About Writing Spaces
Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing is a book series containing peer-reviewed collections of essays—all composed by teachers for students—with each volume freely available for download under a Creative Commons license. Writing Spaces aims to build a library of quality open access textbooks for the writing classroom as an alternative to costly textbooks. Each series contains engaging essays from different writing teachers in the field and explores important topics about writing in a manner and style accessible to both teachers and students. In each chapter, authors present their unique views, insights, and strategies for writing by addressing the undergraduate reader directly. Drawing on their own experiences, these teachers-as-writers invite students to join in the larger conversation about developing nearly every aspect of their craft. Consequently, each essay functions as a standalone text that will easily complement other selected readings in first-year writing or writing-intensive courses across the disciplines at any level.
The Accessibility Group
The 5 Volumes of Writing Spaces essays include 93 PDFs and the Activities & Assignments Archive include an additional 40 PDFs. We’re convening this Accessibility Group to help us ensure that all of our Writing Spaces materials are accessible.
In particular, we are looking for:
- An accessibility expert to help us design a checklist and a protocol for revising our materials in accordance with Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 and PDF/UA (Universal Access, or ISO 14289). Experience with Adobe Accessibility tools helpful but not required.
- A group of volunteers who will each be assigned a list of Writing Spaces resources to revise using that checklist and protocol.
Anyone with interest and/or expertise in this area is welcome to join the team, including graduate students, part- and full-time faculty, and educator-scholars who are not affiliated with specific institutions.
Two of the Writing Spaces co-editors, Mary Stewart and Bryna Siegel Finer, will oversee the logistics of this team.
Time Commitment
We will have a better sense of the time commitment after we’ve worked with the accessibility expert to design the checklist and protocol, but our hope is to recruit enough volunteers so that the time commitment is only a few hours. Our goal is to have the Accessibility Group’s work complete by the end of Spring 2024.
Expressing Interest
To express your interest in participating in the Writing Spaces Accessibility Group, please write to writingspacestextbooks@gmail.com.