[Athen] Fwd: [CIO] TEACH Act: Good Intentions, Bad Legislation

[Greg Kraus]

Hi All,

EDUCAUSE has posted a response to the TEACH Act.

Greg

--
Greg Kraus
University IT Accessibility Coordinator
NC State University
919.513.4087
gdkraus at ncsu.edu
http://go.ncsu.edu/itaccess

EDUCAUSE IT Accessibility CG Leader
http://educause.edu/groups/itaccess



---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Jarret Cummings <jcummings at educause.edu>
Date: Tue, Sep 16, 2014 at 9:58 AM
Subject: [CIO] TEACH Act: Good Intentions, Bad Legislation
To: CIO at listserv.educause.edu


The American Council on Education (ACE) and EDUCAUSE published a joint
piece in today’s Inside Higher Education explaining the higher
education community’s opposition to the TEACH Act
(https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2014/09/16/essay-criticizing-teach-act).



This bill, originally proposed by the National Federation of the Blind
and currently under consideration in Congress, purports to establish
voluntary guidelines for accessible instructional materials and
related technologies in higher education. It further describes those
proposed guidelines as safe harbors that would protect institutions
adopting compliant materials and technologies from litigation under
current accessibility laws and regulations.



Unfortunately, while we share the goal of improving the accessibility
of digital instructional materials, TEACH is written in such a way
that it would inadvertently work against that goal. It would impose on
higher education – and only on higher education – a new standard for
accessibility that would essentially eliminate the existing provisions
of accessibility law and regulation that allow institutions to meet a
student’s need in relation to the curriculum in question and the
technologies available.



Instead, it would restrict campus technology use to only those digital
instructional materials and related technologies that are fully
accessible from the start to all students regardless of the nature of
the disability, the commercial availability of such materials and
technologies, and the availability of reasonable accommodations. The
bill also includes no provision for the “installed base” of campus
technologies and materials, so at a minimum, the full scope of campus
instructional technology could be impacted.



EDUCAUSE, ACE, and other leading associations will share more
information on our concerns about the bill shortly. In the meantime,
we are committed to finding an approach to improving the accessibility
of digital instructional materials and technologies that will allow
higher education to continue advancing learning for all students via
technology.



_______________________________________________

Jarret S. Cummings

Director of Policy and External Relations

EDUCAUSE
Uncommon Thinking for the Common Good
1150 18th Street, NW, Suite 900 Washington, DC 20036
direct: 202.331.5372 | main: 202.872.4200 | educause.edu



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