Examining Inclusive Computing Education for Blind Students in India
The growing demand for computer professionals, driven by the rapid expansion of the Information Technology industry, has led to numerous inclusive computing education efforts. These efforts have even included blind or visually-impaired (BVI) students, who are being increasingly encouraged to pursue education and career in computing, despite the visually-oriented nature of the discipline. Extant literature has predominantly focused on identifying and addressing the accessibility barriers faced by BVI students, to promote more inclusive learning environments. While few studies have also investigated the accessibility of computing eduction from the perspectives of BVI learners and instructors, these have been primarily situated in the Global North contexts; there is still a knowledge gap regarding the teaching and learning experiences of instructors and BVI students respectively in resource-constrained Global South contexts, where accessibility awareness and inclusion efforts are at nascent stages. To fill this gap, we conducted an interview study with 15 participants in India, where we inquired BVI students, instructors, and BVI professionals, regarding their challenges, experiences, and needs pertaining to computing education. The study revealed that BVI students face significant difficulty in comprehending the instructional materials, the instructors often deal with courses not progressing as planned despite meticulous preparation, the students heavily depend on peer learning for grasping computing concepts, and they need additional support for managing the cognitively-burdensome task of simultaneous learning computing concepts and screen readers. Informed by the findings, we offer recommendations to improve computing curricula for BVI students, and discuss self-learning assistive tools to supplement accessible computing education.
Thu 19 FebDisplayed time zone: Central Time (US & Canada) change
13:40 - 15:00 | Accessible ComputingPapers at Meeting Room 260-267 Chair(s): Trent Dawson University of Nevada, Las Vegas | ||
13:40 20mTalk | Debugging Support for Students with Blindness and Visual Impairments on Notebook-based Programming Environments Papers God'Salvation Oguibe The University of Texas at San Antonio, Lauryn Castro The University of Texas at San Antonio, Katherine Holloway University of Texas at San Antonio, Kathy Ewoldt The University of Texas at San Antonio, Leslie Neely The University of Texas at San Antonio, Taslima Akter UTSA, Wei Wang University of Texas at San Antonio, USA | ||
14:00 20mTalk | Where are the Disabled Students?: A Literature Review of Disability Inclusion in Computing Education Research Papers Isabela Figueira University of California, Irvine, Josahandi Cisneros University of California, Irvine, Jason Weber University of California, Irvine, Wendy Sanka University of California, Irvine, Karen Phan University of California, Irvine, Jennifer Wong-Ma University of California, Irvine, Stacy Branham University of California, Irvine | ||
14:20 20mTalk | Students with Disabilities in Computer Science Principles: An Examination of Capacity, Access, and Participation Papers Sara Frey Pennsylvania Training and Technical Assistance Network, Hannah Williams University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Andreas Stefik University of Nevada at Las Vegas, USA | ||
14:40 20mTalk | Examining Inclusive Computing Education for Blind Students in India Papers Akshay Kolgar Nayak pc, Yash Prakash pc, Md Javedul Ferdous Old Dominion University, Sampath Jayarathna Old Dominion University, Hae-Na Lee Michigan State University, Vikas Ashok Old Dominion University | ||