The CSUN Assistive Technology Conference 2025, held from March 10th to 14th at the Anaheim Marriott in California, brought together a diverse global community of professionals, researchers, and individuals passionate about accessibility and inclusive design. This year’s conference featured a wide array of presentations covering topics from digital accessibility law to AI equity and innovative assistive technologies. Attendees, including Intuit representatives, engaged in sessions, networking events, and discussions, sharing insights and experiences to advance the field of assistive technology.

This article summarizes key takeaways and notes from the week’s sessions. Christopher Phillips has been curating the big ol’ list of CSUN presentation information.

Tuesday, March 11

What is the relative benefit of doing 2d and 3d video analysis for sign language recognition? 2D datasets are easier to collect at a mass scale. But 3d datasets may have higher quality data.

Modern phones and devices can manage 3D analysis. 2D datasets have some limitations, related to dimensionality: space and dimension.

With VR, there are complications with the spatial relationship with sign language. The 2d needs to take a camera that is in the center of the viewers face. A 3D analysis should give more flexibility.

This study focused on Isolated Sign Recognition (ISR)

The only difference in data is on the body, not the fingertips, due to what is available from the Nuitrack pose estimation library.

• “Yes” and “Consent” have hand shapes that don’t change and this gave them a higher recognition rate.
• “No” and “Again” have hand shapes that change while signing.

Wednesday March 12

Gait with a walker under cognitive load and physical fatigue

They’ve been working on solving this by analyzing movement, it’s possible the walker could provide braking or instructions when it detects the user is not keeping up

• Walkers require a higher cognitive load, due to maneuvering, than walking unassisted.
• Stride velocity and distance is reduced when counting backwards.

In the test, the people would do a typical walk with the walker, they would rest, than walk while serial subtraction of 7 from 100 (100, 93, 86…). They would then do squats to become fatigued and do a regular walk with the walker. Finally they would walk while fatigued while serial subtracting.

Risks of isolation and loneliness for People with Hearing loss

Social isolation can have an impact as large as heart disease. It can lead to mental health problems, behaviors (diet, exercise).

What can individuals do

• Understand consequences of social disconnection
• Invest time in nurturing relationships
• Minimize distraction during conversation
• Seek out opportunities to serve and support others
• Be responsive, supportive, and practice gratitude
• Actively engage with people of different backgrounds and experiences
• Participate in social and community groups
• Seek help during times of struggle
• Be open with your health care provider
• Make time for civic engagement
• Reflect the core values of connection

Strengthen Social Infrastructure in Local Communities

• Design the built environment to promote social connection
• Establish and scale community connection programs
• Invest in local institutions that bring people together

Build a Culture of Connection

• Cultivate values of kindness, respect, service, and commitment to one another
• Model connection values in positions of leadership and influence
• Expand conversation on social connection in schools, workplaces, and communities

Deepen Our Knowledge

• Develop and coordinate a national research agenda
• Accelerate research funding
• Increase public awareness

Mobilize the Health Sector

• Train health care providers
• Assess and support patients
• Expand public health surveillance and interventions

Reform Digital Environments

• Require data transparency
• Establish and implement safety standards
• Support development of pro-connection technologies

Enact Pro-Connection Public Policies

• Adopt a “Connection-in- All- Policies” approach
• Advance policies that minimize harm

Related resources

• HHS Social Connection
• The Six Pillars to Advance Social Connection
• Deafblind People, Communication, Independence, and Isolation

Voice duplication works well for those who have lost their voice, such as ALS. Tech for Good:

• Giving a Voice to the Voiceless
• Custom Neural Voice portal

Procurement – the neglected piece of the accessibility puzzle

Intopia Slides for CSUN ATC 25 presentations

There are numerous standards and global laws that define accessibility requirements.

Waypoints to consider for ICT procurement

• Organization support
• Planning process considerations
• Procurement process considerations
• Evaluation process
• Contract considerations
• What if nothing is accessible
• Ongoing issues
• Vendor management

Accessibility policy

Provides a governance framework

• Helps set expectations
• Sends a clear message
• Focuses attention

Add to existing procurement policy

We are committed to accessible business practices. We have a dedicated program to drive improvements in the accessibility of all our customer-facing services and equipment as well as our work processes and systems. We aim to procure goods and services that are accessible to all our staff and customers.

We expect our suppliers to:

• Actively create and support accessible products;

• Embed accessibility principles within business operations;

• Continuously monitor and strive to improve accessibility of their products

Include accessibility in RFIs, RFPs, RFQs

Throughout, not just an appendix.

• Be specific
• Model good practice

Introductory and policy questions

• Contact person for accessibility
• Written accessibility commitment
• The extent of accessibility of [product]
• Statement of conformance
• What is their technical experience with accessibility

Does it require the user to enable an accessibility option? What is the documentation to explain this requirement and how is it maintained?

Thursday, March 13

Digital access is a civil right of disabled people. This session shares U.S. legal updates about access to websites, apps, kiosks, and more, and about laws, regulations, lawsuits, negotiations, and government policies.Accessibility is a civil right.

Digital accessibility is Engine of disability inclusion in tech

• The difference between inclusion + exclusion for disabled people
• Intentional practices that make inclusion happen
• Privacy, security, safety +++ for disabled people

Digital accessibility is a civil|human right

March 12, 1990 – capital crawl.  35th anniversary this week. People left their mobility devices at the bottom of the capital steps and crawled to the house to demand passage of the ADA.

Digital accessibility framework

• Federal laws
• Federal regulations based on the laws
• Federal agency policy statements
• State and local laws and regulations
• Global laws impacting the United States

Existing federal laws and regulations

• ADA (since 1990)

  • Anti-discrimination

  • Effective communication via aids and services

  • Digital since 1996

  • 2024 Web and Mobile rule

• Section 504 | 508

  • To take money or sell to the government requires accessibility

• CVAA + FCC regulations
• Air Carriers Access Act
• ACA Section 1557
• Laws not related to disability rights

New ADA  Web and Mobile Rule (2024)

• State and local government only (libraries, parks, …)
• WCAG 2.1 AA
• Time frame (kicks in 2026)

  • ADA not suspended

  • New Louisiana case

• Fact sheet: new rule on the accessibility of web content and mobile apps
• Video: Webinar: Americans with Disabilities Act Title II Web & Mobile Application Accessibility Rule

What’s the risk to existing Federal laws + Regs

• Will ADA Change?
• Will ADA regulations change?
• Can there be private lawsuits to change laws + regulations

  • Yes: 504 challenge Texas v. Becerra: What it is and How You Can Help Stop the Attack on Section 504

• What can congress do?

Executive Orders

• DEI Executive orders (Eve Hill on lflegal)

  • Lawsuit filed to Block trump DEIA Executive Orders

  • The Effect of Donald Trump’s DEI Executive Order on Accessibility

  • Two Federal Actions Address Disability and Accessibility

• Slight backtrack on accessibility in DEIA

  • OPM Feb 5 memo: OPM Issues Additional DEIA Guidance to Agencies

Power to protect federal laws and regulations

• Disability/civil rights lawyers challenging trump and winning

  • Track the lawsuits via google (civil rights clearinghouse)

• Protecting the laws in court
• Staying the accessibility course
• Complex process for change

Power of the states to push back against federal lawlessness

• Top Lawyers in 16 States Push Back on anti-DEIA Executive Orders

• Sixteen State Attorneys General Affirm Support for DEI Programs

Beyond Laws and regulations: US Agency guidance

• EEOC, DOJ, HHS, DOE
• Telehealth and ai
• Workplace and higher ed
• Resources are on lflegal.com

Use the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine to find archived information and pages that have been deleted/destroyed to use as the basis for challenges.

Don’t Obey in Advance by Timothy Snyder, On Tyranny

Global Framework

• European Accessibility Act impacts US Companies
• US Companies impacted by UNCRPD in India
• States could weaken disability rights laws

  • Limit the right to sue

• States could strengthen disability rights.
• States could adopt new laws
• Court interpretations
• EU, India and other international laws

Access to healthcare: private enforcement

• UNC Health care system private lawsuit

  • 275k damages and fees + 1.2 million in attorney’s fees

• LA Community College District

  • 240k verdict in 2023

• 4224 lawsuits filed last year due to inaccessible web sites

  • 961 against defendants already sued

  • 1000+ against sites using overlays

  • 99% on web sites

• Another Web Access Overlay Company Sued by a Small Business
• Beware of AI Accessibility Promises: US Federal Agency Fines an Overlay Company One Million Dollars
• Dividing and conquering won’t work if we embrace intersectionality.
• The 2025 LFLegal Digital Accessibility Joy Plan

Developing AI Equity, Access, and Inclusion for All

• Ariana Aboulafia: Center for Democracy & Technology
• Rylin Rodgers: Microsoft

AI is everywhere, impacting disabled people in employment, healthcare, and beyond. The U.S. Access Board, alongside nonprofit and industry partners, has created best practices on disability and tech – if you want to know more, this session is for you!

Resources:

• CDT/AAPD Report

  • Building A Disability-Inclusive AI Ecosystem

• Microsoft Responsible AI

  • Responsible AI Principles and Approach

• EDF EUAI

  • A disability-inclusive Artificial Intelligence Act: A guide to monitor implementation in your country

• Accommodations

  • Using AI to support people with disability in the labour market

  • Generative AI holds great potential for those with disabilities

  • Create Accommodations Using an AI Chatbot

Systems chosen for analysis

• Benefits determination
• Employment
• Education
• ICT
• Health care
• Criminal justice
• Transportation

If something is illegal without AI, it’s illegal with AI.

AI must follow the laws and regulations as the people it is replacing/supplementing.  The same level of transparency must be used for AI functionality.

The first guideline for AI came out within the employment space. It focused on AI discriminating and being just as responsible as a hiring manager discriminating against a candidate.

There’s a new shift for AI as a reasonable accommodation. For instance a co-pilot license within Microsoft Office to accomplish their work. For instance someone that is dyslexic that benefits from the advanced copyediting functionality.

There’s still an issue with AI tools as an accommodation being blocked by educators, such as the ability to use ChatGPT within a math class.

The integration of technology into schools can both be helpful for advancing accessibility and tailoring educational services, as well as pose risks related to accessibility, privacy and discrimination for youth with disabilities. The civil rights of students with disabilities, including how educational technology (edtech) is used in K-12 schools, are protected by several federal statutes — including the aforementioned Americans with Disabilities Act (“the ADA”), as well as Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (“Section 504”),25 and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (“IDEA”).26 There also may be state or local level statutes that protect students with disabilities when edtech is used in the educational context.

• Building A Disability-Inclusive AI Ecosystem

Accessibility consulting is still broken

Karl Groves, AFixt

Traditional accessibility consulting is often little more than an audit. Using survey data from long term practitioners in the field, this take dives into the various other things that can be done to help customers improve and be self-sufficient.

Accessibility Consulting is Broken – Karl Groves – 2014

Root of the cause for accessibility issues

• Ignorance
• Lack of culture that embraces accessibility
• Lack of quality focus

Look at accessibility errors as the symptom of the root causes.

Top 5

1. Link quality
2. Text alternatives i
3. Contrast
4. Object labels
5. table/header structure

In a survey of techniques to solve accessibility, Audits performed very bad in all categories.

Disclosure, Accommodations, and Interactional ecosystems

Madeo Sukhai, Ontario Tech University

The duty to accommodate process is the means by which we provide accessibility supports to students and employees with disabilities. Learn how this framework may fail the people it is intended to serve, and potential ways to improve its effectiveness.

IDEA-STEM

• Making science accessible is a matter of human rights: A scientist’s call for inclusion
• CAN/ASC-1.1:2024 – Employment – Accessibility Standards Canada

Duty to accommodate

1. Duty to inform
2. Duty to inquire
3. Duty to accommodate

The 12 Barriers to Effective Accessibility Supports in the Workplace (1) IDEA-STEM

1. Lived experience with disability is not “one size fits all”
2. Disability policy in the workplace was built for yesterday’s workers with disabilities
3. Policy and application don’t (always) line up
4. Intersecting histories – of work, of disability, of productivity
5. The persons who came up with “Duty to Accommodate” (probably) never had to use it
6. Bona fide occupational requirements and duty to accommodate
7. Hidden assumptions with disclosure
8. Disclosure is person centered – the requester is at the core of conversations, but also at the core of legitimization of their need
9. Disclosure and Trust get Conflated
10. Disclosure doesn’t (always) work
11. Accommodations alone are insufficient, even when they are working
12. (Over-)Emphasis on personal barriers

The end of average

Are you above average? Is your child an A student? Is your employee an introvert or an extrovert? Every day we are measured against the “average person,” judged according to how closely we resemble the average—or how far we exceed it. The assumption that average-based yardsticks like academic GPAs, personality tests, and annual performance reviews reveal something meaningful about our ability is so ingrained in our consciousness that we never question it. But this assumption, argues Harvard scientist Todd Rose, is spectacularly wrong.

Time for School, Little Blue Truck –  children’s story that you don’t have to meet the expected requirements to be successful. Rather it’s about succeeding in projects that make you successful.

The Meiorrin Test: if an employer can legitimately argue in favor of a discriminatory BFOR, which cannot be accommodated, undue hardship applies.

Friday, March 14

Slides: Know Before You Buy

• Product reviews
• People with disabilities talking about everyday products they use in their homes
  • The Things We Love and Hate
• Conversations about standards and developing with people with disabilities in mind
• Exploring what makes products accessible for everyone

The original video was also a pitch for the LIghthouse for the blind’s grant project: Holman Prize – Know Before You Buy

Gamestop effect:

The “GameStop effect” refers to the 2021 short squeeze of GameStop stock, triggered by retail investors on the Reddit forum r/WallStreetBets, which led to a dramatic price surge and significant losses for hedge funds that had shorted the stock

• Someone posted Lucy’s video on Reddit and it led to 180k+ views and she was able to monetize her channel and get in contact with LG.
• A Korean journalist followed up with the video and challenged LG to contact Lucy.
• LG reached out to Lucy and wanted to work with her to solve the issue.
• The person who came to install the braille overlay explained that many people cannot read the display because they’ve lost vision and have the appliance in a dark area. Also, people with people with parkinson’s repeatedly tap buttons.

The problem with LG’s approach

It worked great for Lucy, but doesn’t scale. The template used letters, like a, b, c, d instead of short text.

The braille templates are not available to buyers in the united states. The order screen is not publicized and required calling the accessibility help desk. They promised to send a template in 2 weeks and it has been 4 months.

Nobody is getting braille templates and the newer machines don’t have the basic buttons. They require customers to use the app to use the machine.

Cognitive load is a significant issue with appliances and this can be especially difficult for those with ADHD.

Embedding accessibility in a design system playbook

How Design, Engineering, and Accessibility teams collaborated to integrate accessibility into a new design system and playbook at eBay, with practical insights and lessons learned.

• Ebay design system Design System | eBay Playbook
  • eBay Playbook
  • Accessibility | Foundations | eBay Playbook
• Ebay accessibility guidance eBay MIND Patterns
• Figma plugin: Include Plugin: Getting Started | Accessibility | Foundations

Color pairing tool

Notice the image changes based on the color choice

Accessibility details for each component list what is important for a designer. The engineering specific information is located in their Mind Patterns.

Building an a11y program to meet global requirements

David Martin, Intuit

Accessibility requirements are expanding, and our budgets are not. Learn how Security and Privacy organizations have already solved many of our new challenges and real world examples of tools and processes you can leverage today.

Getting an organization to do what it should

“We’d love to do it but we don’t have…” time, people, budget…

When entering a conversation, you need to understand their values and language.

• Values and Money
• Risk and FUD (Fear, uncertainty, and doubt)
• How to start
• Putting it together

Understanding motivation

Organizations care about money. They care about keeping the money they have and getting more.

We need to put aside our value of customer good and it’s right for our customers. Instead, we can talk about the profit lost by not approaching the customers that are being ignored.

How do you talk about money when it is treated as a cost?

Speaking their language – risk

What is it: the uncertainties that can affect a company’s ability to achieve its strategic objectives.

Go through the risk types and mark which ones would be relevant to your company/organization and then build strategy around them.

Risk types:

• Market
• Credit
• Liquidity
• Operational

Strategic risk

• Competitive
• Technological
• Reputation / brand
• Regulatory

Operational Risk

• Process
• People
• Systems
• External Event

Compliance and legal risk

• Regulatory compliance
• Contractual compliance
• Intellectual property
• Environmental Compliance

How to use it

Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt (FUD) – Your new best lever

What is the risk appetite for your organization?

FUD is the native, negative emotional response to influence perception and drive behavior by making the audience feel uncertain, fearful, or doubtful about a situation or decision.

• Internal leaders can use FUD to highlight potential risks and motivate action
• When used constructively, it can drive innovation, improve risk management, and enhance competitive positioning.

Use FUD to motivate positive action

• Risk identification
• Risk management
• Drive planning and steering committees
  • Create detailed action plans to mitigate identified risks
• Building awareness and top of mind critical thinking
  • Encourage a culture where employees are proactive in identifying and addressing risks
• Why it works
  • Discomfort, in the right amounts, gets folks to listen and re-evaluate to get back to their comfort zone.

Putting it together

Groundwork, and parallel workstreams

The laws

• Documentation and tracking: even if you know it, others need to refer to it
• Legislation and Key Dates
  • European Accessibility Act, enforcement begins June 28, 2025
  • Accessibility Canada Act
  • CA AB-1757
  • UK Equity Act 2010: Overview of UK accessibility laws

The standards

• WCAG 2.2
• EN 301 549
  • Canadian version
• India’s IS 17802
• Internal accessibility policies

Make your business case:

What’s my current state

• What works well
• What isn’t working well
• What doesn’t exist but should
• What doesn’t exist but could
  • In-house capabilities
  • Third party services

Document how things get done

Get to know people outside the accessibility team to understand how things get done. What is the actual process? Who does the tasks to get things done. Make sure your policy and documentation standards look like security and privacy. People are used to following a security policy and it’s easier for them to absorb an accessibility policy when it follows their pattern.

The Joy of 4 Legged AT: Puppy Raising Trainer and Recipient

Unique AT, service dogs, increase individuals with disabilities independence. Framed by service dog history and laws, this session covers benefits and aspects of the training of puppies to be service dogs and having a working service dog.

History, training, and life with a service animal.

Guide dogs began in Germany with disabled veterans of WW1. 1923, Fortunate Fields, Americans learned about the training and shared the information with international news, the Sunday Evening post in 1927.

The first guide dog school started in 1929 in the US.

Guide dogs for the blind in 1942

Service dog as a concept in 1975 started by Bonnie Bergin. Canine Companions for Independence.

• Bergin College of Canine Studies
• ADA National Network
• Intervention in school and clinic 

Categories of service dogs

• Service Dogs
  • Guide Dogs
  • Hearing (Signal) Dogs

Video: Guide dog saves man and woman from swerving vehicle