Computer Science Accessibility Professional Development for K–8 Teachers

We believe every student should have the opportunity to learn computer science, including students with disabilities. Our work is guided by the POUR accessibility evaluation framework: Perceivable, Operable, Understandable, and Robust (POUR).

This project is led by the University of Florida’s CS Everyone Center and funded by Google’s Blockly Accessibility Fund. Together with teachers, schools, and partner organizations, we are providing professional development and resources for teachers to analyze, design, and implement the POUR principles and the hardware assessment evaluation framework in their classrooms to make computer science learning accessible for all.

Meet our Team

How This Project Started

This project grew out of UDL4CS (Universal Design for Learning for Computer Science), where teachers came together to design ways of teaching computer science and robotics to all learners, including those with disabilities. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) focuses on making lessons flexible, engaging, and accessible for every learner.
Our focus now is to support teachers through professional development and resources that help them bring accessibility into their classrooms. That means giving teachers frameworks, strategies, and even robots to make computer science activities inclusive and fun.

What We Aim to Do

Learn from teachers about how they bring accessibility into computer science.

Prepare teachers to use accessibility frameworks for both hardware and software evaluation for Blockly-supported tools in their classrooms.

Provide classroom resources, including robots, so teachers can use them in lesson plans they will create.

Provide the Blockly team with approaches to improve the accessibility of their products

Framework We Use

POUR Framework

The POUR framework is the tenet of our work:

Perceivable: information is presented in ways students can recognize and access.
Operable: students can navigate the information with their preferred tools.
Understandable: students can easily follow the information from the consistent and predictable design.
Robust: information presentation works reliably across different platforms and technologies.

Perceivable

Information is presented in ways students can recognize and access.

Operable

Students can navigate the information with their preferred tools.

Understandable

Students can easily follow the information from the consistent and predictable design.

Robust

Information presentation works reliably across different platforms and technologies.

Hardware Evaluation of Accessibility for Teacher (HEART) Framework

Alongside POUR, we are creating a hardware evaluation of accessibility for teachers (HEART) framework to help teachers choose and use devices that support accessibility in their computer science classrooms.

Our Team

Meet the people behind the project

Project Team

Andrew Bennett

Principal Investigator (PI), Doctoral Candidate

Maya Israel, Ph.D.

Co-PI, Director of CS Everyone Center for CS Education & Associate Professor

Dwi Maharrani

Graduate Assistant, Doctoral Student

Leela Kumaran, Ph.D.

Research Coordinator III

Stephany Rodriguez

Research Coordinator I

Michael McKelvey

Web Developer & Accessibility Specialist

Nykema Lindsey

Innovative CS Education Teaching & Learning Specialist

Advisory Team

Luis Pérez, Ph.D.

Stephanie Ludi, Ph.D.

Kiki Protssman

Regina Fugate

Our Partners

We work closely with schools and organizations that share our vision

Major Milestones

Bennett, A. & Israel, M. (2025). Teachers’ POUR Evaluation of Computer Science Technologies (2025). RESPECT 2025: Proceedings of the Research in Equitable and Sustained Participation in Engineering, Computing, and Technology. 18-26. https://doi.org/10.1145/3704637.3734774.
Bennett, A. & Israel, M. (2025, June 4). Professional development for K-5 teachers to tailor the POUR principles to their use cases [Paper presentation]. Google Blockly Summit 2025, Seattle, WA, USA. Video.
Israel, M., Stefik, A., Fugate, G., & Bennett, A. (2025, May 9). Beyond compliance: Designing accessible tools for dynamic learning [Panel discussion]. Infosys Crossroads Conference 2025, Indianapolis, IN, USA.