MINUTES
Education and Outreach Working Group Teleconference
03 May 2013

EO Charter

<shawn> http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO/wiki/Charter_2013#Mission

Shawn: Our charter work will go to W3C management and then out for review by entire membership advisory group. So let's look at Mission statement.
... thanks to Howard, Vicki, Andrew for comments
... statement has been shortened, and there are some additional ideas here. Some have been addressed for EO consideration. (Reads)

Denis: I appreciate that these are shorter. I am comparing the previous longer one and it does not seem that we are losing anything and the shorter form is good.

Sharron: Is the fact - the one difference in #3 was to reference the other working groups. Is that the important enough to include the extra length?

Shawn: And the reference to other groups is in the section, in the next sentence.

Denis: Thinking about it fitting into a slide presentation. And don't all groups work with other groups - are we special in that way?

Shawn: We are really explicitly charged with supporting all of the other WAI working groups - so we are somewhat unique in that specific charge.
... So we could say that the WG support is covered in the second sentence.

Shadi: I really like the one that is there, I don't think the others are improved. One minor point would be to replace the word "improve" with the word "promote."
... I agree that EO has a more articulated role in coordinating work between other WGs so it is good to have that referenced, but doing so in the second sentence is fine.

<Vicki> +1 for mention in second sentence

Howard: And the coordination aspect and WCAG are mentioned in the scope and so I think they don't need to be in the Mission as well.

Shawn: OK, refresh with those suggestions in mind
... is everyone OK with this?

<shawn> proposal: The mission of the Education and Outreach Working Group is to develop strategies and resources to promote awareness, understanding, and implementation of web accessibility.

<shawn> EOWG is part of the WAI International Program Office Activity, and its mission includes supporting the work of other Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) Groups within the WAI Technical Activity and the WAI International Program Office Activity.

<AnnaBelle> +1

<paulschantz> +1

Sharron: +1

<Vicki> +1

<dboudreau> +1 for support

<shadi> +1

<Bim> +1

<Howard> +1

Shawn: OK, and the next section is to review the Summary.

Denis: Why do we reference the previous charter without linking to it?

Shawn: She may or may not be linking it, I am not sure. For people who are aware of what we have done in the past, the point is to highlight what is different about what we will do with this charter.
... Basically this is just the areas of focus developed in the Scope and summarized here.

Sharron: So do we need to approve the Scope before we can finalize the Summary?

Shawn: Yes, sure, let's move to that section and review. Nothing much has changed from last week except one word change...comments?

<Howard> +1

Denis: I think it is great.

<Howard> +1

<dboudreau> +1

<Bim> +1

<Vicki> +1

<paulschantz> +1

<AnnaBelle> +1

Shawn: Accept the scope as currently written?

Sharron: +1

<shadi> +1

Shawn: Then that takes care of Scope and Summary...now onto the Deliverables.

<Bim> :)

Shadi: Very first paragraph, while I understand what you are trying to say, it throws me off a bit.

<paulschantz> ...and it's not just documents

Shadi: somewhat circular and limited to online resources. We have discussed creating handouts as well and want to leave it a bit more open.
... the distinction between WAI documents developed by EO and those developed by stafff is confusing too. If they are staff-developed, they aren't actually EO deliverables.

AnnaBelle: How long is the charter for?

Shawn: 3 years

Sharron: What happened to WCAG-EM?

Shawn: It is only our job to review, and that is mentioned in review of work for other groups.

Sharron: It seems like we were collaborating quite extensively on that one however and I expect we will continue.

Shawn: OK let me change that reference.
... I included a list of things we expect to review.

Denis: Does the idea of review include providing feedback?

<Andrew> EOWG contributes to, and reviews, other W3C Working Groups' deliverables

Shawn: Yes, but in some cases, such as WCAG-EM we spent an entire month working on it, so we may need to strengthen that language...adding contributes to, collaborates, etc. What about "contributes to" other deliverables.

Denis: My concern is that we are talking about contributing to those efforts when we don't put as much time and effort into as the Group members.

Shadi: We do have the modifier that we contribute "from the education and outreach perspective"
... support maybe?

<shadi> +1 to shawn -- don't want groups to throw things onto EO

Shawn: Not sure that we want to commit to that much contribution in any case since we won't be able to meet all of those expectations.
... so making the contribution implicit in the provision of feedback?
... are we OK then?

Paul: What is EasyStart?

<dboudreau> "EOWG reviews other W3C Working Groups' deliverables and provides feedback from an education and outreach perspective" ?

Shawn: Y'know how you put something in something that you want to check if people are reading?
... I had for a week and a half the phrase, "Web Accessiiblity Quickies" and no one commented.

<Vicki> I guess I'm missing some interesting conversations

Shawn: Easy Checks was from a review perspective, but more recently we have talked about the ten easy things to do from a design and development perspective.
... we don't have a title for it, but we may want to commit to doing soemthing like EasyChecks from a design/development perspective.

Denis: Well, we are always wondering how to make accessiiblity sexy

<Vicki> oh but isn't it?

Howard: The way it is worded now, if we include it, we should be more specific about what we mean. It could be philosophy, process, technical...so we should be specific.

Shawn: We have techniques but have talked about adding a layer of simpler ways to approach the topics.

Howard: So if we include it, make sure it is explained.

<paulschantz> "Easy Start: 6 steps to making web pages accessible"

<Andrew> "Easy Start: 6 steps to making web pages more accessible"

Shawn: Yes, agreed. But first we should decide if we want to do it.

AnnaBelle: I would so very much love there to be something like this, I hope we do.

Paul: We have developed something along those lines for faculty and presented it at CSUN.

<paulschantz> It could almost be an infographic

Shawn: Suzette, in your case study, you were doing design and development rather than evaluation of existing, is that right?

Suzette: Yes, late stage development.

Shawn: In the past, we had thought about creating a layer on How to Meet WCAG that was specific to a technique.
... we could relate it to that, but instead don't try to relate it to a technique, or to cover everything, or such but would just pick out and describe the easy things.

<Zakim> Andrew, you wanted to ask does the tutorial set cover what we're after?

Andrew: How different would that be from what we are doing with the Tutorials?

<shadi> http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO/changelogs/cl-app-notes

Shawn: My understanding is that the Tutorials will cover both basic and advanced topics. They are deeper learning that what this is proposed to be. I think we may provide intro in a quick guide and lead to the tutorials
... we could decide this is not well enough defined to focus on for now, or we can decide to work on it, flesh it out.

<Andrew> lets commit to doing it :)

AnnaBelle: I think creating something that is quick, easy to understand and give them an easy accessibility win - it will be so very useful!

Shawn: People on lists have asked for these kinds of things.

Denis: Yes, and there is a real need for something like this.

Shawn: Bim, Shadi, what do you see as the relation to your tutorials?

Bim: From what I gather in the way we are discussing it, it seems like a quick start, a way to get oriented to basic concepts of accessibility whereas the tutorials will be more specific, more detailed, more complex than the quick start guide may be.

<paulschantz> yes

<dboudreau> +1

Shawn: Should we do an analysis for what this would be - what are the goals, audience, approach - sketch out what it would be. Work on the definition and then decide?

+1

<Andrew> +1

<Howard> Sure

<Howard> +1

<Vicki> +1

<Bim> +1

<AnnaBelle> +1

Shawn: In terms of timing, within the next week or two more people will be looking at the Draft Charter, but we have 2 or 3 weeks before it goes o final review. So if we can get a rough draft soon, that will be best.

<scribe> ACTION: Anna to work on definition of the accessibility quickies [recorded in http://www.w3.org/2013/05/03-eo-minutes.html#action03]

<trackbot> Created ACTION-296 - Work on definition of the accessibility quickies [on Anna Belle Leiserson - due 2013-05-10].

Shawn: Thanks for the discussion on this...other thoughts on the deliverables list?

<shawn> Evaluation and Repair Tools Working Group (ERT WG)

Shawn: A while ago, we had a database of web accessibility evaluation tools. It is outdated and part of WAI-ACT is to update. Is that something that EO should be maintaining, or should it be in the charge of the Evaluation and Repair Tools WG?

Sharron: It seems that is their main focus, it seems to belong there.

Shadi: Previously the Deliverable was to update the interface since it needs to be aligned in terms of cross references to other resources. Considerations of how to present info in most effective way. Until yesterday we were thinking of keeping the update itself in EO and have the data fed from the Eval WG
... maybe we should keep it as the responsibility of EO but add a stronger language about in collaboration with Eval

Shawn: Having items that are joint responsibility sometimes adds complexity, but probably not in this case.

Sharron: But it sounds like it has not been successful since it is so outdated. We don't want to get to that point agan.

Shadi: Yes but there were technical reasons having to do with a server ugrade for how that happened. It is not related to the collaborative nature of the project. The timing, the Easy Checks, the WCAG-EM work all contribute to the fact that this is a good time to do this update. I think we should leave it as a collaborative effort.

Andrew: So we are taking on the responsibility of updating the DB itself?

Shawn: it is not ours. What we have done before, people could submit updates and someone on the WG had to review and approve the addition of new tools.
... OK anything else on deliverables?

<Andrew> last time a small group did some initial collection to kick start the database

Howard: I had thought for my project in college curricula, I had expected to create some short videos. Do we think this is included implicitly?

Shawn: Yes, some of the deliverables are deliberately left open and can fit there.

AnnaBelle: To my POV - looking at the structure of the deliverables, I see four basic categories. It seems the development categories should come first and PM related materials should be with that. Outreach would go to the bottom.

Shawn: What if we put Intro materials at the top?
... weakest section is project management in terms of actual content.
... (reorders list) anything else on deliverables?
... I will make the suggested changes, post the link. Reminder that EO Home Page has Actions for All that is kept current. Check in to find things to do.

Tutorials

<shawn> Accessibility Tutorials - Guidance on how to create content that meets WCAG

<shawn> need "web" in there somewhere. either:

<shawn> Web Accessibility Tutorials - Guidance on how to create content that meets WCAG or

<shawn> Accessibility Tutorials - Guidance on how to create web content that meets WCAG

Shawn: Finalize what we will call them? Last week we had discussion. Bim had taken the conversation and come up with this...

<shadi> +1 for the first option

<Vicki> +1 for first option

Shawn: 3 or 4 weeks ago there was concern about them being called tutorials, last week subsequent discussion made us more comfortable with that.
... we will create a top level file system and once we name these items, we do not want to have to rename them and change the URI. So we should be confident in our decision.

Denis: No real concerns, I am just not thrilled with that choice. Why did we move away from How-To guides,

Sharron: The substantive nature of the content. They will in fact be quite extensive and a full learning experience, so tutorial seemed OK.

<Bim> http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO/Drafts/app-notes/

Howard: In looking at the drafts we reviewed last week, I kept getting error messages.

<shawn> draft http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO/Drafts/app-notes/

Denis: I have a feeling that tutorial is a very old word, popular in years past, but not much used these days. Old school.

<Vicki> btw, my comment may be out of context since i'm not on the phone but for seo, better to put the key words first.

wikipedia defintion of tutorial http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tutorial

<Andrew> "a tutorial seeks to teach by example and supply the information to complete a certain task."

<Vicki> tutorial works for me but then again, i'm a bit old

<Bim> http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO/Drafts/app-notes/tables/Overview.php

<Andrew> "Internet computer tutorials can take the form of a screen recording (screencast, a written document, interactive tutorial, or an audio file, where a person will give step by step instructions on how to do something."

Shawn: Next point is to look at open issues.

<shawn> Web Accessibility Tutorials - Guidance on how to create content that meets WCAG

AnnaBelle: The subtitle makes me wonder about using the word content. If developers see that, they will think - "content" it's not for me?

AnnaBelle: in fact we want them to think it is very much for them. Why not just say web sites?

<shawn> Web Accessibility Tutorials - Guidance on how to create websites that meets WCAG

<shawn> Web Accessibility Tutorials - Guidance on how to create websites that meet WCAG

<Andrew> +1 to 'websites'

Andrew: Very much support websites rather than content

Shawn: Would have to make clear very early on that a reference to websites includes web applications.

Andrew: It does more so than web content

Shawn: Can still tweak the subtitle in the next few weeks.
... can we create it as WAI/tutorials or should we put it back on the list?
... almost all active members have been in either this meeting or the last one.

<Vicki> oops a bit late but +1 for the title

<dboudreau> @bim - i like it more, thanks

Shawn: If you go to the first page of any of the pieces, the title to the subsections are Summary and Who Benefits. Should it be Overview or something else...comments on the first heading?

Andrew: So the suggestion is Overview instead of Summary?

Denis: One thing that looks wierd to me is the placement of Next and Previous, they seem reversed to me.

Shawn: That is all just in draft form...

Bim: It's likely because I am a keyboard user

Shawn: Navigation is very much in flux, only points ready for consideration are title and subsection headings.

Denis: I think that it is good that it maps to the other documents, gets people accustomed to how the materials are formatted.

Shawn: Nice point.

Howard: Any of those terms work - Overview, Summary, Description. Going for consistency would be useful.

Shawn: But this really is different - it is more of a summary than a description.

<Andrew> +1 for Overview

<Howard> +1 also for overview

<dboudreau> overview

+1 for I don't care

<Vicki> either will do

Shawn: Since most are in favor of Overview, how about let's do that unless anyone has objection or strong feelings?
... next is Who Benefits? Howard noted the possibility of What are the Benefits? or Rationale...

<dboudreau> +1 for "who benefits" - let's put the people first!

<Howard> or SEO

Shawn: that is an interesting question since "Who" focuses on the users. "What" could include Biz Case benefits

Andrew: Such as SEO, maintenance, etc
... could just call them "Benefits"

Shawn: How does that strike you Bim?

Bim: Yes I am happy to include anything that will be likely to make people embrace accessiiblity.

<Vicki> +1 for Bim

<Andrew> "Benefits" leaves the option open for adding additional benefits if we choose

Denis: It is a nice touch to say these people will beenfit from what youa re doing. There is enough documentation of the biz case reasons and people are here because they have decided to do it and are here to find out.

Shawn: Yes and we tried to keep it as brief as possible and not to editorialize much or at all.

Andrew: Using just "Benefits" allows flexibility to include those items if something jumps out.

<AnnaBelle> +1 to just "Benefits"

<Andrew> +1 to just "Benefits" - keeps heading short

Howard: I have observed that in scanning, Who Benefits is quite precisely aligned to the content.

Shawn: Is the "Who" quite important then? Or is Benefits alone sufficient?

<dboudreau> i think the "who" is important

Sharron: I agree with Denis

Shawn: And it keeps the people perspective

<Andrew> sure - can accept those arguments

Denis: And we have less risk of going in different direction

<Howard> +1 for "who benefits"

Shawn: Any objection then to keeping it as "Who Benefits?"
... Bim we can look later at the other comments, esp Sylvie's about indicating more pages, etc? We will llok at that with navigation.

<Andrew> +1 for 'markup'

Shawn: next question was code vs mark-up. Strong inclination in favor of "Mark-up"
... any further discussion?

Bim: Version 1 did use that word exclusively and code was added to make it more accessible to those with less technical knowledge.

Shawn: there are ways to make that explanatory text appear early on...will discuss

Bim: Yes, OK I can do that.

Easy Checks

Shawn: There are still open issues that we have not addressed as we got pulled into other work. As we get back, note the highlighted text also marked by [EOWG]. If folks can find and comment, we will discuss next week.

<shawn> to replace http://www.w3.org/WAI/eval/preliminary.html

Shawn: the first question for your general thoughts. Remember this is meant to replace the old Preliminary Review page
... the question is at what point can we move the new content to that URI (still in draft) but more pointable.
... we prefer not linking to Drafts because as it is taken up and adopted, it comes up higher in search engine.

AnnaBelle: Can't you redirect?
... or noindex?

Shawn: We have that on our wikipages but they still get indexed.
... and we don't redirect in case people want to see the old page
... so the question is at what point do we want to make this move?

Denis: Knowing that it is publicly visible we will work harder on it. Working under the spotlight is sometimes a good thing.

Shawn: So let's look at it in its current shape and say what we are and are not comfortable with. All but two or three sections are all quite stable.

Andrew: Another way of doing it may be to only move to the permananet location those stable sections with placeholders for the ones that are not.

Shawn: Any other thoughts about the pros and cons of moving sooner rather than later?

Suzette: I have added in a few comments that have come from my recent case study.

Shawn: Send email to the group, so everyone can review and then we can discuss next week.

<Vicki> ciao

Shawn: explains how to watch a page

<Howard> good article on hiding from indexing - http://yoast.com/prevent-site-being-indexed/

Shawn: Thanks so much for adding that useful date Suzette. Thanks for the call and for all your input. Will send the updated charter info. it will go to W3C management for review, maybe as early as next week...then to member review in another couple of weeks. Current charter expires at the end of June, so this will go into effect then. Don't forget to update availability and stay current with Action Items.