Exploring Design Thinking as a Software Accessibility Awareness Raising Methodology in Computing Courses

Abstract

Despite many advances in the area of software accessibility, thereare still many problems to be overcome that prevent a greateravailability of accessible software. One of these problems is thataccessibility is usually not included in the curriculum of computingcourses. This educational gap causes software development professionalsto leave college or university without understanding howthe software they develop can be adapted to guarantee its use bypeople with different needs and how to implement these adaptations.This work proposes and evaluates an accessibility teachingmethodology based on Design Thinking with the main objectiveof increasing accessibility awareness among students. The resultsindicate that the proposed methodology was effective and managedto significantly increase students’ accessibility awareness, makingthem more sensitive and empathetic about the topic. The resultsalso showed that the students approved of the methodology andconsidered it interesting and engaging.