Sorry for posting this post a bit late. BTW, this is my personal blog so views expressed here are of my own and doesn’t represent my employer.
As you all know by now, 9th May, world has celebrated Global Accessibility Awareness Day (External link). All the accessibility (we cutely call it as a11y) enthusiasts did their bit to create awareness about digital accessibility across the world.
It was an energetic day for us at PayPal too. Our GAAD started at Singapore (as they are ahead of everyone with time zone). Employees were gathered in a room over the lunch and our Champion Victor Tsaran interacted with them over video conferencing and with the help of colleagues locally, a few demonstrations of assistive technologies were given!
Then clock turns to our Chennai office where in the morning we have launched Accessibility Open hours to our employees. A lot of employees walked in and had conversation about how they can evaluate products for accessibility, fix them, how assistive technologies work on mobile devices and so on… It was a three hours long interaction with employees over refreshments and some goodies!
Later in the evening, we have hosted a panel discussion at our Chennai office which was open for outsiders too and attended by about 50 to 60 people. Panel discussion was around basics of web and mobile accessibility, engineering best practices and accessibility evaluation. The panel discussion went on for a couple of hours with a lot of interesting conversations like how we could convince designers to implement accessibility and so on… Even after the panel, a lot of discussion around accessibility took place over the refreshments and goodies!
When India turned to night, celebrations were started at San Jose, where we did a soft launch of our Accessibility show case consist of several assistive technologies like Low vision glasses, Braille displays, switches etc., It has been always pleasure to see colleagues experiencing simulations of different disabilities. We guess, that’s probably the best way to educate someone the need for accessibility.
We also congratulate everyone around the world contributed towards creating awareness about accessibility. Let’s take this momentum on and make a milestone by GAAD 2014.
Thanks to 
The day when I saw the Computer for the first time at my uncle’s office in the year 1995, I was so inspired and internd to learn to use this vast technology. However, I am told that since I have problem with my vision, it is impossible for me to operate the computer and hence, I am not suitable to IT Industry. In the year 1999 I came to Mumbai in order to undergo the Telephone Operator’s Training at National Association for the Blind, India and subsequently, one day I was searching for the Cybercafe in order to gather some information on education in IT for blind, low vision and visually impaired people. As a matter of fact, some mistakes also show a wonderful way towards success. I was misguided and therefore, instead of cybercafe, I have reached to Shramik Vidya Peeth which is an unique institute imparting training in various fields including Computers. I have Welcomed by its Director and approved to undergo the course in their programme. I have undergone three months training in MS-Office under the auspicious guidance of Miss. Pallavi Bodhare. This is how I have entered into IT Industry
