Author: danica

In order to answer the question of “Are there equal opportunities on campus to get involved?”, my group analyzed the UBC Peer Programs to determine whether it is accessible to those who are disabled. A key concept when discussing accessibility is Universal Design, which is a design outline that attempts to make things accessible to as many people and as many situations as possible. One component of our analysis was to determine whether the concept of Universal Design was applied in order to make the site more accessible, especially for those with disabilities.

Since none of us in the group were disabled, it was challenging for us to “take the role of the other” and view the page through the lens of someone living with a disability. At first, this added some difficulty to our analysis of the Peer Programs webpage, since we assumed everything looked easy enough to read and access. However, after actively analyzing the page with the criteria for accessibility given to us by Universal Design, the criteria gave us direction in what to look out for in terms of format and layout of the website, and how to shift our thinking to determine in what ways the webpage was easy to access for those who live with some form of disability. We found that the page was easy to read due to there being enough contrast between the darker colour of the text and the lighter-coloured background of the webpage, therefore fulfilling the UD principle of “simple, intuitive use”. We also found that the page was easy to navigate due to a simple design. In addition, we found that the page has a Readability score of 9.9, making it fairly easy to understand for those at a college level, and when compared to the Readability scores of other groups, the lowest score of all assigned webpages for this assignment.

Despite some aspects of the page contributing to its accessibility, our group still came across some accessibility problems. For example, there is no obvious way to increase text size for those who have a visual impairment. To do that, I discovered that one must scroll to the very bottom of the page and click the small link entitled “Accessibility” in order to view ways the text size can be changed so it can be read more easily. When compared to a website like Cbc.ca, where the “Accessibility” are clearly outlined in a distinctly visible area on the side of the page, it is obvious that UBC could do more to make the page more accessible to those with visual impairments. In terms of page content, the “Peer Programs” UBC offers may not be accessible to all who wish to join those programs, due to the nature of some job duties requiring an amount of physical effort that would not cause too many problems for an able-bodied person, but not so much for someone with a physical disability. Also, it was noted by one member of the group that most of the “support” programs offered by UBC on this page mainly cater to those with mental disabilities rather than those with physical disabilities.

When taking into consideration the research my group and I did, I believe that opportunities to get involved are not equal. Equal opportunities to get involved stem from how equally accessible the information about these programs is. If measures are taken to improve the accessibility of this page for those who are disabled, then opportunities will become more equal.

In our social networks, many different factors have a significant influence on who we deem as part of our personal network. Following an analysis of and discussion about who I see as important in my life, I have found that context and institution are especially relevant to my social network. Surprisingly, I have noticed a slight heterophily in my social network in regards to context, education, occupation, and age of those in my social network, and a homophily stemming from the gender and means of communication.

Since I have lived in the Vancouver area my whole life, almost all who are in my social network reside or have resided in areas close to me. However, many friends I hold in my social network are not friends from childhood, but friends I met when I was in high school. I was formerly close to some people who I met in elementary school, but grew apart due to the fact that we attended different high schools. Prior to attending UBC, I attended an all-girls private school on the west side of Vancouver, which explains the strong homophily in my social network in terms of the gender of those in it, since I am mainly friends and am comfortable around other females. It was a very close-knit community, and many of the friends I made there shared the same values I did, such as the importance of getting a post-secondary education. From this knowledge, I found that with the context of knowing many people in my social network from this community, there is a strong correlation between the categories of institution, education level, and occupation. Many of those in my social network who I became acquainted with in high school went on to enrol in universities as full-time students, creating said correlation. Another prominent, common factor in my social network that causes this correlation is privilege. Although many of those in my social network would not define themselves and their families as “rich”, it does require some privilege to be able to attend a private school in one of Vancouver’s most affluent neighbourhoods. The experience I had and the friends I gained while in high school had a great influence on who I am and what my goals are.

Another prominent attribute in my social network is the means of communication I employ to talk to each member. When analyzed in my social network, the attribute of “means of communication” had an E-I Index of -0.3, indication a somewhat strong homophily. I noticed that instead of online methods of communication and offline means of communication, I tend to communicate with those in my social network using a mixture of online and offline methods. In addition, those I deemed to have the strongest relationship with me were the ones more comfortable to talk to me while in person, as opposed to someone I can only have online communication due to them not see very occasionally.

Further discussion in my group assisted in confirming my thoughts. We had significant similarities in our data sets. Each of us had high homophily levels in terms of the genders of those in our social networks, and similar education levels.

Overall, I think my social network says a lot about who I am as a person. It shows that I tend to gravitate towards those who share my same priorities and need for success in life.