To ensure equal access to all audience members during your presentation, follow these helpful tips.

• Allow access to front row seats for persons with disabilities.



• If possible, adjust lighting for persons with visual disabilities. Ask them what works best.



• Make aisles accessible so participants using wheelchairs/scooters do not have to sit in the back of the room.



• Clear aisles of obstacles for persons with visual mobility disabilities.



• Control background noise to greatest possible extent.



• Speak in well-paced, well-modulated tones. Monitor rate and volume.



• Avoid turning your back to the audience when speaking. People may be depending on speech/lip reading.



• Repeat questions aloud before answering them.



• Accompany overhead transparencies, posters, Power-Point presentations etc. with verbal description. Be sure to read what is on the screen.



• Avoid relying solely on oral presentations and gestures to illustrate a point, or using visual points of reference (e.g. this, that, here, there, etc.). Read or describe what you are pointing/referring to.



• Having your handouts available on disk and/or having a large-print version of your handouts available will be helpful to persons with low vision. (Enlarging font to 18 point bold or enlarging each page 130-150x on 11x17 sheets of paper would be ideal.)



• Have transparencies available in hard copy for close examination.



• Use clear, vivid, legible, sharp, high-contrast handouts, transparencies, etc. Avoid using dark ink on dark paper, fancy fonts, and extremely small print.

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ACPA Task Force on Disability Issues