The Special Educational Needs and Disability Rights Act
Are local authorities all set for change? - promoting social inclusion and tackling the digital divide. October, 2001.
A shorter version of this article has been published by Local Government Chronicle, October, 2001.
With the passing of the Special Educational Needs and Disability Rights Act (SEN) in May 11th 2001 education has finally been brought within the scope of the Disability Discrimination Act, 1995. New responsibilities have been placed upon local authorities, schools, nursery schools, universities and colleges to ensure that disabled students are placed at no ‘substantial disadvantage’ in relation to their non-disabled peers. The Act requires ‘reasonable adjustments’ to be made to ensure that disabled students are not treated ‘less favourably’ than other students. The legislation applies to England, Wales and Scotland, and covers both pre and post-16 education. Discrimination against disabled students in the provision of education, training and related services is being made unlawful. The legislation is extensive in its scope and includes services such as community education, youth services, pre-five nursery provision, student services and leisure and recreational facilities.
The timetable for the introduction of the legislation is in three stages:
The main new sections of the Act will become law on 1st September, 2001 and from this date it will be unlawful to treat disabled people or students less favourably than others . By this date responsible bodies will be required to carry out reasonable adjustments to ensure that disabled individuals are placed at no substantial disadvantage.
Responsible bodies will also be required to make any adjustments involving provision of auxiliary aids and services (e.g. provision of interpreters) by 1st September, 2003.
Any physical adjustments being implemented to ensure compliance with the SEN Act will require to be carried out by 1st September, 2005.
Concilation Service
The Disibility Rights Commission is setting up a Conciliation Service to support any cases raised under the SEN ActConsultation Exercise
A consultation exercise is being carried out by DRC with regard to the SEN Act, to be completed by March, 2002. Two Draft Codes of Practice, a Schools Code of Practice and a Post-16 Code of Practice have been produced by the DRC and these are available on their Web site. (http://www.drc-gb.org).
The digital divide and disabled people.
The SEN Act should stimulate enthusiasm for positive change within local government services, higher education and further education - it fits so well with current policies which promote social inclusion, including tackling the digital divide. However, there is an important area, which tends to be neglected but will require to be addressed under the terms of the new legislation. This is the provision of accessible information on the Internet - and the serious implications this has for many disabled people.
Despite the growth of physical access to computers and the Internet in schools and communities, and the expansion of information and training available on line - the problems encountered by many disabled people in accessing the World Wide Web are not being addressed.
This is not a new problem, as far back as 1996 Gregory (Informability Manual - Central Office of Information, HMS0) predicted that:
"The move away from a text based Internet will have an impact on the estimated 1.7 million of the population in the UK who are unable to read standard print with any ease" (In formability Manual - Central Office of Information, Gregory, 1996 (HMSO)
More recently warnings have been voiced by the Data Monitor that the UK six million people could be: "set to miss out on the benefits of the digital revolution unless the issues of access to the Web are addressed.". Jim Byrne of the Making Connections Unit, Glasgow Caledonian University specifically highlighted this issue with regard to education: "the World Wide Web "the killer application" of the Internet - remains inaccessible to many within our schools, colleges and universities". (Times Educational Supplement Scotland, July, 2001).
Unfortunately, it has been estimated that as many as 3 out of 4 Web sites are inaccessible. Access is denied to many disabled people because of bad practice in Web site design. . This includes people, who are blind or have visual impairments; those who are deaf or have hearing impairments and those with motor impairments and cognitive difficulties.
The Potential of the SEN Act
Potentially the SEN Act will make our schools, colleges and universities more inclusive by applying pressure to ensure that their Web sites are accessible. At present many disabled people are disadvantaged because they cannot easily carry out tasks being taken for granted by non-disabled students; applying on line for admission to colleges or universities, participating in on line learning opportunities and carrying out research using the Internet. Martin Sloan in a paper examining legal issues relating to the growth of e-commerce and e-learning points out that: "In an age when the Internet is increasingly being used in Higher Education as a teaching tool it would appear that accessibility issues might well arise under the 2001 Act.. (Web Accessibility and the DDA, Journal of Information, Law & Technology)
However, the question of whether or not Web sites fall within the new act is not straightforward. Sloan, after carefully considering the issues and making comparisons with similar laws, which have been applied in other countries, concluded that: the accessibility of Web sites provided by service providers would fall under Part 111 of the DDA. He goes on to suggest that this obligation would extend services to current students with the introduction of the SEN Act.
By law, services which should be provided to disabled students would include auxiliary aids such as speech readers or Braille pads when providing Internet Access. Of course, speech enabled devices and Braille readers can only operate successfully when Web sites are accessible so the provision of such auxiliary aids does not overcome the problem of inaccessible Web sites. Another area, which has to be considered relates to teaching methods and Sloan draws attention to the relevance of of accessibiity to distance learning projects, including the proposed e-University. He argues that lack of access to this facility would surely constitute less favourable treatment.
Reasonable adjustments
Within the Draft Codes of Practice the duty of responsible bodies is explained together and guidance with regard to determining what is meant by ‘reasonable’. Also a number of areas are listed and examples provided which will assist organisations in deciding what are justifiable and reasonable requirements. . Two areas which are likely to be carefully considered by organisations, with regard to revamping or developing Web sites are: the cost of taking a particular step and the need to maintain academic standards and quality of services.
The World Wide Web Accessibility Initiative provides Accessibilty Guidelines (http://www.W3.org) and organisations can be assured that costs of compliance are modest. It is no more expensive to design and develop an accessible Web site than it is to produce an inaccessible site. Also they may want to consider whether they can afford not to have accessible Web sites, Accessible Web sites are not only essential for disabled people to access the Internet, they are beneficial for all users. They have many advantages to offer, including economic advantages. They tend to have lower site management costs and also have the potential to reach a much larger audience. Furthermore, they are more usable for everyone and easier to find on the search engines. Good design ensures that everyone can access and use the information on the Web, this includes people using older browsers as well as those using up to date technological devices such as Personal Digital Assistants and Digital TV.
Accessibility and E-Learning
One area, which merits important financial consideration relating to accessibility and usability (two areas which are closely linked), is that of eLearning. Failure to offer on line learning courses on accessible Web sites could have serious consequences for Universities and FE Colleges. Anthony Quinn has carried out research in this area and highlights problems relating to eLearning in his article: ‘Why People Can’t Use eLearning’ (http://www.frontend.com). Quinn points out that: "unusable interfaces will cost eLearning companies billions of dollars in lost revenues because many people won’t be able to use their products"
Quality and standards are also of prime importance to educational institutions. It is likely that the provision of accessible information would be considered an important indicator of quality within an institution. This is made clear by The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education in their ‘Code of Practice - Quality and Standards in Higher Education’ which recommends that dissemination of information should be in accessible formats. Specific recommendations are also made with regard to accessibility on the Internet: "electronic information, including web sites, is accessible to students with disabilities" (Section 3) It could be argued that, rather than threatening quality and standards, more accessible information would improve quality, and that accessibility would be an essential indicator of the quality of an organisation’s service.
Anticipating Change
The SEN Act expects responsible bodies to have an anticipatory approach in tackling issues which place disabled students and school children at a disadvantage. It has previously been indicated that problems created by inaccessible Web sites have long been acknowledged. Specific research both in the UK and USA has specifically highlighted problems within educational provision. Studies such as Lesley Waddell’s (Evaluation of the RNIB Pilot Internet Project in the UK) and Cyndi Rowland’s study "Accessibility of the Internet in Post Secondary Education" in the USA serve to highlight how disabled students are disadvantaged by not being able to access poorly designed web sites."
Impact of legislation in USA
However, in the UK in the world of Web design there is still a lack of awareness, knowledge and skills relating to this area. In other countries the drive for accessibility has come earlier and is much stronger and more extensive. In anticipation of new legislation dramatic changes have taken place in the USA with regard to the issue of access to information technology for disabled people. On June 25th 2001 Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act Amendments, 1998 became law.. The Act’s goal is to ensure that federal employees and members of the public, who are disabled have the same access to information technology as those who are not disabled.. John Williams writing in BusinessWeekOnline points out that: "At stake is the $40 billion annual federal IT market" . In the same article Williams suggests that:
"You can bet disabled Web users will be testing the federal agencies Web sites for accessibility. In fact, there is outright fear within many agencies that they won’t be ready to meet the avalanche of Web Inquiries from people with disabilities."
(http://www.section508.gov/classes.html)
Maybe in the not too distant future we will see something of the fervour for change brought about by Section 508 in the USA. In the meantime local authorities, schools, universities and colleges do need to anticipate accountability to the disabled community as within Disability Interest and Support Groups there has long been awareness around the issue of accessibility on the Internet. Disabled Internet users will be more aware than most of both the advantages and redress offered by the introduction of the SEN Act.
Also there will be no doubt that Maria Eagle the newly appointed Minister for Disability will be monitoring the impact of the new legislation.
Pat Byrne -ScotConnect, September, 2001
ScotConnect in partnership with the Making Connections Unit, Glasgow Caledonian University are running training courses covering the SEN Act and Accessible Information on the Internet. For details contact: pat@glasgowwestend.co.uk