At Accessibility NSW our aim is to help you create, build and buy accessible content, products and services, so you can support people with the widest range of abilities to do what they need to do. So, without further ado, we have some exciting stuff coming up that we wanted to share with you!
Before we get started, let’s talk about digital accessibility
We all experience changes to our abilities over our life. Some of us might have a temporary or situational change, for example if you broke your arm, or are a new parent holding a baby, or holding a handle on the bus. Some of us have a permanent disability, including nearly 1 in 5 people in NSW.
Digital accessibility means making digital products and services usable by people with the widest possible range of abilities, within the widest possible range of situations. Digital accessibility benefits everyone, including you!
Who is Accessibility NSW?
Our goal at Accessibility NSW is to support you to create, build and buy accessible content, products and services, so you can support people to do what they need to do. Our aim is to be a one-stop-shop for digital accessibility, providing practical tools and resources to support you to make things more accessible. Inclusion and accessibility are at the heart of every project we do, and our people and our customers have been the foundation of our achievements so far.
We’ve got some exciting stuff coming up in the coming year that we wanted to share with you
Accessibility Centre: You will be able to use the centre to conduct usability testing with customers who have diverse needs. This means that the design of your products and services will be informed by the lived experience of your users. The centre also aims to increase understanding of accessibility needs in the community. The Accessibility Centre will be piloted as an online resource, with the potential to expand to a physical space.
Accessibility Compliance Toolkit and Learning: The toolkit is a one-stop-shop for digital accessibility delivery excellence, providing practical tools and resources to support you to build your accessibility skills. The toolkit will be supported by online training modules that will help you learn how to design, deliver, remediate, and buy for accessibility.
Accessibility Ambassadors: The network has representatives from all departments of the NSW Government, including some members have lived experience of disability. This network is an environment for discussion and collaboration for accessibility compliance, content, tools, skills, and capability uplift. They can help you with accessibility questions and knowledge.
Accessibility in Procurement: Accessible digital products and services are essential in making the public sector more inclusive. It also plays a key role in supporting the Premier’s Priority of increasing the proportion of our workforce who identify as living with disability. Accessibility NSW is working with procurement teams, buyers, people with lived experience and suppliers to understand the key challenges. We’re also co-designing solutions to ensure we are buying stuff people can use. We have developed accessibility clauses for the ICT Purchasing Framework and are co-designing guidance and other solutions.
Want to know more?
Accessibility is a journey, not a destination. Our team wants to support you to get started with accessibility, to make progress over perfection. We want to help you build your accessibility capability and feel more confident making digital products and services more accessible. By doing that, we hope we can all support people to do what they need to do.
Accessibility NSW will be showcasing our work at the Digital NSW Showcase in November 2022 so if you are attending, drop by and say hello to our team!
If you need help checking your website, or if you’ve experienced an inaccessible NSW Government website – or even if you have an accessibility idea you’d like to share – please reach out to Digital.Accessibility@customerservice.nsw.gov.au. We’d love to hear from you!