CREATE Co-Director Jacob O. Wobbrock Named ACM Fellow

We congratulate CREATE Co-Director Jacob O. Wobbrock on being named an ACM Fellow by the Association for Computing Machinery for his contributions to human-computer interaction and accessible computing!

Wobbrock’s research seeks to understand and improve people’s interactions with computers and information, especially for people with disabilities. He is the primary creator of ability-based design, which scrutinizes the ability assumptions embedded in technologies in an effort to create systems better matched to what people can do.

Jacob O. Wobbrock, a 40-something white man with short hair, a beard, and glasses. He is smiling in front of a white board.

For this and his other contributions to accessible computing, he received the 2017 ACM SIGCHI Social Impact Award and the 2019 SIGACCESS ASSETS Paper Impact Award. He was also inducted to the ACM CHI Academy in 2019. In addition to being a CREATE founding co-director, Professor Wobbrock directs the ACE Lab and is a founding member of UW’s cross-campus DUB Group.

The ACM is the world’s largest educational and scientific computing society. Its Fellows program recognizes the top 1% of members for their outstanding accomplishments in computing and information technology and/or outstanding service to the ACM and the larger computing community. ACM Fellows are nominated by their peers, with nominations reviewed by a distinguished selection committee.

Wobbrock, and the other 70 Fellows named in 2021 will be formally recognized at the ACM Awards Banquet in San Francisco in June.

This article is adapted from the UW Information School (iSchool) article and the ACM press release.

Findlater and co-authors receive 2020 Best Paper award for study of Voice Assistants by Older Adults

The Association for Computing Machinery announced the 2020 Best Paper Award goes to Use of Intelligent Voice Assistants by Older Adults with Low Technology Use, co-authored by CREATE associate director Leah Findlater, Alisha Pradhan and Amanda Lazar.

The team conducted a 3-week field deployment of the Amazon Echo Dot in the homes of seven older adults to understand how older, infrequent users of technology perceive and use voice assistants. They observed consistent usage for finding health-related information, highlighting concerns about credibility of information with this new interaction medium.

Leah Findlater, CREATE Associate Director

And while voice-based interaction appeared to be easy to learn, the study pointed to some usability and accessibility challenges to be addressed, including:

Devices timing out before users complete their voice commands
Unclear and inconsistent voice commands that must be remembered
Dependency on paired computing devices
Lack of awareness of the voice assistance device’s capabilities

Perkins School touts Blocks4All for blind and low vision students

The Perkins School for the Blind — one of the most famous schools for the blind in the world — is heavy into technology for their students. Recently they touted the Blocks4All app, paired with a Dash robot, as a tool to teach block coding to blind and low vision students.

“The Blocks4All app is completely accessible on the iPad with VoiceOver and Dash carries out the commands, making it easy for students who are visually impaired to know if they used the correct commands,” wrote Diane Brauner, Perkins’ manager of Paths to Technology.

Blocks4All was developed by Lauren Milne, a former student of CREATE Director of Education, Richard Ladner. Milne is now an Assistant Professor at Macalester College in Minnesota.

This past summer, Milne and Ladner got together again with several students to make Blocks4All even more accessible and to create two activities for the Hour of Code.

Learn more:

Full article on the Paths to Technology blog
Blocks4All video and description

Ph.D. student Ather Sharif targets personalized design, visualizations, ableism

Media sites offer digital graphics for important information such as election polling data, stock market trends, and COVID-19, excluding many users. CREATE Ph.D. student Ather Sharif‘s research on Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) focuses on designing data visualizations to be accessible by people with low vision or who are blind.

“We have built a world where people who are blind or have low vision are unable to… participate in the financial world or polling information. We have built technology where we have excluded them on a very fundamental level.”

Ather Sharif, doctoral student in the Allen School at UW

Before a car accident and intense physical therapy to recover the use of his hands, Sharif built websites without considering whether people with disabilities could access them. “It was only after I became a part of the disability community that I started to realize how inequitable the world is for people with disabilities, and I wanted to do something to fix that using the skills I already had,” Sharif said.

With his new perspective, Sharif wants to see technology being built to adapt to the needs of its users — personalized technology as opposed to universal design, which is designed for the majority and forces users to adapt to technology.

A doctoral student in the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering, Sharif is co-advised by CREATE faculty Katharina Reinecke and CREATE Co-Director Jacob O. Wobbrock.

This article was adapted and excerpted from the UW Graduate School’s profile of Ather Sharif and his research. Read the full article.

Feldner and Steele’s ‘Reimagining Mobility’ series featured in The Daily

Collaboration and diverse perspectives and approaches are at the heart of CREATE’s mission to make technology accessible and make the world accessible though technology.

One program developed by CREATE faculty looks at mobility solutions and ways to eliminate barriers. Hosted by CREATE associate directors Kat Steele and Heather Feldner, the Reimagining Mobility Conversation Hub brings in speakers from a variety of backgrounds and industries to inspire conversations about the future of mobility.

The UW student newspaper, The Daily, featured the program in Reimagining Mobility: Professors Amplify Disabled Voices in the November 15 2021 issue.

Working at a children’s hospital made me want to grow my knowledge as an engineer. There was just this disconnect of how we thought about technology, how we thought about what was possible, and what was actually available.

Dr. Kat Steele, CREATE Associate Director and Albert S. Kobayashi Endowed Professor of Mechanical Engineering.

How we move around really impacts our social relationships. It impacts our ability to participate in school, in jobs, in social events — it’s really one of our major connections to the world. The end goal of mobility is to engage in our lives and participate meaningfully.

Dr. Heather Feldner, CREATE Associate Director and
Assistant Professor, Rehabilitation Medicine: Physical Therapy

Year 1 Impact Report

The CREATE Year 1 Impact Report describes the major accomplishments of CREATE in Academic Year (AY) 2020-2021. It also lays out the goals for AY 2021-2022.

Front page of the accessible CREATE impact report with highlights and photos from research

In this report:

Research: papers, collaboration, hiring and awards
Education: student programs, workshops and more awards
Translation: Conversation, Google Play store, Community Day
Operations: Advisory board, leadership, membership
Fundraising: progress toward five-year, $10M goal

Faculty and Alumni win awards at ASSETS 2021

Congrats to the many accessibility leaders from CREATE and UW who won awards at ASSETS 2021.

Co-authored by Jennifer Mankoff (a founding co-director of CREATE), Gillian R. Hayes and Devva Kasnitz in 2010, the paper, Disability studies as a source of critical inquiry for the field of assistive technology, has been awarded the 2021 SIGACCESS ASSETS Paper Impact Award at the virtual 2021 ASSETS Conference. This award is given to a “significant innovation or contribution to knowledge that has proved influential” over at least a decade. The paper was cited for groundbreaking and influential work on bridging the gap between the assistive technology research field and the field of disability studies.

The Best Paper Award went to Qisheng Li, Josephine Lee, Christina Zhang and CREATE faculty member Katharina Reinecke for How Online Tests contribute to support systems for people with cognitive and mental disabilities.

The Best Artifact Award went to a UW team Lucy Wang, Isabel Cachola, Jonathan Bragg, Evie Cheng, Chelsea Haupt, Matt Lazke, Bailey Kuehl, Madeleine van Zuylen, Linda Wagner and Daniel Weld for making academic papers accessible through scia11y.

A runner up for Best Artifact Award was Sidewalk Gallery, by Michael Duan, Aroosh Kumar, Mikey Saugstad, Aileen Zeng, Ilia Savin and CREATE Associate Director Jon E. Froehlich. Sidewalk Gallery is an interactive, filterable gallery of over 600,000 crowdsourced sidewalk accessibility images across seven cities in two countries (US and Mexico). It includes five primary accessibility problem types, 35 tag categories, and a 5-point severity scale.

Best paper nominations also went to students Kelly Mack; Venkatesh Potluri; Dhruv Jain; and Erin Beneteau for their paper Mixed abilities and varied experiences: a group auto-ethnography of a virtual summer internship and Kelly Mack for her paper Designing Tools for High-Quality Alt Text Authoring.

Finally, the Best Student Paper Award went to a team including CREATE Alumnus Cynthia Bennett and UW Alumnus Jeffrey P. Bigham for their work on Aided Nonverbal Communication through Physical Expressive Objects

Congrats to all!

Previous ASSETS paper awards for CREATE faculty

CREATE faculty also had many successes at ASSETS 2020 and ASSETS 2019 including:

Best student paper (2020):
Living Disability Theory: Reflections on Access, Research, and Design
Megan Hofmann, Devva Kasnitz, Jennifer Mankoff, Cynthia L Bennett

Best paper (2020):
Input Accessibility: A Large Dataset and Summary Analysis of Age, Motor Ability and Input Performance
Leah Findlater, Lotus Zhang

Best Artifact (2020):

SoundWatch
Dhruv Jain, Hung Ngo, Pratyush Patel, Steven Goodman, Leah Findlater, Jon Froehlich

Paper Impact Award (2019):
Slide rule: making mobile touch screens accessible to blind people using multi-touch interaction techniques
Jacob Wobbrock

Go Baby Go Car Adaptation Workshop

UW Go Baby Go, co-directed by CREATE Associate Director Heather Feldner, is excited to announce its fall workshop where we will build ten Go Baby Go cars for local children with disabilities and their families!

Composite of 4 images from Go Baby Go workshops: participants modifying ride-upon toys and excited toddlers sitting in a variety of toys.

UW and CREATE students, postdocs, and faculty (especially from engineering, computer science, and rehab programs), local clinicians, and parents/caregivers are all encouraged to attend.

Saturday, November 6, 2021

* Workshop: 8:30 a.m.-2 p.m.
* Family car fittings and pickup: 2-4 p.m.

UW Rehab Medicine, BB tower 916 and 918
Outdoor car pickup location TBD

Each car will be custom-adapted for safety and accessibility so children can engage in self-initiated mobility, exploration, and socialization at ages equitable to their non-disabled peers. Through sponsorship and fundraising, cars are provided at no cost to families.

Volunteers needed!

To volunteer, please fill out the volunteer form and we will be in touch with all the rest of the logistics and details!

Please note that per Washington State and UW policy, all volunteers will be required to mask up throughout the build and show proof of full COVID vaccination to participate.

We will have a separate refreshment space for breaks and snacks/drinks throughout the build.

Questions

Email us at gobabygo@uw.edu.

CREATE is proud to sponsor this event.

Reimagining Mobility: Urban Accessibility – from Crowdsourcing to AI

Still image from YouTube with photo of a crowded urban street and text about mobility inequities

In December 2021, CREATE faculty Anat Caspi and Jon Froehlich discussed the innovative ways they are using AI, crowdsourcing, and translational research to reimagine urban accessibility.

Teams from the UW Makeability Lab and the UW Taskar Center for Accessible Technology have worked to develop and deploy tools like AccessMaps, OpenSidewalks, and Project Sidewalk that are transforming how we share, evaluate, and understand our urban environments.

Participants were invited to a deep dive into one of these initiatives – Project Sidewalk – to learn how to contribute to the crowd-sourcing efforts. Despite the important role of sidewalks in supporting mobility, accessibility, and public health, there is a lack of high-quality datasets and corresponding analyses on sidewalk existence and condition.

Project Sidewalk explores a twofold vision: first, to develop scalable mechanisms to locate and assess sidewalks in cities across the world using Crowd+AI approaches, and second, to use this data to support new urban analyses and mobility tools.

Project Sidewalk is currently deployed in seven cities, including two in Mexico.

Join the Reimagining Mobility conversation

Join us for a series of conversations imagining the future of mobility. Hosted by CREATE Associate Directors Kat Steele and Heather Feldner, we connect and learn from guests who are engaged in critical mobility work – ranging from researchers to small business owners to self-advocates. We will dive deeply into conversations about mobility as a multifaceted concept, and explore how it intersects with other dimensions of access across contexts of research, education, and public policy.

Upcoming conversations

Stay tuned. 2022 series to be announced.

Past conversations

Flyer summarizing the information on Conversation Hub topics for Fall 2021 — Download the Fall 2021 flyer (PDF)

Reimagining Mobility: Collecting Data. Creating Plans. Removing Barriers?

A graphic showing the cycle of lack of access and mobility in the built environment and how that impedes community participation which feeds limited societal views of disability, which contributes to inaccessibility in the built environment. — Click to view the captioned and transcribed video on YouTube.

On November 18, 2021 Dr. Yochai Eisenberg shared successes and challenges in the pursuit of accessible pedestrian networks. We discussed community mobility as it relates to accessible pathways, use of public transportation, and modes of travel to destinations.

Dr. Eisenberg described a systematic mobility evaluation, detailed some of the findings, and shared the conclusion that communities in the U.S. do not have strong plans for building accessible pathways. He stressed that the solution includes meaningfully involving people with disabilities, so that transition plans can help cities.

Dr. Yochai Eisenberg is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Disability and Human Development at the University of Illinois at Chicago and affiliated researcher at the Great Lakes ADA Center. Dr. Eisenberg studies the ways in which neighborhood environments, policies, and systems impact community mobility, health behaviors and health outcomes for people with disabilities using a blend of big data analytics, policy evaluation, and community engaged research.

Dr. Eisenberg’s research has contributed to better understanding implementation of ADA transition plans for the public rights of way in the US, rideshare use and satisfaction among people with disabilities, and accessibility of environments that support healthy, active living. Dr. Eisenberg’s interdisciplinary work reflects his training in public health (Ph.D.), urban planning (Master’s) and disability studies and is interwoven in his undergraduate course that explores the links between disability, urban planning and geography.

Join the Reimagining Mobility conversation

Upcoming conversations

Stay tuned. 2022 series to be announced.

Past conversations

Reimagining Mobility: Inclusive Architecture

Karen Braitmayer, seated in her wheelchair on the observation deck of the Space Needle, with full view of Seattle because obstructive walls were removed in a remodel — Click to view the captioned and transcribed video on YouTube

On October 13, 2021 Karen Braitmayer shared images from her experience of— and critical goals for— inclusive architecture. Noting that the best and brightest designers might come in bodies that are different than employers expect, she called for design schools to welcome students with disabilities and for design firms to hire and support the careers of designers with disabilities.

First steps for designers:

Provide options: wider seats, different height soap dispensers, etc.
Learn about building codes and regulations.
Talk to folks who have already figured out how to accommodate for their own disabilities and hack for accessibility.

Karen Braitmayer using a wheelchair in a modern building with stairs and ramps

Architect Karen L. Braitmayer, FAIA, is the founding principal of Studio Pacifica, an accessibility consulting firm based in Seattle, Washington. Her “good fight” has consistently focused on supporting equity and full inclusion for persons with disabilities.

In 2019, she was chosen as the national winner of the AIA Whitney M. Young, Jr. award—a prestigious award given to an architect who “embodies social responsibility and actively addresses a relevant issue”. In the award’s 48-year history, she was the first recipient honored for their work in the area of civil rights for persons with disabilities. Braitmayer was also appointed by President Barack Obama to the United States Access Board, a position she retains today.

Join the Reimagining Mobility conversation

Upcoming conversations

Stay tuned. 2022 series to be announced.

Past conversations

Help make the WSDOT website more accessible

Anthro-Tech is looking for people who use screen readers and other assistive technology to participate in a usability study on the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) website redesign.

During a study session, the facilitator will show the participant the new website and ask them to use it to complete a few tasks.

Sessions will take place on Zoom for 60-90 minutes and participants receive a $100 check as a thank you.

Learn more and sign up at WSDOT Website Study: Call for participants.

Recruiting for Tactile Map Participants

UW researchers are seeking participants for a paid study.

Who: People who are blind or low vision who use a screen reader and are 18 years or older.
What: Participants will be asked to test 3D-printed tactile maps. Sessions are 60 minutes. For details, see the signup survey.
Where: UW Seattle campus.
When: August.
Compensation: $40 and a travel stipend.
How: Contact Kelly Mack at kmack3@cs.washington.edu or fill out the signup survey.

CREATE Community Day & Research Showcase 2021

CREATE Community Day 2021, held on June 8, was a rich program that included an important discussion of the concerns and approaches to just, sustainable accessibility research that puts the needs of community members with disabilities front and center. Following this discussion, CREATE members highlighted what their labs are doing, with time to hear about a variety of individual projects. Here are some highlight videos of a small sample of the presentations:

Just one day later, the Future of Access Technology class held their final presentations. This class was designed to engage students in active contribution to the disability community, and included assignments to audio-describe videos for YouDescribe.org; try to address bugs within the NVDA open source screen reader community; and build first-person informed final projects on a wide range of topics, including:

Improved Word Alt Text plug-in modifies the default behavior in Microsoft PowerPoint when an image is inserted such that the user is prompted with a dialog box that guides them to create alt text that is high quality and contextually relevant to the image’s intended use.
video preview | website
VSCodeTalk project implements a Visual Studio Code extension of CodeTalk, which makes Visual Studio more accessible to visually impaired developers.
video preview | website
Input Macros project makes it possible to easily add text shortcuts (e.g., “ty” automatically becomes “thank you”) in both Word and on the Web.
video preview | website
Non-verbal Captioning project provides a SnapChat filter that explores how non-verbal captioning in video meeting applications can support DHH and other captioning users.
video preview | website
Signal Monitoring for Accessibility for mobile and hardware programming makes serial port signal data, such as that generated by an Arduino system, accessible to BLV developers. Data can be copied to the system clipboard and audible cues are fired on significant events in the input data stream.
video preview | website

$1M NIDILRR award for leadership training program

A team of CREATE faculty has received a five-year, $1M grant from the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR) for the project, “ARRT: Postdoctoral Training in Physical Computing and Fabrication to Support Innovations for Community Living and Participation.” Congratulations on the funding to the team members:

Co-PI Jennifer Mankoff, Ph.D and Professor Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science and Engineering
Co-PI Anat Caspi, Ph.D. and Principal, Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering
Heather Feldner, PT, Ph.D., PCS and Assistant Professor, School of Medicine, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine
Kat Steele, Ph.D. and Associate Professor, Mechanical Engineering

The award funds a program that will train four postdoctoral fellows to become leaders in rehabilitation research who can harness advances in physical computing and fabrication to enhance community living and participation with people with disabilities. Each fellow will complete a 24-month training program to build their expertise in physical computing, fabrication, rehabilitation, and disability studies. Training will address a shortage of people qualified to harness, deliver, and advance physical computing for rehabilitation research. The four postdoctoral fellows will participate in research, coursework, and mentoring that expands expertise in using primary and complex adaptation tools, 3D-modeling software, and fabrication machines (e.g., laser cutters, 3D printers) for rehabilitation applications. Their innovative research, publications, presentations, and community resources will amplify the impacts of this training program.

Grad student Kelly Mack receives a Dennis Lang award

Kelly Mack, a Ph.D. student in Computer Science and mentored by CREATE Founding Co-Director Jen Mankoff, received a Dennis Lang Award from the UW Disabilities Studies program and the following praise:

“Kelly is dedicated to improving accessibility for disabled students at UW through her research, service, and mentoring and allyship. Her thesis work will examine communication between DRS, students, and other stakeholders, and develop a prototype to allow tracking of DRS requests for improved accountability.”

This award honors Dennis Lang, a co-founder of the UW Disability Studies Program, for his dedication and service in the creation and growth of the UW Disability Studies community and program. The award goes to students who embody Dennis’ spirited commitment to and academic excellence in the field of Disability Studies.

Mack received a merit-based monetary award and was recognized at the Disability Studies convocation on June 4.

Jon Froehlich named Outstanding Faculty Member by the UW College of Engineering

Congrats to CREATE Associate Director Jon Froehlich on being selected for the Outstanding Faculty Award by the UW College of Engineering!

As noted by the College, Froehlich went to extraordinary measures to support his students’ learning during the pandemic. He fundamentally transformed physical computing courses for virtual platforms, assembled and mailed hardware kits to students’ homes, and developed interactive hardware diagrams, tutorials and videos. In addition, Froehlich co-created and led a group of university educators to share best practices for remote teaching of computing lab courses.

Jon Froehlich, CREATE Associate Director and Allen School faculty member

As chair for the conference ASSETS’22, Froehlich has helped ensure the conference is accessible to not only those with physical or sensory disabilities, but for those with chronic illnesses, caretaking responsibilities, or other commitments that prevent physical travel.

In response to the award, Froehlich noted, “I quite literally could not have done this without [CREATE Founding Co-Directors] Jake and Jen’s mentorship and support.”

This article was excerpted from the UW College of Engineering’s CoE Awards announcement.

CREATE Research Showcase – Spring 2021

Jun 8, 2021
9:30 a.m.
Register for Zoom invitation

The CREATE Community Meeting is open to the public.

Schedule

10:00 | Just Sustainable Accessibility Research – Panel

Although accessibility research is a fundamental component in reducing gaps in quality of life, health disparities, wealth disparities and digital access, many people with disabilities have had adverse experiences with researchers and accessibility professionals; consequently, communities and community members have lost trust in both the process of research and the people who conduct it. Too often, research has been conducted “on” rather than “with” people with disabilities and established communities, resulting in their being stigmatized or stereotyped. There has been increasing recognition that more comprehensive and participatory approaches to research and interventions are needed to address the complex set of determinants associated with problems that affect populations with disabilities, as well as those factors specifically associated with disparities affecting intersectional groups.

This panel aims to expose some of the tensions and problems facing people with disabilities when engaging in research. No attempts at solutions will be made.

11:00 | Welcome

11:07 | Lab fast-style presentations

CREATE labs introduce their work in 90 second segments.

11:30 | Showcase Breakout Sessions

Three breakout sessions, each lasting 17 minutes and 3 minutes between, are devoted to short presentations and Q&A about these CREATE-lab affiliated projects:

“Investigating visual semantic understanding in blind and low-vision technology users”
“Comparing muscle versus manual interface for people with and without limited movement”
“Living Disability Theory”
““That’s Frustrating” – Stakeholder perceptions: provision processes, use, and future AFO needs for people with cerebral palsy”
“Decoding Intent With Control Theory: Comparing Muscle Versus Manual Interface Performance”
“Unimpaired adults can reduce motor control complexity during walking using biofeedback”
“Gait Recovery in Adults with Cervical Spinal Cord Injury Receiving Transcutaneous Spinal Stimulation”
“Reliability of Fitts’ Law”
“Stitching Together the Experience of Disabled Knitters”
“Mobility Gets Personal: Why Google Directions and Other Trip Planners Might Be Leading Us Where We May Not Want To Go”
“Perceptions of Disability and Mobility Technology Before and After Modified Ride-On Car Use in Caregivers of Children with Disabilities”
“”I can bonk people!”: Effects of Modified Ride On Cars On Communication and Socio-Emotional Development in Children with Disabilities”
“Ready, Set, Move! Tracking Children’s Modified Ride-On Car Use with a Custom Data Logger”
“Challenging Terrain: Community-Based Early Mobility Technology Research through the Lens of Critical Disability Theory”Time

The Future of Assistive Technology: A Panel Discussion

Anat Caspi, CREATE’s Director for Translation, participated in a panel discussion on the future of assistive technology and how recent innovations are likely to affect the lives of people with disabilities.

Read on to find out what Caspi had to say about how industry and education can and should shape future AT. For the full Provail Assistive Technology Panel discussion, watch the video below.

On what’s the biggest recent game-changer, Caspi noted that larger companies have recognized the importance of inclusive design and the need for multi-modal platforms, data standards, and the ability of Android, iOS and Microsoft platforms to offer integrated access functionality, not just at the single application level but throughout the entire operating system. While speech generation technology is evolving to include natural language processing such as gesturing and inflection and interaction devices like eye-gaze and pupil tracking, Caspi looks forward to communication devices being used to manipulate 3-D interaction in physical space as well as VR/AR.

With increased accessibility to prototyping, organizations and educators need to be reaching out to high school students and introduce them to design thinking and inclusive design.

Anat Caspi, CREATE Director for Translation, Director of the Taskar Center for Accessible Technology

Caspi noted that small-scale innovation, as encouraged by the maker and DIY movements, can be adopted by niche as well as large-scale markets thanks to a game-changing trend in consumer electronics markets: the availability of cheap sensing technologies and the popularity of what’s commonly known as Internet of Things. With increased accessibility to prototyping, organizations and educators need to be reaching out to high school students and introduce them to design thinking and inclusive design. Recently, there is a trend even among the larger technology organizations to create the introductory tools and educational materials at scale in order to gain a steadier audience and attract a more diverse group of future engineers and innovators.

Further, the future will see assistive technology designed for a team — not just the primary user but also their support network: caregivers, parents, and therapists.

The panel’s sponsor, PROVAIL, is a non-profit based in western Washington that provides therapy and active living services for people with mild to severe disabilities, for whom service options and resources are often limited.

Watch the full panel discussion

Reimagining Mobility: Inclusive Living and Home Design

This UW CREATE event has passed. Continue to read a summary and watch a recording of the session. Sign up for future Reimagining Mobility Conversations.

You are looking for your first home – you’d like an open layout, 3 bedrooms, a big garage, lots of light, and easy access for your wheelchair. How many homes fit your criteria? Do the listings consider manual wheelchairs or bulkier powered wheelchairs with larger turning radii? These are just the start of the questions Barry Long would ask when viewing homes.

Barry Long is an advocate for people with disabilities who is helping to make real estate more accessible. In our third Conversation Hub session, Long shared how his passion for relationship building and helping others–combined with experiences as a manual wheelchair user, Dad and real estate broker–evolved into becoming a voting member of the Washington Building Code Council and advocating for standards for real estate listings.

Watch the conversation with Long about opening the door to accessible real estate and get a virtual look inside homes reimagined for inclusive living.

	Visual semantic understanding in blind and low-vision technology users
	“I can bonk people!”: Effects of modified ride on cars on communication and socio-emotional development in children with disabilities
	Blocks4All, an accessible blocks-based programming language
	Decoding Intent With Control Theory: Comparing Muscle Versus Manual Interface Performance