[nabs-l] Accessibility in a college classroom

[Karl Martin Adam]

I would suggest you go to class and talk to your instructor 
there, if you haven't heard back by that point.  Sighted people 
often underestimate what blind people can understand from videos 
and overestimate the importance of visuals on powerpoint and 
such.  Actually your DSS office is responsible for making the 
powerpoints accessible to you and having someone describe the 
pictures.  If the instructor sends them the powerpoint ahead of 
time--sending an e-mail is hardly too much work for your 
instructor--they should be able to have someone describe the 
charts and such.  Psychology really isn't very visual, and 
there's no reason for you not to be able to take this class.  
Most of my instructors have been nice and would come over to me 
and quietly describe the videos while they were playing, but if 
this instructor doesn't really want to help you, which is what it 
sounds like, having a reader sit in the class with you might 
work.  To be honest that's probably overkill though.  You could 
most likely understand most of the videos on your own, and maybe 
have the instructor send you the links--again this takes like 30 
seconds for them to do--so you can watch them on your own with 
someone to describe if they're very visual.

Hope this helps,
Karl

 ----- Original Message -----
From: Amber Kraft via nabs-l <nabs-l at nfbnet.org
To: nabs-l at nfbnet.org
Date sent: Tue, 13 Jan 2015 22:59:05 -0600
Subject: [nabs-l] Accessibility in a college classroom

Hello,
   My name is Amber and as this is the first week of my new 
classes I
have ran in to a few problems and I am not sure what to do. I 
have
signed up for a Intro to Psychology on-campus class and after 
signing
up for this class along with the rest of my classes I set up a 
meeting
to meet with the disability cordanater for my school along with 
all of
my new instructers. Before getting to the meeting I received an 
email
from the disability cordanater expressing the psychology 
instructors
concerns for me being able to complete this class. She explained 
that
there are many videos and powerpoints for the on-campus class and
suggested that I take this class online as she would not have the 
time
to make the videos or the powerpoints accessible for me.
After meeting with the disability cordanater and talking to her a
little more about my options for this class it it was agreed that 
I
would be able to make the powerpoints accessible myself as long 
as
they are mostly text and I could have someone attend class with 
me to
explain any videos we may watch in class or explain any pictures 
on
the powerpoints that would need to be described. Also after 
talking
with the disability cordanater about this class it was explained 
to me
that the instructor would not be able to make the accomadations 
that I
needed because in one of her other classes she is teaching she 
has
another student who is blind that she has to make accomadations 
or and
will not have the time to make the accomadations for both of us.
after meeting with the disability cordanater she had told me to 
send
an email to my instructor and explain to her what we have come up 
with
to make the class accessible for me and to make sure that it is 
ok
with her that someone attends class with me as some instructors 
will
not allow that. I did send the instructor an email explaining 
what the
disability cordanater and I talked about and asked if it would be 
ok
with her that someone attends class with me. When sending this 
email I
did CC the disability cordanater on the email as well. Well 
tomorrow
is going to be my first day of this class and I am not sure what 
to do
as I have not received an email back from the instructor. So I am
wondering if anyone has any suggestions on what to do at this 
point?

Thank you
Amber Kraft

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