by Eric Royer, Program Director, Reinert Center
In this blog, I’d like to take the opportunity to look back on the programming and resources the Reinert Center has developed (or collaborated on) this past academic year to support accessibility. Recent changes to Title II of the ADA have moved accessibility, often placed on the pedagogical backburner, to the forefront of effective course design. Many of us are becoming more familiar with accessible course design practices, including those contained in SLU’s new Checklist for Accessible Online Course Materials. At the same time, we continue to explore technologies that make this work more practical and manageable, such as using autocaptions in Panopto to create transcripts or leveraging Ally course accessibility reports to remediate Canvas content. Through it all, our focus remains on designing quality learning experiences that allow all of our students to achieve the learning objectives we’ve set for them, regardless of whether they have a disability or not.
In the past academic year, we offered two one-week, asynchronous online courses on Creating Inclusive Online Courses and Accessibility in Online Formats. As part of our Spring 2026 Technology for Teaching series, we explored the use of Ally as an accessibility tool in Canvas to create materials that are more accessible to online (and all) students. In partnership with the Center for Accessibility and Disability Resources and the Distance Education Office, we offered a two-week asynchronous course on Universal Design and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), along with a facilitated conversation on “Getting Started with Creating Accessible Course Materials.” We also collaborated to launch a new public-facing Canvas resource site that provides further guidance and strategies for making online course materials accessible. Additionally, our colleague Cathy Cooke, in the Distance Education Office, published a blog post on Ally and alt-text: Your final stop on the accessibility digital materials journey
We expanded our resource offerings by developing resource guides on Designing Visually Accessible Slides and Auditory Accessibility when Presenting or Recording a Slide Deck. My colleague Beth Petitjean’s new Four Minute Focus video series now provides a one stop shop for exploring specific accessibility issues and topics in a digestible format, and a recent Notebook blog post provides guidance for those just getting started with digital accessibility.
Looking forward, our programming will build on this momentum to further move the needle on accessibility efforts at SLU. To better support the diverse needs of our students, our one-week online courses in Fall 2026 will take a deeper dive into the topics of Universal Design for Learning, inclusive online teaching, and engaging the online learner. We’re also working on new resources related to Ally and other accessibility tools. Several partnerships with others in the SLU community will continue to support workshops, courses, and resources centered on accessibility.
Finally, we offer one-to-one consultations as a space to think through and apply accessibility strategies in the courses you teach. You can request a confidential consultation by submitting our consultation request form.
The Notebook 