[Blindtlk] Inaccessible conference website

Sun Jan 12 03:49:26 UTC 2014

Arielle,
	I would say this is directly related to the human services
profession, as research is an integral part of our profession. I will
forward your message to Merry 
Schoch, the division president, and our legal counsel for their information.

With warm regards,
Marion Gwizdala

-----Original Message-----
From: blindtlk [mailto:blindtlk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Arielle
Silverman
Sent: Saturday, January 11, 2014 12:31 PM
To: Blind Talk Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Blindtlk] Inaccessible conference website

Hi Marion,

The conference sponsor is the Society for Personality and Social Psychology,
a private membership organization of research psychologists. It doesn't
directly relate to human services as most members are academic researchers,
though a few may have clinical practices too. I believe the conference uses
a specialized online platform for online registration, which other
conferences may use as well, but I don't recall the name of the platform.

Best,
Arielle

On 1/11/14, National Association of Guide Dog Users <blind411 at verizon.net>
wrote:
> Arielle,
> 	I have a couple questions concerning this. What sort of conference
is 
> this? Is the sponsor a public (governmental) or private entity? As the 
> Co-Chair of the Policy & Law Committee of the Human Services Division 
> of the National Federation of the Blind, I am gathering information 
> concerning the inaccessibility of services that tend to discriminate 
> against blind professionals in the human service fields. We have 
> already made progress on this issue with the practice tests and 
> licensing examinations of the American Board of Clinical Social 
> Workers. You may have noticed a message from Valerie Yingling  
> concerning Electronic Health Records (HER); This is also an initiative 
> of the division. We will be having a Policy & Law Committee meeting 
> tomorrow and would like more information concerning this, if it is 
> applicable. You can either reply to this list or write to me 
> personally at
>
> Marion.Gwizdala at verizon.net
>
> Fraternally yours,
> Marion Gwizdala
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blindtlk [mailto:blindtlk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of 
> Arielle Silverman
> Sent: Friday, January 10, 2014 3:12 PM
> To: Blind Academics Discussion List
> Cc: blindtlk at nfbnet.org
> Subject: [Blindtlk] Inaccessible conference website
>
> Dear all,
>
> I'm attending an academic conference next month and as I was about to 
> submit my online registration, discovered an inaccessible slider that 
> had to be slid to the right before the website would let me submit my 
> payment info. I complained to the registrar that as a blind person I 
> couldn't access the online conference registration, and was told to 
> try a different Web browser.
> When I explained that the problem wasn't with the browser's interface 
> but with the use of  a slider, which to my knowledge cannot interact 
> with JAWS, the registrar offered me to fill out a PDF registration 
> form and said that they cannot remove the slider because it offers 
> enhanced security. She did seem attentive to my concerns but I am not 
> terribly confident that the problem will be remedied on the website. I 
> eventually decided to have my husband help me with the slider because 
> the PDF registration form could not be filled out by computer and so I 
> would have needed sighted help regardless, and doing the slider required
less sighted help.
>
> I have a few questions for you guys. First, have any of you had 
> success handling these sliders with JAWS? I've never seen such an 
> element before on a Web page. Second, do you know if conference 
> websites are legally required to be accessible under Section 508? If 
> so, I would like to push the matter further. The website for this 
> conference had multiple accessibility issues although the slider one 
> was the most blatant. I complained to them back in
> 2009 and they fixed some of the problems but not all of them. Third, 
> is it really true that a slider offers maximum security and if so, 
> what accessible remedy should I suggest to them that doesn't 
> compromise security?
>
> Thanks,
> Arielle
>
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