Returning to the Office – Accessible Hybrid meetings


Tuesday, November 28, 2023
1:00 PM - 2:30 PM Eastern Time Zone

Description

Federal workspaces are required to be accessible in both the physical and online environments.

During the period of the COVID-19 Pandemic, the widespread transition to telework made use of virtual meetings and conferences commonplace. Now that agencies are transitioning to a workspace which may be either physical or virtual or a hybrid of both, there are novel issues facing federal accessibility specialists.

This webinar will provide a review of the requirements for making the physical environment accessible under the ABA and the virtual environment accessible under Section 508. Presenters will also offer recommendations, best practices, and identify available resources to maximize participation in the federal workspace, whether virtual, physical or hybrid. Section 508 Coordinators, IT Specialists, Reasonable Accommodation Specialists and Disability Program Managers are encouraged to join this webinar to gain the following unique insights.

Attendees will learn:

1. The requirements for making offices, conference rooms and assembly areas accessible under the Architectural Barriers Act.

2. How the Section 508 Standards and WCAG 2.0 Success Criteria work to ensure an accessible online environment for all.

3. How accommodations can improve the experience of Federal employees in both the physical and virtual environments.

This session is intended for entry-level to intermediate audiences, but all are welcome to join.

Questions can be submitted in advance of the session or can be posed during the live webinar. Video Remote Interpreting (VRI) and real-time captioning will be provided.

Continuing Education Recognition Available

Certificate Credit hours
ACTCP 1.5
Certificate of Attendance 1.5

Speakers:

Timothy Creagan, Senior Accessibility Specialist, U.S. Access Board

Josh Schorr, Training Coordinator and Accessibility Specialist, Office of Technical and Information Services, U.S. Access Board

Questions for presenters:

1 Please address any requirements or best practices for providing closed captioning, or streamtext options. Could you also address this for telehealth, as it seems many platforms used for telehealth do not have a CC option for automatic or pinning a ASL or streamtext. Conducting health appointments from social worker, LPC and/or MD, NP, DNP, etc should be required to have CC, yet there seems to be no education or emphasis on this. Thank you
2 Section F203 General Exceptions provides for 13 General Exceptions and is silent on accessible path of travel. However, F202.4 Alterations Affecting Primary Function Areas, does not require the path of travel to be altered to provide an accessible route if such alterations are disproportionate to the overall alterations in terms of cost and scope. Does this mean that in an existing building that does not have an elevator & alterations to employee offices on the 2nd floor is anticipated, an elevator can be omitted if the cost of the elevator is disproportionate to the office remodel costs? Thank you.
3 Please address the need for nonverbal communication as an accommodation with meeting software. Neurodivergent employees are often excluded in virtual and in-person meetings and experience discrimination. This includes program and job discrimination where being fully verbal is a requirement for employees to participate.

Session Questions

This session is accepting questions from registered users. After you have registered to participate in this session you can submit your questions on your Account Manager page. Please note: the number of questions will be limited and submissions will be closed well before the session starts to provide time to prepare answers.

Privacy Statement

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