So, here is a quick – and completely uninteresting – update:

July
- Attended Charlie’s graduation and graduation ball
- Went to an extremely wet Global Gathering in Stratford-upon-Avon
- Worked full time at a web development company in Cardiff as I have for every summer since Y10

August
- More working at said web development company

September
- Charlie & I spent a few days in Paris
- I moved into my new place in Swansea
- Charlie moved into her new place in Cardiff
- Discovered that the university had pretty much forgotten about our course and we had to organise it all

October
- Finished organising the course – although many important details still haven’t been sorted out
- Lots of boring university work
- Lots of web development work

November
- Even more boring university work
- Lots more web development work

So, as you can see, it’s been a pretty boring few months with lots of work but nothing particularly interesting happening. Never the less, I am intending to get back into the habit of blogging regularly.

Hopefully my next blog entry should be a bit more interesting.

Been very busy the last few days.  Helped Charlie move out of her house on Sunday.  Took a while to clean, but I think we left it in a pretty good condition.

Had a meeting on Monday at Hereford Sixth Form with a company who wanted to set up an alumni website for the college.  Unfortunately the meeting didn’t go very well, and the costs were much more than the college can afford.  The final decision is yet to be made (and I won’t be involved in making it), but it was good to be able to get my views across to the marketing team.

Anyway, lots to do and many things to pack.  I’m starting work on Monday morning – working at the web development company again.  Will be interesting to see which projects I will be assigned to this time.

Got a very busy week ahead.  work leaving party for Mark Overy on Wednesday, trip to Oakwood on Thursday, Sarah’s “last supper” party on Friday and SUCS beach party on Saturday.  Then the week after that we’ve got the Summer Ball again.  Should be a fun end of term.

Charlie’s headed to Plymouth for a few days to take the first batch of her stuff home.  I think I need to spend a bit of time having a clear out and sort out the mountains of unopened post thats sitting in my draws.  Oh well, I will get round to that soon.

Back to revision I think.

Dai

The first attempt at raising the motion was cancelled due to some last minute problems, but this evening it was heard at the SGM. After a bit of debate about a badly worded point (despite numerous people proof reading it, I’d made a mistake, doh!), the motion was passed.

This isn’t the end of my aim of making the sites more accessible, this motion will be followed up by an article in Monday’s Waterfront newspaper – written by Charlie Duff and supported by Discovery – the disability support charity operating in the university. I’ll post more about that as soon as it is released.

I’ve copied in the motion text below for anyone who is interested.

The Union Notes that:

1. There are 2 million people with sight problems in the UK (Source: RNIB 2007)
2. Sight problems and motor problems can both cause difficulties in using websites
3. The Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) 1995 makes it a legal requirement for all websites to be accessible by October 1999
4. The Internet standards body – W3C – runs a website accessibility initiative that provides 3 levels of accessibility – A, AA and AAA.
5. The RNIB recommends that websites should aim for the ‘AA’ standard
6. Many university departments make use of websites such as Blackboard for providing course documents and submitting assignments

The Union Believes that:

1. The Students’ Union website at www.swansea-union.co.uk does not comply with any of the three levels of accessibility
2. Other SU websites such as the Summer Ball 2007 website also do not comply with these standards
3. Swansea University websites such as Blackboard and Voyager do not comply with these standards
4. Failing to comply with these standards makes university life difficult for disabled students
5. Owners of websites that do not comply are open to legal action under the DDA

The Union Resolves to:

1. Ensure its website(s) comply with all UK laws regarding Website Accessibility to at least ‘AA’ standard
2. Lobby the University to maintain and improve the accessibility of its website
3. Lobby the University to ensure services such as Voyager, Blackboard and the Intranet comply with a minimum of ‘AA’ standard