS is helping Brickfield break into new markets and reach more learners. Our ultimate goal is to break down barriers, improve online learning for everyone, and enact lasting change. We have clients in the UK, the US, and Australia, and we’ve had some great outreach. We’re looking forward to our continued shared success.