Paul K. Longmore Institute on Disability - People with Disabilities in Tech

Ending the Cycle of Low Expectations

Visitor — Thu, 14 Sep 2017 21:34:51 +0000

By: Danny Thomas Vang

"A school counselor administered the Braille test to me at a different time and place than everyone else so that I could have more time. However, it was not even graded until after the winners had already been announced, and my parents asked how I had done. I can only assume that everyone thought I would not have been competitive. But after it was finally graded, I actually came in second."

How teachers and schools interact with students serves as a major indicator of future success; a negative outlook will stifle potential but a positive outlook can promote innovation and bring out the best in a student. Nicole Torcolini, a blind woman who is a computer programmer in the accessibility department at Google, spoke about how engagement with work readiness programs that outreach to people with disabilities can bridge the gap between a lackluster supportive environment for the disability community and tech relevant careers. She is a proud Stanford graduate who loves to figure out how objects and items operate.

As shown by the opening quotation from Torcolini, low societal expectations of people with disabilities can limit students with disabilities trying to carve out a path in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics). Like Torcolini, many of the other interviewees we spoke with remembered being discouraged from STEM fields – labs tended to be inaccessible and chemistry and math made for more challenging translations to braille.

However, Torcolini was able to break this cycle of low expectations and pursue her dreams because of her supportive family as well as several programs aimed to support people with disabilities pursuing careers in tech: Youth Employment Solutions (YES); Disabilities, Opportunities, Internetworking, and Technology (DO-IT); and camp sessions held by the National Federation of the Blind (NFB).

Torcolini expressed how the employment readiness programs gave her the chance to practice mock interviews, learn more about tech, engage in volunteer jobs, network with people in the field, and create relationships with mentors. She argues that when hosting programs to encourage people to pursue a career in tech, employers should “reserve spots for people with disabilities or reach out to the community to find people to participate in existing programs” to ensure that diverse talent is brought to the workforce. These programs will allow students with disabilities to decide for themselves whether tech is the correct path for them.

The benefits of these programs aren’t just for people with disabilities. Torcolini points out that “There is a misconception that if you have a disability, you cannot work and are going to cost the company a lot of money. But people with disabilities contribute a lot of good ideas and perspectives to companies. Even if they need equipment, people with disabilities still work and can be productive and an asset to the company.”

Torcolini demonstrates the need for people with disabilities in tech in her current role at Google, where she knows she’s making a difference. She explains, “Most people who work on accessibility have never used a screen reader before. If they have, they have played with it. But not actually used it. By hiring me, they got someone who uses a screen reader and knows accessibility problems.”

To learn more about the contributions and perspectives of people with disabilities working in tech, watch our webinar (with audio description and captioning): https://longmoreinstitute.wordpress.com/2017/08/23/beyond-diversity-101-learning-from-the-perspectives-of-people-with-disabilities-in-tech-w-webinar-video/

Read more from our series on disability as #diversityintech:

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Youth Employment Services

There’s Always Something to be Done: Liz Henry on Being Disabled in Tech

Visitor — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 23:43:39 +0000

By: Asa Gordon Liz Henry, Release Manager at Mozilla

Liz is currently the release manager for Mozilla, and has worked in two eras of tech: the 1990s and the mid-2000s to the present. She learned her computer skills from tinkering with computers from a young age, and having the freedom to experiment. In addition to her work in open source software, Liz is a blogger, writer and translator, and is involved in hackerspace projects. Liz deals with mobility impairments, and chronic pain from those impairments, that have a significant effect on how she can work.

The structure of Liz’s work at Mozilla has many benefits for her because of her mobility impairments. Instead of working on a traditional hourly schedule, she has longer timeframes, like six weeks to work on a project. This means that even if she is not productive over a specific hour or even a day, she is very productive over the course of those six weeks. In addition to this, Liz often works remotely with a distributed team who are in many different time zones around the world. It is not important that everyone be working at the same time. It’s more important that communication is strong, persistent, and frequent. If she has a flare-up and is unable to leave the house she still has the possibility of getting work done. She often thinks, as she is working from bed, that this job is perfect for people with mobility issues.

In addition, the fact that her physical condition can change at a moment’s notice means that she is very good at contingency planning. And since software release, as she describes it, can be “a constant disaster,” this skill is very helpful in her workplace. In her opinion, anyone with a disability who has managed their own healthcare competently, with all the medical, insurance, and government bureaucracies, has many skills needed in software project management - tracking a complex process and coordinating work across several teams.

Liz’s relationship with her work in tech has changed over the course of her time working in it. In the ‘90s she was much more uncertain about how people would treat her and her disability. She would often fake being able-bodied for a job interview, scoping out the location days beforehand to see how she could get through it with minimal signs of having a disability, minimizing walking distance. Then when on the job, she would openly use her mobility aids such as cane, crutches, or wheelchair. She worried that if possible employers saw her disability first, they would think she was too unreliable or would be out on sick leave too often. Liz describes this period as, “struggling to be as badass as possible; to be super tough and independent and hide any difficulties. And then I would have that moment where I would go oh no, I am going out on medical leave.” Interestingly, she often got more rude (and illegal) assumptions and questions about her gender, like whether she would get pregnant, than about her disability in this period.

In contrast, Liz has found that now things are more open around disability, although there are still some issues. In general, Liz finds that the places she works at now are more welcoming and upfront about their healthcare policies. She also is more upfront about her needs, partially because she has openly blogged about it, so people are more likely to have come across the information. She also relies on her wheelchair or scooter for mobility, which you can’t exactly hide. She finds that her team often acknowledges the need for skills like contingency planning as well nowadays. Despite this general atmosphere of acceptance, Liz often finds herself the only visibly disabled person or wheelchair user at work. Even at the yearly Mozilla conference, which brings together around 1000 people from the company, she has been the only wheelchair user for many years.

Liz has also found that companies and event organizers could improve their work around accessibility. Like many disabled people, being an unpaid disability consultant (and general diversity since she is also a woman) is, “my extra job, right?” She feels particularly strongly about event accessibility. Many times, a conference will claim they are accessible when they don’t have the structure to make the supposedly accessible spaces as easily usable as the non-accessible parts for able-bodied people. Some examples include having to hunt down the manager with the keys to the freight elevator and the time when Liz had to crawl on stage to give a talk. On this she says, “OK, I have to crawl on stage in front of two thousand people…I can do it, and I did do it, but it was not the frame of mind I wanted to be in, i.e. fury…when I’m on stage giving a talk.” Liz is much more convinced by an event’s or company’s effort when they have detailed accessibility information that is easy to find by default.

Many times, while waiting for a freight elevator or hotel lift to be unlocked, the people Liz are waiting with are mothers with double-wide strollers or an elderly person with a cane. She is also frequently approached by people asking for advice on mobility aids, or even where the nursing room is, because her mobility aids mean she is in a marked state. Because of this, Liz feels it is important to seek solidarity with unexpected groups who can also benefit from disability accommodations. Although it can feel devaluing, as if disabled people aren’t truly the important ones, it is ultimately helpful in getting everyone the services they need. She is honored when people ask her questions like the ones above, because it tells her that those people recognize that solidarity.

Unfortunately, Liz’s marked state doesn’t always produce positive reactions. Since her physical condition changes, she doesn’t fit the common stereotype of the paralyzed wheelchair user. Thus, she will get rude comments like, “what’s your deal, I saw your legs move!” One particularly egregious example of this is when a woman in HR gave her and a chronically ill coworker a “heartfelt speech” about how she would kill herself if she had a disability, since she wouldn’t want to be a burden on her family. When Liz asked if she should kill herself, since she had similar problems, the woman replied that Liz shouldn’t because she has great upper arm strength. Liz says, “And I was like, oh is that the barrier? If I don’t have upper arm strength I should just off myself?” However, Liz has also had significant positive experiences because of her marked state. When Noisebridge, a hackerspace Liz is involved in, was moving spaces she brought up that they should keep wheelchair accessibility in mind. They did, and to this day maintain that accessibility in multiple ways. She says that despite her visibly being around, they probably would not have considered accessibility if she had not mentioned it. Other wheelchair users have benefitted from the constant attention to accessibility at Bay Area hackerspaces like Noisebridge, Sudo Room, and Double Union.

Liz has always been attracted to hackerspaces and open source software for the ideals of the movement. In theory, it is open to anyone, although in practice the same oppressive dynamics as elsewhere can apply. She believes that people and companies who force customers into exclusive, expensive deals are “super evil” whether they are a tech company or a wheelchair manufacturer. Liz thinks Wikipedia, the Internet Archive, Mozilla, and similar organizations are “awesome”, and says that although they can be anarchic and chaotic, the rules for helping exist, “you just have to figure out which part of it you care about.” She also says that in that chaos, “there’s always something to be done.” Volunteering for open source projects can be a good way for people with disabilities to test the waters of the industry, and is a great pathway to get hired.

Students for Access cares about making the tech industry accessible and available to people with disabilities by default, so that others don’t have to be the only disabled person they can find in their workplace. We thank Liz for opening up about her experience and perspective in the tech industry, so that others may learn from it. Read more from our Disability in Tech series here:

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The Glass Elevator: Chris Schlechty’s Path through Tech

Visitor — Mon, 28 Aug 2017 22:07:36 +0000

Chris Schlechty, a Senior Software Engineer at Microsoft, makes his story of breaking into tech as a person with a disability sound rather easy. He visited the Microsoft campus as a student at a nearby high school, and there he learned about the “DO-IT program” (Disability Opportunities Internetworking Technology), run by the University of Washington, which helps people with disabilities secure careers in STEM. By his senior year of high school, he was already a participant with DO-IT and an intern at Microsoft. When he graduated college, he had an offer to come back to Microsoft full time and has remained with the company ever since.

His disability may, in fact, have given him a head start on his career success. He shared, “I’ve had a lot more personal experience with time management and planning than other people have. Being a wheelchair user, I have a lot of experience planning logistics, thinking how I’m going to get from point A to B, so it’s effectively a self-managing perspective. Doing extra planning, figuring out the schedules - it kinda blends into project development and being a manager of people. You already have a subset of those skills.”

At Microsoft, where he serves as his team’s accessibility expert, he has felt accepted and welcomed from day one. His accommodations as a wheelchair rider, namely a well-organized office and an accessible desk, have always been met, and he remarks that his accommodations are treated no differently than other nondisabled team members’ needs, like working from home or being able to leave at a set time to pick up their kids.

It’s outside his place of employment where he sometimes encounters negative perceptions of disability. “People always assume that since I’m in a wheelchair and young, people think I’m not working, living at home, and then they find out that ‘You work at Microsoft? Really?,’ that initial shock that you’re defying what they expected.”

While Chris’s path into tech was straightforward, the path forward for his career is murkier due to “the glass elevator,” (think “glass ceiling,” but a barrier that is more disability-specific). “You can only get so high up before you risk losing your benefits,” Chris explains, “There are a lot of strategies but it’s really hard to navigate, it’s a huge pain… I crossed the threshold and now rely on family for personal care which I know is not a long-term solution and I’m not entirely sure how I’ll navigate that moving forward.”

While the glass elevator is a problem in all employment positions, it’s particularly likely in the tech sector today. Chris added, “The healthcare is great, but you have to be able to live and do stuff other than just going to the doctor. It’s difficult because a lot of the tech jobs are in really expensive areas, so it’s the high cost of housing, and you’d be paying for at least two added personal care assistants. There’s so many extra expenses when you have to rely on other people.”

Chris’s story raises an important point that’s often forgotten when we discuss the need for more diversity in tech. Getting people like Chris, who has clearly been an asset to the company, to work in tech isn’t just about adding a disability page to a company’s website or asking recruiters to strive for more disability hires. It involves opening up the paths for disabled people in hiring, retention, and development, and sometimes, that might involve supporting social changes that go beyond the workplace.

Interested in more on disability in tech? You can watch our webinar “Beyond Diversity 101: Learning from the Perspectives of People with Disabilities in Tech” now (with captioning and audio description).

Read more from our Disability in Tech series here:

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The Future is Now: Virtual Reality Artist & Researcher M Eifler

Visitor — Fri, 25 Aug 2017 17:08:45 +0000

By: Ellie Gordon M. Eifler

When M Eilfer describes their position on the eleVR team as an artist/ researcher “who works on virtual and augmented reality systems,” you might feel as though you have slipped into the pages of a really good sci-fi novel. It would make sense then, that their office/ studio in a lofty industrial building in downtown San Francisco would look like a futuristic art laboratory. Once you leave your shoes at the door and walk past the large geometric shaped sculptures to sit on green and purple mats, you notice that the brick walls are strung with series of bright abstract paintings. Instead of a desk, M’s computer sits on a low to ground table surrounded by red cushions and yoga blocks.

M is one of four people on the eleVR team, a non-profit research project of the Human Advancement Research Community, that studies and experiments with virtual reality and immersive virtual media in order to understand and develop new ways of thinking with computation. EleVR’s many projects, shown on their website, can look like everything from mathematical experiments to Seuss-like art projects that combine both real and virtual materials. In 2014, the team created the first spherical video player for web virtual reality. Instead of having hard deadlines or end-goals, the team works from an open ended research model in which technological inventions affects how their psychical testing is done and how the material practice is done in turn aids the development of new technology. This, M believes, “is the future of technology research."

The cyclical process of research and art making is something M learned when they were sick and out of work for many years due to a traumatic brain injury caused by carbon monoxide/ chlorine gas poisoning they were exposed to at a swimming pool when they were ten. When M was home-bound they “became an artist because [they] needed a way to function and learn how to be an adult with a body that couldn’t do what [they] thought it would be able to do.” From their years at home, they found that art was a therapeutic and transformative tool that taught them how to be a hard worker and creative problem solver - all skills they use in in their work at eleVR. M's customized workspace.

M says their full-time work and productivity is not only supported by their personally curated environment but also because of a culture of trust built with their intimate and highly collaborative team. Chronic migraines, extreme heat sensitivity and spontaneous loss of motor skills leave M. incapacitated for moments throughout the week. But in the company common space, “there are couches out there, and if I suddenly get a migraine, or suddenly my hands aren’t working, going out and laying on those couches isn’t socially inappropriate at my work environment. If I fall asleep at 2:00 in the afternoon, no one would think ‘oh you’re a lazy human.’” M has not always worked in such an accessible environment and recalled a time at a previous job where the elevator was constantly broken and if they got sick, had to spend 45 minutes going down the stairs on their butt.

M believes that disability inclusion in the workplace is built upon three different elements: physical infrastructure, social infrastructure and personal infrastructure. On a personal level, M says they are fortunate enough to have a supportive partner and service dog who helps them function while working full time. M doesn’t think that every job is able to support every disabled person in all the ways they need, but that they hope that recruiters and managers can start to take a more holistic vision of accommodation that consider factors that go beyond physical access to ensure general life quality. And building a supportive infrastructure at work, M says, goes both ways:

“Not only does the person with the disability trust the environment that they’re working in, so they can disclose and actually ask for what they need…but the working environment also has to trust the person with the disability…if you trust people to do a thing that you need them to do and they trust that they can ask for the things that they need, you will build a work environment that’s better for everyone.”

M admits that asking for needs at work can be very difficult and personal. As a queer, non-binary person, the way M presents themselves is a work of art. They make almost all their own clothes out of funky fabric and often rock cubist-style panting’s on one side of their shaved head. While everyone at work knew of their disabilities and that they were queer, disclosing to their team that they were non-binary, a gender identity on the transgender spectrum, was deeply emotional: “My disability needs a lot of help so I felt like this weird shame… [At first] asking people to change my pronouns [and use them/they] I felt like I’m already asking people to make a mental effort to help me when I’m disabled. It definitely felt like, am I taking up too many mental resources?” M’s coworkers embraced them coming out as non-binary but too often are disabled people forced to compromise aspects of their identity due to ableist cultural standards that pigeon-hole them or threat their needs as burdens.

While universal design may seem like a futuristic fix to access issues in the workplace, M isn’t having it. A universal model would not be realistic to cater to each person’s individual and unique disabilities. Workspaces, they believe need to be custom in their accommodations and flexible to change. The concept of diversity, like universal design, is a buzz word that M is also critical about. Don’t forget, M says, that tech is mostly run, and its work environments deigned by “a network of white boys.” Thinking ahead to the future of the industry, M says; “Disability is not just a hiring pipeline thing… you actually have to every day, on an ongoing basis, support someone that has needs that the rest of people, of many able bodied people in your company are not going to need.”

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Beyond Diversity 101: Learning from the Perspectives of People with Disabilities in Tech (W/ Webinar video!)

Visitor — Thu, 24 Aug 2017 05:54:16 +0000

Missed our webinar on August 22? Well here it is! [Captioned and all visuals audio described.]

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j511DMDAecU?ecver=2]

Related resources:

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Dennis Billups: An Activist through the Disability Rights Movement, Two Tech Booms, and a Housing Crisis

Visitor — Wed, 23 Aug 2017 16:36:18 +0000

By: Asa Arnold

The experiences of Dennis Billups reveal two things that are overlooked in today’s discussions of disabled people in tech: 1) we live in a second tech boom (the first was the “Dot-Com” era at the end of the 1990s) and 2) people with disabilities play important roles in tech that are completely unrelated to programming, development and access. Interviewer Asa Arnold and Dennis Billups

As an African-American man with a visible disability, Dennis predated today’s discussions of diversity in tech by a generation. He worked in the dot-com era. Many times, when he took the train to his job in Silicon Valley he was given free fares because people found it so remarkable that a blind man was going to work at all. A participant in the 504 occupation of the San Francisco Federal Building in 1977, he has long been an activist who focuses on increasing economic power for disabled people [click to view our oral history interview with Dennis to learn more]. Since working as a telephone operator and information specialist for various Silicon Valley companies in the 1990s, he has first-hand experience with the effects of gentrification, the changing skillsets required in today’s tech world compared to thirty years ago, and ideas around people with disabilities. In each area, he finds both positives and negatives.

In the mid-80s, Dennis was looking for a job, but was unable to find one that would let him stay close to his wife who he had recently married. After a while, a representative from the Department of Rehab came to him about a job program in Silicon Valley and said, “We want you to become our poster child because you had a good speaking voice, you speak clearly, and you’re around a lot of people and a lot of people like you.” Dennis enrolled in the program and became a phone operator and information specialist at various computer chip companies in Silicon Valley. He describes his job as being “the person who did the calls, made sure packages got out, faxing in and remembering names of people and changing the phone list…letting people know what’s going on with the company.”

Dennis’ experience working in Silicon Valley during the Dot-Com boom was remarkably positive. This can partially be attributed to his job working well with his personality and skill set, but it was also due to supportive coworkers and workplace accommodations. He had documents provided in braille in addition to teachers who explained what he needed to do; his accommodations were “a natural thing.” Dennis also got on well with people in the office; for example, he would tease them when the lights went out, offering to guide them to the bathroom. One engineer and friend of Dennis’ would give him tours of the workplace, saying “you don’t need to be isolated at that desk all the time.”

With the money from his job and some struggle, Dennis and his wife bought a house in Bayview/Hunter’s Point, San Francisco in 1994 so they could settle down. He lived in the house for 20 years. In 2015, five years after his wife had died and 15 years after being laid off from his job, Dennis found himself being evicted due to failure to make monthly mortgage payments. Believing it unfair as he feels he was not given adequate time to prove he could make payments, having been receiving notification in print rather than braille, he has been challenging the decision. In general, Dennis is disappointed in how gentrification is sweeping San Francisco and pushing many (including disabled people like himself) out of their homes. He finds the trend “really uncomfortable, disheartening, maddening…Bayview and Hunter’s Point were the last community for African Americans.” Despite this, his goal is to return to his home and control some property to stop the gentrification and bring disabled people back into the neighborhood. Dennis says, “it’s never too late, as long as you can get one foothold you can get another one just like they do.”

Like many, Dennis lost his job when the dotcom bubble burst in 2000, in his case because many of his responsibilities as an operator were becoming automated. He recalls two good friends and coworkers warned him ahead of time, “Den, you’re going to get fired, and it has nothing to do with you, it’s a company thing.” He had an opportunity to retrain for working on the web which was just starting to take off, but he decided to stay at home to take care of his wife who had grown increasingly sick. He has been unemployed since then and now focuses on advocacy. Dennis believes “we have a chance to do something for disability, especially when it comes to economic chances.”

Having lived through a disability rights movement, two tech booms, and a housing crisis, Dennis is surprisingly upbeat. “We need all kinds of people and all kinds of opportunities,” he says. “That’s how change happens.”

Students for Access also sees the chance to do something for disability, and aims to improve the employment situation for people with disabilities in tech through our summer project. We thank Dennis for sharing his story with us. Dennis Billups during the 1977 504 sit-in.

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“Blasting a Microphone at the Disability Community”: An Inclusive Environment for Jake Hytken at Airbnb

Visitor — Fri, 18 Aug 2017 18:17:55 +0000

By: Danny Thomas Vang

In early June, an article in The New York Times drew attention to a controversial Rutgers University Study that found “travelers with disabilities (using Airbnb) are more likely to be rejected and less likely to receive preapproval, or temporary clearance, for a potential stay.” This study came on the tails of similar studies that expose racial bias from hosts, and as a result, Airbnb has undergone an initiative to address these barriers to access.

Jake Hytken, Airbnb

Yet from inside the company, Jake Hytken has had a much more positive experience. A consultant for Airbnb, Hytken was hired before this study was released, working on an initiative to allow hosts the ability to assess their home’s accessibility and to provide that information on their profile to help make more rental locations user friendly.

As a gay, Jewish, white male who has been a wheelchair user for half of his life, Hytken acknowledges that he has many privileges, but he has experienced his disability as a negative stigma on many occasions as well. However, disability has never been a source of stigma for him at Airbnb. Hytken is proud that Airbnb has made positive strides toward inclusive design within their products and workforce.

“Where I am at, it is frankly incredible. I know that their product is not perfect for people with disabilities right now, but in terms of progressiveness, I wish that I could have a loud microphone to tell the community that they care and that they are thinking.”

From day one, Hytken felt that the company genuinely sought out his participation and contribution. Airbnb understood that Hytken was new to the organization, so when the New York Times piece from above was written, they ensured that he not be targeted for practices that had been in place before his tenure there.

Within the internal structure of the organization, staff with visible and non-apparent disabilities have created a “ABLE” to start a dialogue about disability awareness, best practices, and challenges in the workplace. Hytken states, “This is not only a support group, but maybe this is the buffer that is the mediator to give the abled colleagues the education about how to have these conversations.”

Hytken is a firm believer that this is the time for people with disabilities to engage with the tech industry because companies are listening and are creating platforms to continue the dialogue. For instance, he pointed out that Google Maps has just incorporated a function that will permit users to label accessible locations such as ramps and bathrooms on the application, making it possible to share experiences and knowledge of the physical landscape with other users who may have similar experiences. “I want to not use regulations as a weapon, but to use your perspective as a weapon and to use that as a point of power.” It is imperative to be present in the conversation and to participate in a collaborative process with all parties. “People do not want to come to the conclusion that I have to do this, people want to feel involved in the movement and not forced into the movement.”

An adventurous person at heart, Jake Hytken is preparing to embark on some traveling of his own around the world and is eager to see what access hurdles he encounters.

Interested in more on disability in tech? On Tuesday, August 22nd, from 2-3:30 pm PST the Students for Access will be hosting a free webinar “Beyond Diversity 101: Learning from the Perspectives of People with Disabilities in Tech.” To join us, please RSVP. Captioning will be provided.

Read more from our Disability in Tech series here:

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Triple Minority and Triple Threat: Eboni Freeman

Visitor — Fri, 18 Aug 2017 17:47:40 +0000

Eboni Freeman describes herself as “a future tech consulting titan who happens to be a Black female with a disability - a triple minority and a triple threat.” As a rising senior at Emory College in Atlanta, Eboni knew Google was the right place for a summer internship due to its positive professional culture. When she disclosed she had a chronic illness in a different company interview, it was suggested that the accommodations Eboni might need would be taxing on the company. Eboni knew that this was not an acceptable response; “I’m not a challenge. I am an exciting, value-adding person on your team. And the fact that I already felt like my disability was going to be seen as a liability was really not exciting.”

In school, Eboni participated in Lime Connect’s national fellowship program, which provided her the skills to ask for the accommodations she needs as well as the confidence to seek employers who would invest in her talents and potential. Eboni admits that during the hiring process, conversations about disability with employers can be difficult. On top of that, having an invisible illness adds to the complexity. The invisibility of Eboni’s illness “is a privilege and a weight to carry.” While people with invisible illness sometimes “pass” as being able bodied and have the option of not always having to disclose, they are often asked to prove that they have a disability. Before her current position at Google, Eboni enjoyed her last internship at a finance service center but occasionally her “Lupus fog” (moments of cognitive impairments that can come with the chronic inflammatory disease) would momentarily get in the way. Eboni struggled to think about the best way to tell her manager without threatening perceptions about her productivity.

Eboni thinks these communication issues could be avoided if these conversations were had at the start of the hiring process instead of becoming an HR problem down the line: “I’d love it if we didn’t even start talking about disability, we just talked about accommodations. Because every single person has different tools that would make them one hundred percent more spectacular at their job. And those tools, resources and open communication can make it better for everyone to work well together and individually.” If companies were up front in initiating causal talk around accommodations, Eboni believes it would signal that they offer a supportive environment for people with disabilities to succeed.

As a “Noogler,” (a new employee), or “Googler” at the company’s headquarters in Mountain View, CA serving as an associate account strategist intern in the global customer experience team, Eboni uses a standing desk along with many other employees. Her desk, along with the company’s instated every half-hour breaks and exercise balls, are not considered accommodations but are instead integrated into the workplace infrastructure itself. Eboni also cites the Google shuttles that she uses to catch an early 7 am ride from Cupertino to Google’s headquarters and around campus as another productivity perk for people of all abilities. But, Eboni says, a generally accommodating workplace culture is not one size fits all: “True disability inclusion means not just providing the custom version of the same solution to each person that requests. True disability inclusion is a conversation, research and analysis of what someone actually needs not just what other people think should work.”

When Eboni began her three-month internship at the beginning of the summer, she discovered Google’s internal disability alliance resource group and joined right away. The group offers a list serve where folks can share perspectives and resources. Eboni also sometimes runs into other Lime Connect fellows around campus and is always happy to see other people with disabilities from her cohort building their careers along-side each other. As a Black, disabled woman, Eboni knows that her identity as a triple minority is not considered to be the typical techie profile, but she tries “to keep it in my mind that not only am I a triple minority, I am also a triple threat because that means I get to bring in three unique perspectives that often aren’t discussed or considered in tech.”

Eboni majored in strategy and management consulting and sees the lack of disabled workers in tech as a business issue. She thinks the tech industry needs to realize that disability is not something separate from them. If approximately 1 in 5 Americans have some form of chronic disability, Eboni said, then this “affects employees, their customers, their stakeholders, and people all over the supply team network.” Hiring more people with disabilities isn’t just an equitable practice, it gives a business access to more perspectives and creates a more accessible product which provides a competitive advantage and affects your bottom line. Eboni cited a recent McKinsey study that backs up her thinking. The 2015 study showed that ethnically and gender diverse companies are more likely to out-perform non-diverse companies above the national medium.

Even though disability is yet to be accounted for in major business diversity studies, Eboni, as a true tech consulting titan would say; “if you are addressing something in the market that other people aren’t, you are going to win a little faster.”

Read more from our Disability in Tech series here:

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People with Disabilities in Tech

Silicon Valley

technology

The Meta Maker of the 21st Century: Joshua Miele’s Path to Accessible Design

Visitor — Wed, 02 Aug 2017 22:52:50 +0000

By: Danny Thomas Vang, Students for Access Intern

Whether it be the layout of a room, the words on a sheet of paper, or the comprehension of how to effectively use a piece of technology, information is the basis for success. Without access to this information, a person will not have the ability to complete a task to their fullest potential. This is why Joshua Miele has made it his mission to bridge the gap between access to information and people with disabilities. Growing up in New York in a supportive environment, there was no doubt in Miele’s mind that he would one day become a scientist. “I have been successful to the degree that I have because of all sorts of luck and circumstance. I have a supportive family and I am a middle class white male. I come from a family where college was not a thing that you might do, it was the thing that you did.” Photo by the New York Times

In October 1973, Miele lost his vision at the age of four because of an unpredictable action from his next door neighbor. Miele heard the doorbell ring while playing in the backyard, so he went to identify who the visitor was. After opening the gate for his neighbor, the last item he saw was the wood paneling in the vestibule; the neighbor had poured a jar of sulfuric acid on his head. Rather than succumb to a sense of hopelessness and despair because of a sudden life change for their family member, his family was supportive in his recovery and in his future endeavors as a blind scientist and engineer. His father built him a bed that had a jungle gym, his mother encouraged him to feel the art at museums, and his siblings would advocate with him in public/private settings.

Throughout his life, Miele had to identify methods of how to gain access to necessary information in course textbooks, in the presentations in the classroom, and in the workplace. It is a conventional perception that the process of an action commences with the implementation of the action itself, but Miele sees this process as a multi-layer procedure for a person with a disability. “Before we can do the actual things we want to do, we have to create solutions just to get access to the information or the physical aspects of what we want to do. As a person with a disability, you don’t just go skiing. You have to figure out how you are going to adapt skiing to be what you want to do or something fun that you can do.” To be a “meta maker” is to be an individual who has to bridge a divide between themselves and an action before doing the task that was in mind from the onset. With personal experience as a blind person and a meta maker in the technology industry, Miele knew that the path of an information accessibility researcher was where he would be able to make the most significant and tangible impact for the community he cares for. Miele believes that the lack of awareness of accessibility and the lack in representation of people with disabilities in the technology industry is a result of low societal expectations. “The failure comes way before you go in for an interview; it’s in school early on. I am talking about the failure of the system to provide for people with disabilities.” In order to create a culture of inclusion, family members and educators must reach youth as young as possible. It is his belief that teaching students without disabilities about accessible design at the commencement of their education rather than after a product is found to be inaccessible will ensure that there will not be a need to retrofit products and will promote a greater comprehension of disability from the outset. In conjunction, positive reinforcements and opportunities to explore the realm of technology as a youth will allow people with disabilities to decide for themselves if this industry suits their interests.

This is not to diminish the current enthusiasm and effort put forth by those individuals without disabilities who seek to create innovative inventions that may increase access to crucial information for people with disabilities. The issue lies when imagination and cultural assumptions lead the production of a novel product in lieu of practical knowledge or conversational interactions with the community. “Because there is no cultural connection or experience with what that disability entails, they don’t necessarily develop technology that is going to have any relevant impact or usefulness.” Exposure to the barriers in the built environment as a youth will promote the effective and conscious development of products that are usable and practical. At this moment, Miele works on the creation of tactile maps of streets across the nation and the subway/metro system in the local area, online accessibility of YouTube videos, and much more at Smith-Kettlewell. However, his pride lies with the Blind Arduino Project, where youth and adults have the ability to gain hands-on experience on how to utilize an electronics platform to build computerized devices integrating sensors, motors, displays, wireless communications, and a host of other tools. “It’s not that I want every kid to be a blind tech nerd, but I want every blind kid to have the right to know whether or not they are a tech nerd.” Joshua Miele strives to use his experience as a meta maker to ensure that future generations of youth with disabilities have minimal gaps to bridge with access to information while simultaneously providing these individuals the tools to become meta makers as well, should the need arise.

Not all people with disabilities need to develop an interest in the field of technology, but it is imperative that everyone has the ability to explore this area of study. The Students for Access Project strives to capture the experiences of people with disabilities who work in tech and inspire both employers and future techies to push for equitable workplaces.

Interested in more on disability in tech? On Tuesday, August 22nd, from 2-3:30 pm PST the Students for Access will be hosting a free webinar "Beyond Diversity 101: Learning from the Perspectives of People with Disabilities in Tech." To join us, please RSVP. Captioning will be provided.

Read more from our Disability in Tech series here:

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People with Disabilities in Tech

Beyond Diversity 101: Learning from the Perspectives of People with Disabilities in Tech, Free Webinar Opportunity

Visitor — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 21:28:40 +0000

“When you're at a space where you feel you belong you feel empowered to be a part of the success of that company. When you're on an island it's hard to succeed.”

-Tiffany Yu, Founder, Diversability

Are you dedicated to your company’s diversity efforts and advocating for a culture of genuine workplace inclusion for people of all identities and abilities? What could you do with an insider’s perspective on best practices for inclusive hiring and retention strategies? On Tuesday, August 22^nd, from 2-3:30 pm PST, The Longmore Institute on Disability at San Francisco State University invites recruiters, managers, human resource professionals, and disabled people in tech to join our free webinar “Beyond Diversity 101: Learning from the Perspectives of People with Disabilities in Tech.” “There’s this trend in the industry of diversity and tech conversations either leaving out disability altogether or mentioning it as a bullet point but nobody knows yet what to do or where to go.” - Ian Smith, Software Engineer, PlanGird

Over the past decade, the tech industry as a whole has come under close scrutiny for a general lack of diversity. Companies have stepped up their efforts to recruit and support the talent of women, people of color and LGBTQ+ professionals. Yet, disability, which affects roughly 1 in 5 people in many forms, is still missing from the majority of discussions and initiatives on inclusion.

“Beyond Diversity 101” is a culminating product of The Students for Access Project, an initiative centered on the belief that personal stories of a variety of disabled people’s lived experiences is vital to advancing social equity.

We will present our findings after a summer of interviews with tech industry professionals working primarily in the Bay Area who shared stories of success and stigma, of barriers and breakthroughs.

“I try to keep it in my mind that not only am I a triple minority, I am also a triple threat because that means I get to bring in three unique perspectives that often aren’t discussed or considered in tech.”

–Eboni Freeman, Associate Account Strategist, Google

By allowing the stories of people with disabilities building their careers in tech to guide us, we can all learn what practices have led to their success and what work is yet to be done. Based on the accumulation of voices heard in our interviews, The Longmore Institute on Disability has developed valuable recommendations for the tech industry. For those invested in supporting prospective hires, coworkers and employees with disabilities, this opportunity will offer takeaway recommendations on recruitment, retention and company growth.

We are so excited to share what we have learned.

To join us, please RSVP. This webinar is captioned and slides will be audio described. Blind participants are encouraged to use the call-in number as the webinar platform is not yet compatible with all screen readers.

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People with Disabilities in Tech