Currently, there are no AODA education standards. However, two AODA standards development committees have drafted recommendations of guidelines that AODA education standards should include. One committee has recommended guidelines for the kindergarten to grade twelve (K-12) education system. In this article, we outline recommendations for assistive technology in school on demand.
The committee’s mandate from the Ontario government requires recommendations focused on the publicly-funded K-12 school system. However, students and educators with disabilities also face barriers in other school settings, including:
- Private schools
- Pre-school programs, such as early literacy programs
Therefore, all these settings should comply with the forthcoming K-12 education standards.
Assistive Technology in School on Demand
General assistive technology training for educators should prepare them in advance to work with students using a variety of accessible hardware and software programs. However, this general advance training cannot include every possible piece of equipment or software that students may use.
For instance, an educator may focus during general training on becoming familiar with the specific screen magnification program their student will use. However, during the school year, the student may begin using another screen magnification program, or start using a screen reader. If the educator is less familiar with these programs, they cannot give the student the support they need. Therefore, educators should have access to on-demand training to learn about specific technologies as their students need them. The Ministry of Education should make training modules available online for teachers and educational assistants to access on demand.
Similarly, students may need to try various types of equipment and software to determine what technology will be most useful for them. Likewise, when students’ technology needs repairs, they should still have access to equipment. Therefore, the Ministry of Education should provide funding for school boards to establish lending libraries of assistive technologies. Students could borrow hardware or access joint software licences on request, to determine whether a technology is suitable for them, before ordering their own. Moreover, multiple school boards could arrange to pool their resources to access wider varieties of technology.
In addition to purchasing technology for the lending libraries, the Ministry should ensure that technology it buys for general use is also accessible. For example, the Ministry should only purchase digital textbooks and other materials that are accessible. This commitment would encourage producers of these materials to prioritize accessibility when they design educational products.