The southern-most section of the Rocky Mountains before sunset, Las Cruces, NM.

Sabbatical Leave: March Update

Accessibility Updates in March

I spent a lot of time in March updating course content to meet the accessibility standards that will take effect in April 2026. This work is very time consuming and detail oriented. I updated the content for the first three weeks of my Introduction to Chemistry course and revised the format for presenting content in my courses to align with the Brightspace updates that will take effect this summer.

I also updated content on my professional website to align with accessibility guidelines and better support student learning. I updated the guidelines I provide for my general chemistry students for keeping a laboratory notebook and wrote a section on how to review feedback in Brightspace. I have observed that students often don’t realize the importance of reviewing feedback as part of the learning process, and as a result, they are unsure of how to access it. My hope is that this resource will help students improve their learning experience.

I also updated the Organizational Tips for Students I created years ago. I plan to update this resource further to provide a deep dive into how students can use one of the three major technology ecosystems (Google for Android users, Apple for iPhone users, or Microsoft for all students) to better organize and plan. This is a life skill many students struggle with, and college provides an ideal opportunity for them to experiment, find a system that works, and practice using it before entering their careers.

H5P written in March

I created a significant amount of H5P content for my students in March. I wrote interactive lectures that include textbook-like content, videos, images, and example and supplemental practice problems for topics including scientific notation, scientific measurement, density, classification of matter, and significant figures. I also redesigned my introduction to chemistry syllabus in H5P to meet accessibility standards and updated the Frequently Asked Questions material I provide in all my classes.

I also began work on the draft of an H5P presentation I will give in April at Riverland to introduce the faculty to this resource and help them begin using it to create course content for their students. I am drawn to teach the teachers. I believe this is an excellent tool for helping faculty create a more effective and engaging learning experience for students.

Webinars

I attended the following webinars (or viewed the recording) in March:

New Content Experience 101 in Brightspace

This webinar was provided by the Network for Educational Development (NED) on March 2. This webinar demonstrated the new content experience that will take effect in Brightspace in Summer 2026. It became clear that this update requires a complete redesign of my courses. The update is designed for students who primarily access Brightspace from their phones, something I do not encourage, as I don’t think it provides a quality interactive experience with course content. This update encourages students to progress through the course in a linear sequence rather than reviewing each week’s material as a whole and accessing content at their own discretion. As a result, I must rethink how students approach course content and how I organize it to work within this ecosystem. This is frustrating because a linear approach to course content isn’t the best approach for all areas of study. The new Brightspace setup ignores this.

Watched Webinar on Accessibility Remediation Sprints: Creating Accessible PDF Files

I had originally registered to attend an offering of this webinar through the NED in March, but it was canceled due to illness, so I found a previous recording of it on the NED SharePoint site. This webinar taught me why using PDF files in my class is a bad idea. This file type was primarily developed to maintain formatting for printed documents. Unless you have Adobe Suite and really know how to do deep edits using this program, don’t use PDF format in your classes. Even if you created an accessible Word document and converted it to a PDF, the document won’t retain all of its accessibility formatting.

Title II Accessibility: Be Ready for the April Deadline

This OneHE webinar on March 10 emphasized that no one will be ready for the April 2026 implementation of the new accessibility guidelines. The message instead focused on continued improvement and implementation of the new guidelines. When I asked about enforcement, the response indicated that immediate penalties are unlikely and that any compliance issues would more likely be addressed through a longer legal process. It was also noted that reduced staffing in regulatory agencies may limit active enforcement in the near term.

This message conflicts other messaging that suggests enforcement will be immediate and punitive. This lack of consistent guidance makes it difficult to determine how urgently faculty need to act and how to prioritize this work alongside existing responsibilities.

Updating course materials to meet accessibility standards is a substantial undertaking. While these changes will ultimately benefit students, they require significant time to redesign content across multiple courses, including lectures, assessments, and supporting materials. Even with dedicated time during sabbatical, I expect to spend much of the summer continuing this work in preparation for fall courses.

I am particularly concerned about faculty who may not have the same level of time or institutional support. Faculty at Riverland were only made aware of these changes in Fall 2025. As of the writing of this blog, no time has been committed on faculty development days for training or development in this area. The scope of the work extends well beyond simple format changes; it involves revising nearly all course materials and, in many cases, rethinking instructional approaches to ensure accessibility.

Without clearer guidance and structured support, there is a risk that faculty will need to reduce course content or make difficult trade-offs in order to meet these expectations within existing time constraints.

What’s Burning Out Faculty? An Evidence-Based Approach to Faculty Wellbeing

This webinar was presented by OneHE on March 18. The presenters discussed their research on what burns-out faculty. Since their research was focused solely on faculty teaching at 4-year institutions and conducting research, it wasn’t applicable to me. I thought this presentation would have a great connection with the March Leadership Reads, and was disappointed when the focus was on faculty whose main focus is research, not teaching.