Teaching Inclusive Thinking to Undergraduate Students in Computing Programs
Stephanie Ludi, Matt Huenerfauth, Vicki Hanson, Nidhi Rajendra Palan, Paula Conn · 2018 · SIGCSE '18: Proceedings of the 49th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education · doi:10.1145/3159450.3159512
Summary
This paper investigates whether specific teaching interventions in undergraduate computing courses measurably increase students' accessibility awareness and inclusive thinking. The authors note that, while numerous accessibility teaching approaches have been reported anecdotally in the literature, few have been evaluated with consistent methodologies. They address that gap with a 3-semester study at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT), spanning nine HCI classes taken by Information Technology (Year 2) and Software Engineering (Year 3) students. All participating classes received approximately one week of lectures covering sensory, motor, cognitive, and learning disabilities; assistive technologies; U.S. accessibility legal requirements; and web design practices such as alt text and captioning. Students were split into two groups: a 'NoExposure' group (35 teams) who received only the lectures alongside a semester-long design project, and an 'Exposure' group (14 teams) who additionally had first-hand interaction with a person with a disability during requirements gathering or prototype evaluation. The study used three measurement instruments administered as pre- and post-tests: a neutral voting-kiosk design scenario scored for spontaneous accessibility mentions, the 20-item Interaction with Disabled Persons (IDP) scale, and a custom accessibility awareness and knowledge survey. In parallel, 236 student-submitted project documents were qualitatively coded by two researchers (85% inter-rater agreement) to surface how teams actually handled accessibility in practice. A key contribution is that the authors publish their full test battery for other researchers to reuse.
Key findings
Across all 95 students who completed pre- and post-tests, three measures improved significantly by semester's end: spontaneous accessibility mentions in the voting-kiosk scenario (p<.001), the Sympathy subscale of the IDP (for the Exposure group only, p<.05), and self-reported accessibility knowledge (median rising from 30 to 35, p<.001). Accessibility awareness scores and the other five IDP subscales (Discomfort, Uncertainty, Fear, Coping, Vulnerability) showed no significant change. The qualitative analysis produced a striking contrast: 0 of 14 Exposure teams cited formal guidelines such as WCAG or W3C in their work, relying instead on what they learned from the person they met, while only 4 of 35 NoExposure teams referenced guidelines (three of those only covered color choices). More tellingly, 5 of 35 NoExposure teams noted an accessibility barrier but chose not to address it — in some cases placing the burden on disabled users ('Users must accommodate for their disabilities prior to using the site') — versus only 1 of 14 Exposure teams. Knowledge alone helps students notice barriers, but firsthand interaction appears to be what converts noticing into action.
Relevance
For accessibility practitioners involved in hiring, training, or curriculum design, this paper provides rare quantitative evidence that short, focused educational interventions do shift undergraduate accessibility knowledge and attitudes — validating the industry push behind initiatives like Teach Access and AccessComputing. The more practical finding is the gap between knowing and doing: lectures produced recognition of barriers, but only first-hand contact with disabled users produced the motivation to fix them. Organizations building internal accessibility training should therefore pair standards content with direct user engagement rather than relying on lectures or e-learning alone. Limitations include the single-institution sample, modest Exposure group size (n=32 for surveys), reliance on self-reported knowledge, and the IDP scale's age (1999) and cultural framing. The authors' decision to publish their full test battery is particularly valuable for replication across other programs.
Tags: accessibility education · computer science education · inclusive design · HCI education · undergraduate teaching · empathy · ethics · curriculum design · attitudes toward disability
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