Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #ndeam

We began this month of Accessibility Actions by sharing stats on the number of disabled undergrads, grad students, & faculty. We used polls to explore lived experiences of grad students. Why does the number of disabled people drop off the higher in the ranks you go? #NDEAM 1/

The fact that few disabled grad students are enrolled may well start at the interview! Here, we show that folks on the job market or applying to grad schools overwhelmingly had inaccessible interviews. 2/
#DisabilityTwitter #DisInGradSchool

This demonstrates a culture that does not often think of disability. Most folks said that, while their uni has an LGBTQ center and a multicultural center, they don’t have a disability cultural center. This sends the message that disability is not something to be celebrated. 3/

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With COVID, many people and jobs are more online than ever before. If your website, Zoom meetings, even Tweets aren’t accessible, then a sizable percentage of the population can’t navigate them. Here are some resources to make your digital content more #accessible! 1/13
#NDEAM

@access_guide_

@access_guide_ wrote a guide on writing image descriptions to help you understand what’s important to include when you’re posting that cute dog photo. tinyurl.com/ImageDesc. @ImageAltText can be tagged to check if an image on Twitter has alt text! 2/13

If you’re low on spoons and/or don’t have funding to pay someone to write image descriptions for a professional website/presentation (for example), this Facebook community can provide free, crowdsourced image descriptions facebook.com/groups/1376494… 3/13

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Today we’ll be talking about the recruiting & hiring of disabled people for #faculty positions. Only ~4% of US faculty identify as disabled; not exactly representative of the ~20% of undergrads who are disabled...

Have you ever had a disabled professor? 1/6 #NDEAM #HigherEd

Sgoutas-Emch et al write about cohort hiring as a strategy to diversity #STEM faculty hires. This paper focuses on increasing the representation of women of color in UCSD’s STEM departments and outlines the steps of their cohort hiring ftp.arizonaea.org/home/68489.htm 2/6

The Urban Universities for Health also put out a report on the experiences of universities that have adopted cohort hiring practices. 70% of the universities reported an increase in faculty diversity following the implementation of cohort hiring tinyurl.com/CohortHire 3/6

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Hi everyone - we're so excited to have you along with us for the month of #NDEAM (National Disability Employment Awareness Month). We're hoping to take the month of October to create actionable change surrounding ableism in higher ed.

Did you know that roughly 25% of the US population is disabled? Likewise, schools report 20-25% of undergrads are disabled. The sad part is that only 8% of master's students, 7% of doctoral students, and a miniscule 3.6% of faculty ID as disabled #AcademicChatter #AcademicTwitter

As disabled doctoral students we're dismayed by these numbers! We don't see our identities reflected in the academy. As proponents of DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) we want to enact real measurable change. #DisabilityTwitter

We have a few poll questions for you. We hope that these polls will also spur on some discussion about disability in the academy.

Don't forget to share these polls with your colleagues and friends by retweeting! 1/

#DisInGradSchool #NDEAM #DisInHigherEd #HigherEd #DEHEM

You can pick "Show me results" if the question doesn't apply to you.

Please feel free to expand upon your answer in the comments below the poll. 2/

#DisInGradSchool #NDEAM #DisInHigherEd #HigherEd #DEHEM

If you are a TA, staff, or faculty member, have you ever received training about mentoring students with disabilities or promoting disabled student success? 3/

#DisInGradSchool #NDEAM #DisInHigherEd #HigherEd #DEHEM

Ok y'all - we know it's the weekend and the world is a trash heap right now and you're burnt out. However, Universal Design strategies help us ALL - profs and students alike! Here are all of our resources on UDL that we've posted today - RT and tag your colleagues 1/5

@caitskirby

Download @caitskirby's phenomenal one-pager using the following link: bit.ly/2GzKNVc

Print it out, hang it in your office, share it with your grad students. Send it to your cohort members, add it to your collection of pedagogy resources 2/5

@Nicole_Lee_Sch

@Nicole_Lee_Sch's introductory lecture on UDL practices and why we need them during the pandemic. Send it to you department, share it on your grad student facebook page, watch it in small chunks over the weekend. 3/5

#UniversalDesign asks that you think about accommodations BEFORE you begin your course planning. I'm really passionate about UDL because I know how hard it is for students to secure accommodations and ensure they're followed. 1/9

There are huge barriers to securing accommodations. First of all, students need medical diagnoses. Yet we know women, students of color, and other minority students are less likely to be taken seriously by medical professionals. 2/9

Accommodations also cost a lot of money, even if you're privileged enough to have insurance coverage. It also costs time, access to medical specialists, and proper screening. Few people have access to that, so accommodations at best are a marker of privilege. 3/9

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Today will be our first Disbled in Grad School (DIGS) Chat. Guidelines for participation: To participate in the chat, please answer our questions by using the chat hashtag (#DIGSChat) and follow our page to engage with other participants 1/

#DisInGradSchool #NDEAM

When we ask a question we’ll number it Q1, Q2, etc. When you respond, please use these numbers to help others keep track, eg. A1, A2, etc. See the example below:

Q1. What’s brown and sticky?
A1. A stick! 2/

A little background for this #DIGSChat: accommodations are LEGAL guarantees. Students with documented disabilities are legally guaranteed reasonable accommodations for use in classes, research, and more. 3/

We are so excited to be sharing calls to action all October long. We’re a group of grad students promoting accessibility in higher ed. To kick off October, we'll be introducing ourselves to you in this thread. #NDEAM #DisInGradSchool 1/

@DisInGradSchool

@DisInGradSchool Since we want to build this community and get to know you, we also ask that you introduce yourselves as a reply to this thread. Don't forget the hashtags: #NDEAM and #DisInGradSchool.

Then, like and retweet folks to make this community cozy and supportive. 2/

@DisInGradSchool

@DisInGradSchool Hi I’m @Nicole_Lee_Sch I’m a PhD Candidate studying the history of disability, medicine, and welfare in early America. I look at how early disabled Americans resisted medicalization and secured resources despite increasing barriers to access. 3/

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@dol

The US @dol’s National Disability Employment Awareness Month #NDEAM strives to promote hiring, retention, & career advancement of disabled people. Now, on its 75th celebration, this message is incredibly important in wake of the pandemic as we face unprecedented unemployment 1/5

Disabled people already contribute to the workforce in meaningful ways. Unfortunately, some of #NDEAM’s resources promote inspiration porn and offer a narrow, capitalistic view about the benefits of hiring disabled individuals. We DO NOT support this. 2/5

Since members of our group are in higher ed, we have framed our month of actions around increasing access to employment in the academy, at the undergraduate, graduate, and faculty levels. 3/5