Accessibility Engagement Partner

Upon award of a new contract or a change in scope to an existing contract, the Accessibility Engagement Partner will review the accessibility-related requirements and make recommendations on how we can successfully meet those requirements with a high level of quality. We will identify potential risks related to accessibility and accommodations solutions and help develop risk mitigation plans.

Our team can also work with you to discuss potential opportunities for expanded scope with clients. This might be any service ranging from more robust item accessibility reviews to the creation of assessments designed to work with assistive technology.

In the event that internal capacity for creating and delivering accessible assessment products and services cannot meet the needs of the program, we will help identify and establish relationships with qualified accessibility vendors or consultants.

Your Accessibility Engagement Partner has access to information about the accessibility capabilities of our competitors in the K-12 assessment space and stays up to date on the current trends in accessibility policy. We will use this knowledge to participate in knowledge-sharing with internal teams and clients about what is happening in the world of assessment and how other states are addressing specific access needs.

When clients have a clear policy direction, the Accessibility Engagement Partner can offer guidance on how Pearson solutions support the accessibility and accommodations needs of each student.

Students with disabilities use a wide range of technologies to learn and demonstrate what they know and can do in the instructional environment. Your Accessibility Engagement Partner will help you and your clients understand the needs of students with a wide range of disabilities and the types of technologies that are used instructionally to meet those needs.

This includes accessibility features that are built into computers and mobile devices, extensions that expand the accessibility of web content, and software and hardware that interact with digital and printed assessment content.

If your program supports the use of third-party assistive technology, the Accessibility Engagement Partner can organize demonstrations of assistive technology being used on assessment content. This includes screen readers with refreshable braille devices, speech-to-text and word prediction software, and other assistive technology.

The Accessibility Quality Assurance team conducts regular evaluations of TestNav using a range of assistive technology. The Accessibility Engagement Partner will share testing outcomes and discuss any current access barriers with internal teams and clients.

Creating Accessible Content Accessible Content requires an understanding of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), knowledge of how to appropriately encode content for use with assistive technology, and an understanding of the best practices for providing accessible alternatives to content (such as alternative text for images). We can support teams in understanding the standards and determining where in the development cycle to address content accessibility. The Accessibility Engagement Partner can help teams understand the best approaches to creating items that will work well for students with disabilities by taking full advantage of the capabilities of the assessment delivery system.

Increasingly, our clients are requiring that all products and services used as a part of the assessment solution be accessible. Accessibility is not only a requirement for student assessment content, it is a requirement for training materials, resources, and any publicly posted website content and systems accessed by parents, educators, and the general public. Your Accessibility Engagement Partner can help you build processes that support the creation of accessible services for all parts of the overall assessment solution.

The Accessibility Engagement Partner will seek out information from subject matter experts within the Accessibility Team for Assessments and will pull in the right team members to respond to more complex requests.