G3ict is the Global Initiative for Inclusive ICTs

	Monica Samanta

Article Review: Agencies Overlook Disability Rule

**Section 508 requires that Federal agencies' electronic and information technology is accessible to people with disabilities. IT Accessibility & Workforce Division, in the U.S. General Services Administration's Office of Governmentwide Policy, has been charged with the task of educating Federal employees and building the infrastructure necessary to support Section 508 implementation. Using this web site, Federal employees and the public can access resources for understanding and implementing the requirements of Section 508.
-- http://www.section508.gov/index.cfm

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Jenifer Simpson
What should happen is to have the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) devise some way to ensure that federal supervisors and managers are made responsible in their job descriptions, and rated accordingly during evaluations, to: #1-hire more people with disabilities; #2-ensure that persons with disabilities hired get the accessible technology they need to do their jobs. The number of persons with disabilities in federal jobs is decreasing, rather than increasing, and while accessible technology is only part of this sorry story, unless there is a commitment made -- to hire and to ensure necessary accessibility the day the person with a disability starts the job stuff -- we won't see the kind of implementation of Sec 508 that should happen.
08:04 PM, 04/14/2008

Jim Tobias
Yes, there is always a risk that we are achieving only a "Potemkin Village" of accessibility. If you attend accessible technology conferences and visit the exhibits, you will see a solution for every problem. But how many users actually have those solutions? Similarly, if you only look at policy statements, laws, and regulations, you may conclude that access is guaranteed to all, even though it may exist only on paper. In both cases we need to improve our ability to collect data on real experiences, and we need better frameworks for understanding where "the system" is not working as it was intended to.
02:47 PM, 04/14/2008