URL: https://www.nicchan.me/blog/was-my-iaap-certification-worth-it/
The questions I struggled with the most were questions about keyboard shortcuts for different screen readers, and questions about different laws around the world. This may be a little odd, but when I use the keyboard, I don’t consciously think about what keys I’m pressing, I basically remember what finger motion I do to activate the key. I also have a fancy ergonomic keyboard so I remap a bunch of default shortcuts to be more comfortable for me, so remembering combinations that feel arbitrary is genuinely pretty difficult.
I’m more well-versed in the legal aspects now, especially now that I’ve done more accessibility work, but I do feel that it is slightly western-centric in that I’m sure there are plenty of other accessibility experts who do not live in the regions that the test tends to ask about. Some people have also levied the criticism that such a focus on rote memorization for these kinds of facts is ableist, which I think is important to keep in mind.
I do think it helped, marginally. In my experience, people in the accessibility field do not find IAAP certifications to be a particularly useful as a benchmark for how ‘good’ someone is at accessibility. Almost none of the folks I respect the most in the field have a certification. However, it is somewhat of a useful tool for appealing to the ‘box-checking’ folks who might be in charge of an organization’s accessibility processes.
I’ve been on teams where I was the only person with a IAAP certification, and the fact I had one was seen as an asset for those seeking work in government or education, because they could point to my certificate as additional validation.
As a self-taught developer, I’ve often had bouts of imposter syndrome. It can be difficult to feel secure in your accessibility knowledge when you know that mistakes can contribute to the further oppression of marginalized groups.
I genuinely don’t like to nitpick people unnecessarily, I think it can hurt well-intentioned folks trying to learn. But if you are judging us on our accessibility, I do believe that gives us the right to judge you back. I find it a bit embarrassing that the organization that certifies accessibility experts has such obvious accessibility errors that can be detected with even a superficial glance.
The accessibility field already struggles with the ‘divide’ between experts and disabled people. With a test that has an ableist focus on rote memorization, a re-certification process that adds additional burden onto a group that may already struggle with having enough spoons to do unpaid work, and an inaccessible website, it sometimes feels like the IAAP just widens the gap between practitioners and the disabled people they’re meant to serve.