AccessComputing

Many different curricula are used to teach Advanced Placement (AP) Computer Science Principles (CSP). Most of these curricula are not fully accessible to students with disabilities, largely because the programming tools that they utilize are not accessible to students who are blind or visually impaired and typically use screen readers to access content presented on the screen. Screen readers can read text aloud to users but cannot interpret content presented in images.

Code.org’s Hour of Code activities are one-hour tutorials designed to expose K-12 students to coding and other aspects of computer science. Although there are numerous Hour of Code projects, many are not accessible to students who are blind and visually impaired. However, there are two that utilize the Quorum programming language and are accessible.

XML is short for Extensible Markup Language and is a specification from the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). It is a meta-syntax, used to define new markup languages. XML's key benefits are its extensibility (XML-based languages can be extended with new custom tags) and its portability (XML-based languages can be used across different platforms and devices).

Information and communications technology may be inaccessible to people with disabilities if it provides only one way for users to gain access to or manipulate information.

Computers, multimedia, software, electronic communication, the web, and other information technologies are common in educational institutions today. The ability to access and use this technology has become essential to full participation of students in academic and other school-related activities. For most educational institutions, accessibility is commonly addressed as an afterthought and on an individual basis, often making it difficult, time-consuming, and costly to provide adequate access.

The Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) is a standard template developed by the Information Technology Industry Council (ITI) in partnership with the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA). Information and communication technology vendors can fill out a VPAT to document the extent to which their products comply with accessibility standards.