“When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.”
— Alexander den Heijer
Above photo by Alessio Cesario, accessed via Pexels.
The Accessible Design Guide was initially created by Faculty Librarian in Summer 2025. This collaborative resource contains input and recommendations from the Spokane Community College eLearning and Disability Access Services departments.
This guide contains is not intended to teach readers about accessibility and disabilities directly; instead, it serves as a hub connecting to links with tools that can be used and reading to learn about key concepts. It also includes a page with selected definitions of key terms connected to accessibility.
This guide is a living document and will be regularly updated with new information and links as accessibility practices evolve.
Accessibility is more than legal compliance or providing accommodations—it is a values-based commitment to equity, inclusion, and dignity. Refocus 2.0, a framework developed for disability resource professionals, reframes accessibility as a matter of social justice rather than charity or obligation. It invites us to recognize disability as a natural and valuable part of human diversity and to question deficit-based assumptions that shape how institutions respond to difference. Rather than centering on “helping” or “meeting requirements,” this approach asks how systems, environments, and practices can be designed to remove barriers and promote full participation for everyone. Accessibility, then, becomes an active expression of shared responsibility—one that belongs not just to disability services but to every member of a campus or community.
Grounded in the principles of universal design, this perspective encourages proactive, inclusive planning rather than reactive fixes. It reminds us that meaningful access depends on collective effort: educators, staff, designers, and administrators all have a role in creating environments where people can thrive without needing to request special accommodations. This LibGuide builds on the philosophy of Refocus 2.0 and its Core Values and Beliefs to help readers connect accessibility with institutional values, develop inclusive practices, and understand that true inclusion comes from integrating accessibility into the culture itself. When accessibility is embraced as an ethical and communal responsibility, it transforms from a checklist into a way of advancing justice, equity, and belonging for all.
If you have any resources connected to accessibility or disabilities, in general or specific to higher education, please consider emailing Faculty Librarian Greg Bem. All recommendations will be considered.
This guide is licensed with a Creative Commons BY 4.0 License. This license requires that reusers give credit to the creator. It allows reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format, even for commercial purposes. You are welcome to copy some or all content from here into a new guide, link to this guide, and otherwise share this content with proper attribution. If you have any questions about reuse of and remixing this guide, email Greg Bem.