Recorded versions of the Universal Design for Learning webinars are made available to provide additional training and education to all.
Below, you will find links to each of the Webinar Recordings. Each of the recordings, have been sent for Post-Production Captioning, and contain a text transcript link within the description of each video. If you require a disability-related accommodation or auxiliary aid to access a webinar archive video, please contact Meghan Mesanovic at meghan.mesanovic@suny.edu.
A full video list is available in the Access for All Webinar Series: YouTube Playlist.
Teaching, Learning, and Instructional Design
Digital Accessibility
Disability and Neurodiversity
While faculty can provide accessible materials for students, it's not always clear what that means to the students. During this webinar, I'll talk about ways to show students the benefits for accessible content and how they can make sure materials they create are more accessible. Many of the techniques are straightforward to demonstrate and use. There are additional benefits to students if they use these techniques that you can demonstrate, beyond accessibility. What’s in to for students? They can promote their ability to create and understand accessible materials as they search for jobs.
Students thrive with transparent and explicit instruction, which includes clear understanding of not only the “rules” and requirements of course work, but also its underlying principles and purposes. This session introduces participants to strategies, resources, and tools for embedding accessible, inclusive practices in communication and problem-solving in any course. In addition, participants will explore how to prepare and integrate straightforward, ready-to-use “templates” into course work and student products such as assignments, documents, presentations, and digital artifacts.
Accessible Math: Steps to More Inclusive Math Content
Math materials often utilize expressions with seemingly arcane symbols and notation, graphs and diagrams, and spatial reasoning—features that can create access barriers for many students. This session explores the unique accessibility challenges of mathematical content and offers practical strategies to improve clarity and inclusion. Participants will explore why math content presents unique accessibility challenges and review examples of inaccessible math and accessible math. The session will focus on practical workflows for creating accessible math from the start, including using accessible equation editors, writing effective descriptions of graphs and notation, structuring problem sets for flexibility, and checking materials with accessibility tools. Participants leave ready to identify common barriers in their own math materials and apply at least one strategy to make math content more accessible for all students.
Encouraging Inclusivity in Online Classrooms
Unlike in-person classrooms, online classrooms lack the initial familiarity between the students themselves and between them and their instructor. Building that connection in a remote and/or asynchronous environment is vital to improving student learning and outcomes. A learner that feels accepted and heard at the beginning of such a course is much more likely to be involved with the material and to ask for help when needed. Based on the principles of UDL and DEI, this presentation will demonstrate activities that can be implemented in the early stages of online courses from any discipline.
This webinar is designed to equip educators, faculty, instructional designers, and all stakeholders in the realm of online education with innovative strategies for integrating Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles into online discussions.
This webinar discusses how the use of UDL in higher education can serve dual purposes of providing a more accessible education to an increasingly diverse student population, while also privileging formats of expression/assessment that pose challenges for completion via AI technology.
Equity in Assessment
This webinar explores the best practices for designing and implementing inclusive assessments that cater to the diverse needs of students in higher education settings.
This presentation explores the foundational principles of equitable grading and offers practical strategies for implementation in higher education settings.
UDL for STEM Webinar
The Universal Design for Learning in STEM Webinar aims to provide a faculty-focused training for math accessibility, which prioritizes:
Additionally, the UDL for Learning in STEM webinar will focus on the basic principles of Universal Design as applied in STEM courses. The webinar will cover how we can use the foundational mindsets of accessibility, like multiple means of representation into how we share complex mathematical ideas like charts and graphs, and how the systems with the best approaches to math accessibility can aid us in doing that.
Beyond the Image: Writing Alt Text That Includes Everyone
Alternative text and image descriptions are an essential part of inclusive design. Join us for a deep dive into writing effective alternative text, with real-world examples of charts, graphs, diagrams, and even infographics. Learn tips for leveraging AI tools to help you write alternative text. You will leave this session equipped with the skills to ensure every student gets the full picture
Designing Accessible Course Documents
Course documents are often the first point of contact students have with a class, yet many are designed in ways that limit readability and access. Clear structure, consistent formatting, and properly styled text make a significant difference in helping students navigate course materials. Grounded in accessible and inclusive practices, this session will demonstrate how simple adjustments in Word can support the design of syllabi, assignments, and handouts to better serve all students.
Presentations are a core tool for teaching, but design choices such as text size, color contrast, or inconsistent layouts can unintentionally create barriers. Well-structured slides not only make information easier to follow but also support diverse ways of engaging with course content. Building on accessible and inclusive practices, this session will highlight strategies for developing presentations, so they are clearer, more consistent, and more engaging for all students.
Audio and video are powerful teaching resources, yet without accurate captions, transcripts, or thoughtful embedding, they may exclude some students. Media that is inclusive allows learners to review, revisit, and engage with material in multiple ways. Centered on accessible and inclusive practices, this session will show how to design course media so that it promotes broader access, supports varied learning preferences, and strengthens student engagement.
PDFs are widely used in courses, but many lack proper structure or formatting, making them difficult to navigate and use. Inclusive PDFs ensure that course materials remain usable across different platforms and for students with varied needs. With a focus on accessible and inclusive practices, this session will guide participants in developing course resources into PDFs that promote usability, equity, and effective learning opportunities.
*Participants should have basic knowledge of how to create accessible documents and presentation slide decks
Generative AI as a Tool for Accessibility
In the higher education, digital accessibility and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are essential components of a genuinely inclusive academic environment. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine translation technologies represents a transformative step forward in achieving these goals. The potential of AI to enhance digital accessibility and promote DEI is a compelling argument for its adoption across higher education institutions.
Embedding Accessibility into Course Curricula
This workshop shares a fully worked example of the application of backward design to revise the curricula of three diverse graduate courses to embed accessible, inclusive processes and concepts.
We want the next generation of professionals in our disciplines to be well-prepared for their futures. To do this means we need to teach accessibility principles from the start, just like we teach students to follow style guides like MLA and APA. We teach style guides because we value academic integrity. We teach accessibility because we value inclusion.
All of our fields involve the creation of things like presentations, documents, videos, websites, etc. that are shared within teams, organizations, with clients and more broadly to the public. To prepare students for this work we can require the materials they share with peers or more broadly to be accessible. This workshop will walk folks through how to build in these requirements and what supports would need to be in place to make sure students could meet these requirements.
Designing for Readability Webinar
Are you a faculty member struggling to get your students to complete reading assignments? Level up your document and presentation skills by learning how to create these materials so that they are designed to be digestible and easy to read. This session will talk about how to use headings, space, bullets, fonts, and color to make attractive and easy to read materials.
Accessibility for Math Webinar
The Accessibility for Math Webinar - Accessible Equations aims to provide a faculty-focused training for math accessibility, which prioritizes:
Additionally, the Accessible Equations webinar focuses on equations, MathML, and creating math that is high fidelity (zoomable), portable (transferable into other formats like audio or braille), and screen readable (Readable by programs like JAWS, NVDA, and VoiceOver). With a focus on the accessible workflows that instructors can use, whether they prefer to use Microsoft Products, write content directly into the LMS (D2L Brightspace), or write in LaTeX.
Disability, Ableism and Digital Accessibility
Utilizing a Disability Studies lens, this webinar will explore cultural understandings of disability and accessibility challenges that occur in higher education and society, highlighting the experiences of disabled people. Attendees will explore ableism as a form of oppression, identify its presence in social and cultural contexts, and examine the impact of ableism on disabled and non-disabled individuals. Participants will discover how ableism is replicated in society and institutions of higher education and identify ways to make our communities more inclusive of all bodies and minds. We will also examine how ableism manifests in a pervasive lack of accessibility in physical, social, and digital spaces and identify effective approaches for mitigating these accessibility barriers. The webinar will emphasize the importance of faculty engagement in digital accessibility work to meet Title II requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the importance of accessible materials for all students.
Ableism in Higher Education
This webinar will assist participants in understanding ableism as a form of oppression and identifying its presence at our institutions. It will also present the myriad ways that this may impact faculty and students.
This webinar will provide a high-level overview of executive functioning needs for neurodivergent students, with an emphasis on actionable, low response effort universal supports.
This webinar will provide a high-level overview of the continuation of executive functioning through Universal & Tiered Supports.
This workshop will provide a high-level overview of neurodivergence and autism in higher education, as well as universal strategies to support student success in higher education environments.
This webinar will provide an in-depth discussion of universal strategies and will discuss the “why” in supporting self-determination for students with disabilities with a focus on universal supports. We will brainstorm ways we can implement universal design in our work and will engage in case study analysis.
Case Studies of Access in Arts
This session will include examples of ways in which arts organizations and museums have tried to make the visual and performing arts more accessible. Included in this session will be an introduction to resources to support you in doing this work.
This session will provide an overview of neurodiversity (e.g., Autism Spectrum, ADHD). Participants will have an opportunity to apply principles of inclusive teaching to support these students.