TLP Blog

An “accessible syllabus” is highly usable by all students including those with disabilities, more easily updated by the faculty member, and is created using best practices and organization with software faculty already commonly use, such as MS Word. Dozens of faculty have attended TLP’s workshop to make their syllabi accessible, and three of those faculty members were kind enough to share their experiences working with their own syllabus, adopting a syllabus template for a new course, and getting feedback from students on their new syllabus. Presenting on February 26, 2009 at our TILT Symposium about accessible syllabi were Laurel Hill-Ward (Special Education), Kathryn Schifferle (Marketing) and Julie Schneider (Nutrition and Food Science) .

Watch the archive online through Wimba here.

See our new web page answering your frequently asked questions: http://www.csuchico.edu/tlp/accessibility/faq.shtml

Provost Flake announced in December that the short-term goal for our campus is to have all course syllabi accessible to all students. TLP regularly offers a one-hour workshop on how to do this called “Make Your Syllabus Accessible with Microsoft Word”. This past summer, TLP hosted a two-day institute for 60 faculty who learned how to create an accessible syllabus, Universal Design for Learning, and how to use Vista to enhance accessibility for all users. This fall semester, another 14 faculty members took the one-hour syllabus workshop, and during the winter intersession another 26 attended. It’s best to learn in a group! Group workshops for your departments are available, by appointment. Faculty Symposiums for TILT and CELT were offered in the fall, with faculty demonstrating how they are applying these new strategies to their courses.

Confused about how to begin working with ATI? Start by making your syllabus accessible: training, tutorials and a checklist are online at http://www.csuchico.edu/tlp/accessibility/syllabus.

For more information about how TLP is supporting the Accessible Technology Initiative for Chico State faculty, see our Accessibility Page: http://www.csuchico.edu/tlp/accessibility.

The following Technology in Learning and Teaching symposiums will be presented this fall:

Accessibility in Online Course Materials

When & Where: Friday, October 24; 11:30am – 2:00pm in Studio A of MLIB
Presenters: ATI Course Makeover Summer Camp Alumni
Who Should Attend? – All interested faculty

REGISTRATION REQUIRED FOR THIS SYMPOSIUM – REGISTER HERE

When & Where: Thursday, October 30; 11:00am – 12:30pm MLIB 226
Presenters: James Tyler, Online Learning Librarian & Chris LaVerne, Thesis Editor/Adviser, Graduate School
Who Should Attend? – All interested faculty

REGISTRATION IS REQUESTED – REGISTER HERE

When & Where: Friday, Nov. 14; 12:00pm – 2pm in Studio A of MLIB
Moderators: Claudine Franquet, TLP & Jan Costenbader, Math & ATEC
Who Should Attend? – All interested faculty and staff

REGISTRATION IS REQUESTED – REGISTER HERE

CSU, Chico has a goal of making all course syllabi “accessible” this fall, in accordance with the Chancellor’s Office Accessible Technology Initiative (ATI). What does this mean for faculty? If a syllabus is “accessible,” it is in an electronic format such as Word, a Web page, or Acrobat PDF that makes it usable, readable, and even searchable to all students.

TLP offers one-hour workshops called “Make Your Course Syllabus Accessible“. In this workshop, faculty will learn how to create a well-designed syllabus which is more usable and accessible for students with disabilities as well as students of every ability and learning style – and faculty will be able to do the same for all instructional materials they create with the same software.

For more information, see TLP’s Accessibility page which has links to tutorials and even a sample accessible syllabus which faculty may use as a template.

Dipity is a FREE online utility that organizes blogs, pictures, videos and other content from around the web into interactive views.

Here is a visual representation of our TLP blog using Dipity. This could be a great way for instructors to provide an alternate means to represent information visually.

Last but not least of the ATI Course Makeover Summer Camps, group 5 is very engaged in redesigning their courses for accessibility for all their students. Stay tuned to their collaboration and accomplishments. See group photo.

This group was smaller but mighty! July 22-23rd, there were eight mighty faculty who collaborated on redesigning their courses for fall with accessibility in mind. They want to have a reunion before the fall semester begins to continue working together on ideas for improving their course materials for their students offering multiple ways for students to learn the course content. Kudos to all! See photo.

There is still time to sign up for this great two-day faculty workshop. For more information see http://www.csuchico.edu/tlp/accessibility/aticamp.shtml or contact Peter DiFalco at (530) 898-5328.

As a result of the positive reaction to the recent ATI Summer Camp workshops, we will be offering two more instances of this training. The next workshops are set for July 22 & 23, and July 29 & 30. Please contact Laura Sederberg at X 4326 for information if you are interested in learning more about TLP workshops and trainings, or check the workshop calendar to see what we are offering.

ATI Summer Camp Group Two Participants

ATI Summer Camp Group Three Participants

This week has been especially busy for the CSU Chico Technology and Learning Program. For the past two days the department has been conducting accessible technology training for faculty who are redesigning their courses to insure their course materials are accessible to all students. The faculty in the photo comprise the first group to go through the training.

[Front left to right: Hsuying Ward, Ann Bykerk-Kauffman, Rich Rosecrance, Margaret Bierly, Jane Rysberg, Teri Todd, Jeff Jiang, Paula Selvester, Sue Steiner, Kathryn Schifferle, Sara Cooper, Julie Schneider, Katie Whitlock, Steve Koch]