Radical Accessibility
[Music]
so
i would like to start this discussion by
leveling with everyone for a minute
i am preparing to talk about disability
and accessibility
and for many of you in the audience you
are likely thinking to yourself
well this conversation doesn’t include
me but there is a saying that goes that
we are
all one accident and or one
major medical event away from acquiring
a disability
and also the large-scale traumatic
events that have happened within our
society
may exacerbate the disabling impact of
mental health disorders
so when we are talking about disability
we are all in this together
more than you now i would like to rewind
for a second and introduce myself
my name is syria chatters and i am
legally blind and i have albinism
now i i know it’s likely that some of
you out there in the audience may have
immediately thought to yourself
i would have never guessed she is
legally blind trust me
i am and for some of you you may have
also thought well
what does a person who’s legally blind
really look like
me individuals with invisible
disabilities are out there more
than you know up to 34.3
million individuals have invisible
disabilities
from autism to adhd to learning
disorders
to chronic fatigue syndrome arthritis
and diabetes
when my parents found out about my
disability
and genetic condition they were wholly
left alone
to guide not one but two children
through the world with albinism and who
were legally blind
our culture and our culture’s perception
of individuals with disabilities
and accessibility has led us to a world
in which i believe that parents and
caregivers
and eventually the individual who is
differently able themselves
strive to make their disability
invisible
and or strive toward normal rather than
focusing
on how their disability may change their
experience
and in my case help me literally see the
world in a different way
as i indicated earlier when it comes to
being an individual who is differently
able
i am not alone per the cdc
one in four individuals will have a
disability
and or acquire a disability in their
lifetime
disability can impact an individual’s
access to educational
and occupational spaces when it comes to
work
per the bureau of labor statistics only
19 percent of individuals with
disabilities are gainfully employed
and when it comes to african americans
their numbers are even lower at
15 percent compared to 66 percent of
individuals without disabilities
the difference in those numbers are
staggering
but what if i was to tell you that when
it comes to issues of access to
educational
occupational spaces that the issue does
not lie
with the individual with disabilities
but with our culture’s perception
of disability so how do we as a culture
get to a place in which disability
truly means differently abled
so um let’s start with the definition of
disability
the definition of disability wholly
places
individuals with disabilities in the
category
of not as good as less than and
or abnormal this is not only outlined in
countless articles and journals on
disability identity
this is also defined my life
as a young child my father was in the
military and we moved from place to
place
during my k-12 education i would attend
over a dozen schools
every move was marked by that monumental
individualized education plan meeting
better known as an iep an iep is a plan
in which schools
work with students to ensure that
students with disabilities have
accommodations
to ensure that they have a fair and
equal access to education
some of my teachers were amazing and
they worked through accommodations to
a place to which i felt that i did not
have a disability at all
one such teacher was mr plattis my ninth
and tenth grade art teacher
mr plattus wholly believe that any
student can be an artist
he believed it so much that i started to
believe in myself
any barrier that came between me and art
mr plattus was there
to creatively removed i ended up
placing in an international art
competition
and then i moved
to a place an art teacher who shall not
be named
this new art teacher believed that all
of the accommodations that i was
receiving
from the school that i was in before was
cheating
this teacher refused to provide me
accommodations no matter how hard
my mother and father fought they were
only able
to ensure that this teacher was unable
to fail me
my love of art withered and died
i tell you this story not to garner pity
but to emphasize the importance of
centering the needs
of individuals who are differently able
to allow them to thrive
this is the concept behind radical
accessibility
radical accessibility based on mia
mingus’s concept of liberatory
accessibility
centers the voices of individuals who
are differently able
in a radically accessible space we can
change from spaces
that look like this to a culture and
climate
that centers the needs of everyone
centering
the voices and needs of individuals who
may have the least access
can open up our spaces to everyone
because when we consider
the needs of individuals who are
differently abled we are
in a way making places accessible to all
now some of you out there may be
thinking to yourself
radical accessibility yeah that’s great
in theory
but that is going to be pretty difficult
to do and to that i will say
you are absolutely right but
really what things that are worth doing
are actually easy i am going to
challenge you to think about
the reward on the other side with only
15 to 19 percent of individuals with
disabilities
gainfully employed imagine all of the
untapped potential
our society is missing out on simply
because
we are not making all places and spaces
accessible
now let me be clear there is
large scale change that needs to happen
to make our world
radically accessible because the needs
of individuals who are differently abled
cannot wait
but the exciting part about it all is
that we are already on our way
some large-scale traumatic events that
have happened in our society over time
have caused us to make some changes out
of necessity
that we may have previously thought to
be radical
if we work to integrate these
quote-unquote radical changes into our
new normal
we can continue to move forward to make
our spaces
more accessible for all i would like to
offer you some ways large and small
that we can keep integrating these
radical new
thoughts and ways of looking at our
workplaces
and keep moving forward let’s start with
video conferencing i know
i know many of us may be extremely tired
of video conferencing
but for businesses who have been forced
to log on
imagine the millions of individuals who
have access to the workplace
who did not have access before if we
work to maintain some of the courtesies
of video conferencing
we can change the climate of our
workplaces for the better
for those of us who may be tired of
video conferencing i will tell you
personally i love it
being legally blind i am unable to drive
from one place to the next
video conferencing allows me to be able
to access places from the comfort of my
office
and it can also help individuals who may
be differently abled in regards to
mobility
to be able to access workplaces across
the country
from the comfort of their own home next
i would like to encourage you to
say your name the interesting and
awesome part about video conferencing
is your name is in the corner box of
your screen
no matter how many meetings we have been
in together
whether it’s the first second or third
meaning we often try to replicate this
courtesy
by using name tags and name placards
but that courtesy does not work for
everyone trust me i would probably need
to get my face about two inches away
from your
chest to see your name tag too
often we assume that our faces are
memorable
and we forget that not every individual
has the ability to see our face
by saying your name you can help
individuals who may have visual
impairments
or may be blind or may have or be
differently abled due to memory concerns
to be able to focus on the conversation
rather than focusing on trying to
remember
your name one additional thing i’d like
us to think about is to normalize the
use
of shared digital spaces doing this
allows individuals to be able to access
agendas
and powerpoints for meetings by using
the accessibility of their own
technology
using technology can be burdensome but
in this way it’s another way for us to
make
our workplaces accessible for all i am
going to challenge us however
as a society to think even bigger
i challenge us to restructure with the
least
access in mind by designing and thinking
about individuals who may have the least
access in the forefront we could design
spaces and access ways that allow
everyone to be able to equally access
workplaces and educational spaces across
the country
my final challenge is for us to think
about
what is most important and necessary in
educational spaces what that would look
like
is our teachers boiling down the number
of assignments
to those assignments that will help
students to achieve
the key performance indicators and in
organizations
what that would look like is to break
job descriptions down to
the key competencies needed to actually
perform the job
an example of that is as a director of
equity my job is district wide
and it requires me to move from building
to building across
town my job could have easily thrown in
my job description
must have driver’s license but what is
more important
how i get from one place to the next or
the knowledge
and support i’m going to provide when i
get there
drilling down to what is most important
and necessary
has the potential of being able to open
up our educational occupational space
spaces to millions more individuals
i would like you to imagine a world
in which accessibility concerns are a
thing of the past
imagine individuals being able to have
access to all places
and spaces imagine the untapped
potential
our society can benefit from
and now i’d like you to stop imagining
and let’s get to work
thank you