Week 13

Sorting through all the information the web has to offer can be overwhelming. Finding reliable sources on, and off, the Internet is what I would recommend to any colleague asking for advice in coping with this multitasking potential nightmare. First, locate a set of sources known to be experts in a given field such as professional journals, organizations, or individuals already recognized in their field. Bookmark the locations or have a RSS set-up to receive updates, next set-up a folder (or use a bookmarking program such as Diigo) to store any feeds of interest for later use. Regularly check other websites for information as potential new sources, or follow others as people recommend and edit the reliable sources as new ones go up the scale for usability. When questionable information is presented, go to the offline source for another opinion.

Several weeks ago (March 15, 2011) a colleague in the College of Education received a news story about a lawsuit being initiated against Google surrounding their email and application suite for educational institutions. Many Universities are having Google take over their email systems to save money and are letting Google introduce their set of production tools (i.e., Google Apps) for students to use.  The National Federation of the Blind (NFB) is suing several large institutions claiming the Google products are not accessible for use on a screen reader. He was concerned about the College's, and University's, transition to the Google platform and if this lawsuit (actually a US Justice department investigation) would result in having to find an alternative. The web source, The Chronicle of Higher Education, and the story were both credible and true. He asked us, The Center on Disability Studies (CDS) what our opinion was on the matter and since I'm the media person, what I suggested be the best course of action. I checked with my personal resources and the World Wide Wide Consortium's (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) and we all agreed that Google was making the proper adjustments for accessibility in a timely manner. The transition should go on without any interruption. The information gathered on the web was filtered, verified, and lastly, analyzed on how it would be used.