Introduction

When I first started this assignment, I was going to write about how when I was working at my previous district I volunteered to be a part of our board office occupational health and safety committee as a teacher representative. Our district had recently hired two deaf teachers to work with hearing students and staff to learn more about ASL and to help support other deaf/hard of hearing students within the district. Our board office building was brand new and we (as an OH&S committee) were still working out emergency procedures like hold-and-secures and fire/emergency evacuations. Being hard of hearing myself, I realized quite quickly that the common work area in the basement of the board office did not have a visual alarm signal in addition to an audio alarm. I brought this to the attention of the committee and the issue was fixed within a few weeks. What was surprising was learning afterwards that visible signal devices and visible warning systems are only required in the following circumstances as described in section 3.2.4.19. “Visible Signal Devices and Visible Warning Systems” in the Canadian National Building Code 2015: 

a) in buildings or portions thereof intended for use primarily by persons who are deaf or hard of hearing,

b) in assembly occupancies in which music and other sounds associated with performances could exceed 100 dBA,

c) in any floor area in which the ambient noise level is more than 87 dBA, and

d) in any floor area in which the occupants

i) use ear protection devices,

ii) are located in an audiometric booth, or

iii) are located in sound-insulating enclosures.

Findings

I was surprised that visual signal devices were only required in certain circumstances rather than being the norm -especially buildings frequently accessed by the public. 

Some provinces have amended their building codes to require visual signals in common areas, but a position paper from Canadian Hearing Services highlights the lingering issue of who should be responsible for the cost of, or the installation of visual fire alarms and/or notification systems within personal residences. In “The Canadian Hearing Society Position Paper on Alarms and Emergency Notification Systems” they state that “landlords are not required to provide visual fire alarms for their culturally Deaf, oral deaf, deafened and hard of hearing residents nor are home builders required to install such devices into new homes or condominium units for purchase by culturally Deaf, oral deaf, and deafened and hard of hearing buyers.” This is just one example that demonstrates how barriers to accessibility and inequity can be further exacerbated by jurisdictional disputes and excessive costs.   

Inequities 

When inequities exist, there is often an unforeseen or unintended “tax” on a particular individual or group of individuals. This tax can be in the form of additional labour (physical or emotional) or cost. The term “pink tax” was popularized around the mid-1990s, when the Gender Tax Repeal Act of 1995 passed in California, prohibiting price discrimination on services. (Gillespie, 2024) The slight increase in retail items marketed towards women (as well as the taxation of essential items like feminine hygiene products) means that, over time, women pay more than men for the same items. This phenomenon is not restricted to women, and as I’ve illustrated, there is definitely a case to be made that there is an “accessibility tax” as well. 

Limitations of Web Development Platforms like Google Sites 

As I mentioned earlier, this was my initial focus for this assignment but as I began looking at ways to make this post more accessible (using the POUR principles), I realized that I would need a lot more experience with coding. I consider myself relatively tech-savy and have used both Wix and WordPress in the past to create websites and have used HTML to enhance the functionality of a site and for other courses in the PME program I’ve used Google Sites for its ease of use GSuite integration. Despite being easy to use, I was disappointed with the lack of integrated accessibility features. I was able to download a free chrome extension from https://dyslexiefont.com/en/ so that the font of my site could be more easily read by someone with dyslexia but was unsuccessful in downloading and integrating the font into my website as a default because it is not a font supported by Google. 

Another extension that can be a powerful tool for accessibility is Google Read&Write. This is a great tool that can do a range of tasks including highlight and read aloud either an entire page or selected text as well as some minor translation. The Premium version is available for free for teachers to explore and costs $99 for a yearly subscription for student accounts. While this cost is often covered for students (especially those with designations) it is yet another example of how persons needing accommodations or adaptations pay more to access the same services. 

In addition to these extensions, I can add text descriptions to images, add a table of contents, appropriately hyperlink text,and adjust or change the contrast of the background from white to black (or any other colour). But for the most part, these are not the robust types of accessibility features that would make my site equitable for all consumers. Those needing adaptations will have to rely on third party software or extensions (some paid and some free) to freely navigate sites.

Works Cited 

Gillespie, L. (2024). The Pink Tax: Latest Updates and Statistics. Retrieved from https://www.bankrate.com/personal-finance/pink-tax-how-women-pay-more/#what-is

The Canadian Hearing Society Position Paper on Alarms and Emergency Notification Systems (N.d.). Retrieved from https://www.chs.ca/position-paper-alarms-and-notification