The UTLC and campus partners are hosting two, one-day Course Retrofit Incubators on Monday, May 18 and Tuesday, May 19, 2026 in the School of Education Building (SOEB) Room 118.
Participants will have dedicated time to work on their courses with instructional support staff from across campus. Flexible conference-style sessions will also be available for participants to ask questions, request demonstrations, and explore practical solutions for creating accessible course materials. Both days will offer the same programming and support for participants.
Incubator Schedule
Both days of the incubator will follow the schedule listed below. All information sessions will be located in SOEB Rm 118. Attending the information sessions is optional. During these sessions, a separate workspace with accessibility support staff will be available for participants who prefer focused, uninterrupted time to work on their courses.
Time
Topic
Description
8:30AM
Check-in SOEB Rm 118
Check in and breakfast
9:00-9:30AM
Opening Session
A quick review of the day’s schedule, and a brief update on Title II requirements.
9:30-10:15AM
Canvas Accessibility
Get tips on how to structure your content using accessible formatting features and UDOIT in Canvas.
10:30AM-12:00PM
Q&A/Guided Discussions
Use this time to ask questions and request demonstrations on creating accessible content.
12:00PM
Lunch
Join us for a buffet-styled lunch!
1:00-3:00PM
Individual work time
Work on your courses with accessibility support staff.
Information session schedule and descriptions
Hands-on Accessibility Topics
Accessibility specialists are available throughout the day to provide hands-on support on a wide range of topics. Be sure to bring your laptop, charger, headphones, and any course materials you’d like to work through. You can expect to receive help with any of the following issues:
These aren’t the only topics – if you have unique issues that don’t fall into these categories, feel free to share it with an accessibility support team member. They can connect you to the best person or resource to get your issue resolved.
Accessibility Incubator Resources
Accessibility Checkers
The Canvas Accessibility Checker and the Universal Design Online content Inspection Tool, or UDOIT (pronounced “You Do It”) are tools you can use to help identify accessibility issues in your Canvas course content. Accessibility specialists will be on hand to help you use these tools.
Specialists will assist with structuring content in Canvas, MS Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint), and other platforms.
Headings, bulleted lists, and slide titles
Links – meaningful and descriptive
Design – font size, font type, text color, and spacing
Resources
Color Contrast Analyser (CCA) – downloadable tool that can be used to check contrast of background and foreground colors. This tool can be used on webpages and files.
WebAim Contrast Checker – web-based tool that will check contrast of background and foreground colors. This tool is only available to use on webpages.
Writing Clearly and Simply – WebAim article that covers how to write so that your content is readable to everyone
Accessible Images
Specialists will assist with inserting descriptions for visuals. This includes explaining how to write descriptions (when to use alt text, when long descriptions are needed, determining what information to include and what to exclude in a description).
How to Create Alt Text – written instructions for inserting alt text into images in documents and slide presentations
Video: Adding Alt text – short video shows how to add alt text in Word, Google Docs, and Canvas
Poet Training Tool – introduction to accessible images; covers when and how to describe images, and also has a practice tool that helps you create alt text for your own images
Diagram Center Image Description Guidelines – guidelines for describing complex images. General guidance as well as detailed guidance for describing specific types of images (art, science, diagrams, graphs, maps, tables, etc) is available
Specialists will assist with creating accessible PDF documents, editing existing PDF documents to make them accessible, and best practices when deciding to use or not use a PDF.
