For over a year, a team of designers have organized reproducible public workshops to add image descriptions to international open source scientific software projects. To date, we have worked with projects like NumPy, scikit-learn, Project Jupyter, and Dask, indispensable software in contemporary scientific research across fields—including AI/ML development. These events gather participants to surface accessibility needs, share experiential knowledge, contribute accessibility improvements, and develop field-specific documentation. This creates a reciprocal relationship; the designers have an opportunity for informal qualitative research, while participants immediately benefit from the addition of image descriptions based on their feedback.
While image description guidelines already exist, scientific open source communities seldom engage with them. Once prompted, many feel unsure how to apply such guidelines to their varied images. When software continues to be inaccessible, this can impact the careers and opportunities of disabled people, especially in scientific fields where these tools are standard. Our events partner needs of disabled people—to have accessible tools—with needs of the tools’ maintainers— further guidance and support for accessibility.
These workshops include the following: an introduction to image descriptions, examples of image descriptions in scientific contexts, time for questions, collaborative practice of these skills in a no-code environment, contributed changes to a project. So far we have centered image descriptions, but the format lends itself to any combination of one-line code changes and foundational accessibility practices.
In terms of results, the workshop produces image descriptions, multiple new contributors, and documentation for the wider scientific community. While they are not quantifiable, our workshops have prompted other events, accessibility audits, and code fixes based on community members’ newfound knowledge. In a space where accessibility has been an afterthought, this community accountability is a critical initiative towards disability justice in individual projects, open source, and scientific careers as a whole.