Thursday, May 20th, 2021 is Global Accessibility Awareness Day and Information Technology Services invites you participate in the #NoMouse Challenge!
Take the #NoMouse Challenge!
What is GAAD?
The purpose of GAAD is to get everyone talking, thinking and learning about digital access and inclusion, and the more than one billion people with disabilities/impairments.
What is the #NoMouse Challenge?
The #NoMouse Challenge is a global effort to raise awareness about accessible web design. For one day, commit to using the web without using your mouse. Yes, that’s right, no mouse!
Why is the #NoMouse Challenge Important?
According to the World Health Organization, there are more than one billion people in the world who have some sort of disability. Disabilities may be permanent or temporary, visible or invisible, and almost everyone will experience disability at some point in their life.
People with disabilities use a variety of tools and techniques for using the computer and accessing the web. However, these tools are dependent on people who create digital content (e.g., websites, Word docs, PDFs, video, audio) to create these materials in ways that are accessible.
- Some individuals with physical disabilities may be unable to use a mouse, and instead rely exclusively on their keyboard, or use assistive technologies such as speech recognition, head pointers, mouth sticks, or eye-gaze tracking systems. If a website is accessible only to mouse users, these individuals will be excluded.
- Individuals who are blind use audible output (products called screen readers that read web content using synthesized speech), or tactile output (a refreshable Braille device). If websites or digital documents are produced in ways that prevent assistive technologies from accessing their content, these individuals will be excluded.
If you’re a person who designs or develops websites or produces digital documents this challenge will give you a much better understanding of the barriers that can be avoided by considering accessibility as part of your design process.
How to Participate in the Challenge
- There is no need to register but if you’d like you can use the #NoMouse on social media to spread the word!
- Download our Keyboard Navigation for PC and Mac (.docx) to learn how you can use the web with only your keyboard.
- Work, explore, shop, do your banking, plan your dream vacation! Do all of the things you normally do on the web and see what barriers you encounter as you try to accomplish these tasks with just your keyboard.
- Share your experience on social media using #NoMouse and #GAAD!
Other Ways to Participate in GAAD 2021
- Visit the Global Accessibility Awareness Day site for a full list of events.
- Watch the W3C/WAI series of short videos Web Accessibility Perspectives to learn about the impact of accessibility and the benefits for everyone in a variety of situations.
- Visit the Syracuse University Accessible Technology Toolkit and explore the resources available for content creators.
- Watch Derek Featherstone’s Accessibility for Web Design on LinkedIn Learning (requires login) for an introduction to web accessibility for web designers.
- Explore other courses available on the LinkedIn Learning Accessibility Playlist
NoMouse.org is a project of The DO-IT Center at the University of Washington, and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.