Oracle honors National Disability Employment Awareness Month and World Standards Day

November 15, 2023 | 3 minute read
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The month of October marked National Disability Employment Awareness Month (NDEAM). The NDEAM observance was declared in 1988 by the US Congress to raise awareness of disability employment needs and to celebrate the many and varied contributions of individuals with all types of disabilities. 

In honor of NDEAM and World Standards Day on Saturday, October 14, Oracle supports and celebrates the continuous progression of global accessibility standards. These standards empower all web users of any ability to access the world wide web. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is the main international standards organization for the web, and Charles Adams, a member of the Accessibility Program Office at Oracle, serves as co-chair of the W3C Accessibility Guidelines Working Group.

Luke Kowalski, SVP of the corporate architecture group at Oracle, shared his thoughts on the value of W3C: "W3C provides a unique and valuable opportunity for W3C members, staff, and the international community to collaborate on creating open standards in a transparent manner. As W3C transitions from a hosted model to a member-driven non-profit organization, we are excited for the potential to be more agile and accountable while adhering to the same standards processes and licenses that have been successful over the past 28 years. As a member of W3C since 1995, Oracle has been privileged to have helped in W3C’s mission to lead the web to its full potential by creating open standards. Oracle will continue its contributions and participation in W3C including its leadership in the Accessibility Guidelines Working Group (AGWG). Oracle values the benefits that the W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) have provided to improve access to the web by anyone, regardless of their abilities, around the world."

Congratulations to all members of the AGWG for the release of the WCAG 2.2 as a W3C Recommendation. This release expands the support for individuals with vision, motor, and cognitive disabilities with nine new Success Criterion.

WCAG 2.2’s goal is to create a “single shared standard for web content accessibility that meets the needs of individuals, organizations, and governments internationally.” This standard is focused both on information on the page and code or markup that structures web content, and is primarily used by web content and tool developers, accessibility tool evaluators, and other technical roles.

Oracle’s participation in the W3C enables our Accessibility Program Office to craft and implement a global Oracle Accessibility Policy that best serves our customers’ needs. We’d like to recognize our team members who contributed to this effort:

  • Charles Adams, contributing editor and co-chair of the AG Working Group. As co-chair, Charles facilitated conversations among a diverse set of representatives and perspectives to drive member consensus.

A photo of Charles Adams

  • Chris Loiselle, contributing member. His role focused on representing all Oracle products and technologies when conversing about proposed standards.

A headshot of Chris Loiselle

Please join Oracle in its celebration of World Standards Day and NDEAM. The theme for NDEAM 2023, “Advancing Access and Equity,” promotes inclusive employment policies and practices that benefit employers and employees alike. This year, the US Department of Labor announced that its Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) will honor the 50th anniversary of the passage of the 1973 Rehabilitation Act. For related resources, visit the ODAN NDEAM 2023 website.

Learn more about accessibility and standards:

Heather VanCura

Heather VanCura (@HeatherVC) is director and chair of the Java Community Process (JCP) Program at Oracle. She is an international speaker, leader of Global Java Adoption (Adopt-a-JSR) programs in conjunction with Java User Group leaders, and organizer of developer hack days around the world. VanCura is passionate about growing Java technology and community building dynamics, women in technology, STEM education, travel, fitness, and wearable technology.


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