Inaugural HHD Heroes Award to Accessibility Innovator, Mike Paciello
The Inaugural HHD Heroes Award was presented to Mike Paciello, Chief Accessibility Officer, Audio Eye; Founder, V.P., Director, Mentor, on November 8, 2024, at a luncheon event held at Castaway Restaurant in Burbank California.
The Award was presented by Dean Mechelle Best in the presence of Vice Provost Joy Borah, Department Chairs, and distinguished guests from on and off campus, including colleagues from CSUN and friends of Mike Paciello.
Mike also taught for the Assistive Technology Studies and Human Services (ATHS) Master’s Degree program (offered in conjunction with Tseng College), among his many accomplishments. Mike says he owes his career to the influences and inspiration he got from CSUN, beginning over thirty years ago with an invitation to attend the CSUN Assistive Technology Conference.
“I want to ensure that every individual with a disability has access to the information and technology they need to increase their amazing contributions to society.” – Mike Paciello
With connections to the CSUN Master of Science program in Assistive Technology Studies and Human Services (ATHS) that date back to its early days, Mike Paciello established his relationship to CSUN in the early 1990s. That was when he was invited to the CSUN Annual International Technology and Persons with Disabilities Conference, also known as the CSUN Conference, by then-director of the CSUN Center on Disabilities, Harry Murphy, Ed.D. Mike told us he was, “like a kid in a candy shop running all over,” as he began to realize the increased potential for some of the projects he was already working on to assist greater numbers of people with disabilities.
Right there at that first conference, he began working on an international initiative to develop standards for electronic, accessible documentation.
Throughout his career, for more than three decades, he has been a pioneer and influential figure in the accessibility industry. He wrote the first book on web accessibility and usability, Web Accessibility for People with Disabilities, and has since achieved many notable milestones. He is Chief Accessibility Officer for Audio Eye; founder of The Paciello Group (TPG) and WebABLE.Com, and co-founder of WebABLE.TV and Open Access Technologies (OAT).
Mike served as co-chair of the United States Federal Access Board’s Telecommunications and Electronic and Information Technology Advisory Committee (TEITAC). He co-founded the International Committee for Accessible Document Design (ICADD), and was recognized by President Bill Clinton for his contribution to the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). He was the recipient of the 2016 Knowbility Lifetime Achievement and the 2020 ICT Accessibility Testing Symposium Social Impact awards. Mike is active as a public speaker, mentor and contributor in the accessibility industry.
Vicky Jaque, Ph.D. (Kinesiology , and Academic Director of the CSUN ATHS MS Program, offered by HHD through Tseng College) nominated Mike for this award. In her nomination, she emphasized the ways he values, “the importance of human-centered (user-first) exposure to disabilities, which he considers critical for developing technology for those with disabilities. His emphasis remains on the user’s importance in the design and development of Assistive Technology; he often describes how the industry must value human capital in the design process. He also has emphasized the importance of designing in a way that fosters trust in those with disabilities.”
The HHD Heroes Award is made possible by an endowment created by the generous bequest of Christine and Owen Smith. Both were faculty at CSUN, and Christine served as a founding member of the HHD Dean’s Circle. The Smiths loved and were very dedicated to students and the development of HHD.
Watch the video and hear Mike tell his motivating story:
Find out more about the HHD Heroes Award and its benefactors.
F2024
Jean O’Sullivan/HHD