Thank you for this post, Megan! I'm sharing the EC's response below (as emailed to you on June 13, 2023). We hope to continue to be in communication and develop these ideas further with you and with others.
Also, this new SIGCHI Medium post from Dhruv Jain, our VP Accessibility, may be a helpful read for those interested in how the EC is currently approaching accessibility across SIGCHI conferences: https://medium.com/sigchi/accessibility-across-sigchi-conferences-today-4676e9fc65c4.
Lots more to be done and we look forward to working together!
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"Dear Megan,
Thank you for your impactful service to the SIGCHI community! We’re grateful for the time and energy you’ve given to making SIGCHI more accessible, and inspiring and supporting many others in doing the same. Thank you!
Your letter brings up several points that are relevant for multiple members of the EC, especially the VP Accessibility and the Accessibility Committee, and then Pubs, Conferences, Finance, and others, and we’d like to start by reinforcing that we are all, as a team, committed to promoting accessibility across the SIG and its conferences. We’re definitely in this together, and aligned with you on your goals, some of which our Accessibility Committee has already been working towards. It would be great to jointly discuss how to take each of your ideas further, when you have bandwidth, in coming weeks or as you prefer.
For now, we address your five points here briefly:
First, regarding publication accessibility: given the proximity to conference pubs’ processes this might require, we think it would be best for us to bring this up with conference leaders and propose that they consider appointing someone in this role for each conference. It appears to us that, given that the publication process is handled by the conferences themselves, they would be best positioned to enable this, with Pubs and Accessibility Committee members providing support and ensuring consistency. Happy to discuss this in more depth.
Second, regarding standard accessibility features and policies, we have been working to offer accessibility guidelines to our conferences and smaller Development Fund-supported events. Again, we are on board with this suggestion and would like to draw on your input and experience.
Third, regarding the boundaries of conference accommodation and accessibility grants, yes, this is important and we already have structures that do this (e.g., the SIGCHI Development Fund and the Gary Marsden Travel Awards). We can discuss how these currently serve the purpose you mentioned, might be improved upon, or if something else entirely might work better.
Fourth, about pathways through the EC: yes, absolutely. We have assigned accessibility liaisons from our committee in the past, and could do this for all conferences, to support on planning and check-ins. We already extend EC funding to conference accessibility beyond the conference’s budget, and are reviewing how we can ensure adequate support for all conferences.
And finally, to your point on anticipating and adjusting. We appreciate that this is not what we want our members and volunteers to have to do, and at the same time, that it is important to recognize that, as a community, we are always learning. A how-to guide for disabled attendees would be great, and we could discuss formats for this, but we also need to create more SIGCHI-wide awareness, more space for these conversations, more teamwork.
To address several of your points above, we would like to do an accessibility-focused session with our conference leaders in August. This would be one of our monthly calls with conference leaders, each of which focuses on a unique set of EC efforts. DJ would lead this, and we invite you to attend, and if you like, to co-lead this with DJ. We can schedule this at a time that you can make.
In addition, we would like to propose an open session with SIGCHI community members to get the how-to guide underway. We have a large number of new SIGCHI members and they would benefit from orientation around accessibility offerings and opportunities on the SIGCHI front.
And as a final recommendation, DJ and I have discussed that the Accessibility Committee could include a small “Advisory Subcommittee”, to make space for time-constrained volunteers to contribute, and offer guidance and feedback when possible. The hope is that this will enable even further coordination and collaboration between SIGCHI, AccessSIGCHI, and other accessibility experts and advocates for jointly pushing accessibility forward. Would you consider joining such a group?
We look forward to meeting to discuss, and to working together on the above!
Warm regards,
Neha & DJ
On behalf of the SIGCHI EC"
