NEW AODA COMPLIANCE OBLIGATIONS FOR SMALL EMPLOYERS

The start of the new year brought with it new compliance standards under the Integrated Accessibility Standards Requlation of the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (“AODA”). As of January 1, 2017, small organizations will have to ensure that they comply with the applicable provisions of the Accessible Employment Standards, which focus on the recruitment and ongoing support of employees with disabilities.

Educational and training institutions have a unique set of obligations under the Information and Communications Standards. These include providing accessibility awareness training to educators and providing student records and information on program requirements, availability and descriptions in an accessible format to persons with disabilities.

Educational and training institutions include:

·       Institutions governed by the Education Act or the Private Career Colleges Act, 2005;

·       Institutions that offer all or part of a post-secondary program leading to a degree pursuant to a consent granted under the Post-secondary Education Choice and Excellence Act, 2000;

·       Ontario colleges and universities;

·       Public or private organizations that provide courses or programs or both that result in the acquisition by students of a diploma or certificate named by the Minister of Education under paragraph 1 of subsection 8 (1) of the Education Act; and

·       Private schools within the meaning of the Education Act.

If they receive notification of need for accessible formats and communications, educational and training institutions must provide resources or materials in an accessible format that take into account the accessibility needs of the person with a disability to whom the information is to be provided. These needs must be considered by either procuring or obtaining a conversion ready electronic format of those resources or materials, or by arranging for the provision of comparable resources and materials where they cannot be procured, obtained, or converted. To facilitate these requirements, producers of educational or training textbooks have had to make available accessible or conversion ready versions of textbooks since January 1, 2015, and will have to make available accessible versions of other materials by January 1, 2020.

What are some unique issues that small organization have to deal with in terms of accessibility?

If you are interested in learning more about Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) or how to make accessibility a natural part of your business through the application of Corporate Social Responsibility, please contact Sandra Broekhof @ 416-579-1035 orsandra_broekhof@sympatico.ca