Board and AIA Launch On-Line Training Course

The Board and the American Institute of Architects (AIA) have developed a web-based education course on the Board’s ADA Accessibility Guidelines (ADAAG). The four-part course focuses on supplements to ADAAG that cover public sector facilities, including courthouses and prisons, and building elements designed for children’s use. 

The AIA is making this course available on its web site to train architects and to provide continuing education credits to its members and others. The interactive course includes case studies, discussion of key issues, and multiple choice questions.  Users can download a Course Supplement and copies of the guidelines.  The four parts of the course are:

• Introduction/ Course Supplement
• Module 1:  Judicial, Legislative, and Regulatory Facilities
• Module 2:  Detention and Correctional Facilities; and
• Module 3:  Building Elements Designed for Children’s Use.

Users can take any or all of these sections and earn three health/ safety/ welfare learning (HSW) credits per module under the AIA program. The course is available on the AIA web site at: http://eclassroom.aia.org/courselist.cfm.  A free version of the course is also available here on this web site (however, education credits are not offered through the Board’s site).

The guidelines on judicial, legislative, and regulatory facilities address elements such as restricted and secured entrances, security systems, assembly seating, speakers’ platforms, and assistive listening systems.  Much of this module is devoted to courthouses and covers access to courtroom spaces, such as witness stands and jury boxes, holding cells, and jury deliberation rooms.  

The module on detention and correctional facilities addresses the minimum number of cells that must be accessible (2%) and provides technical criteria for accessible cells.  

The third module covers alternate specifications based on children’s dimensions for certain elements covered by ADAAG.  These include drinking fountains, water closets, toilet stalls, lavatories and sinks, and fixed or built-in seating and tables. (As originally published, ADAAG, like most other accessibility guidelines, provided specifications based only on adult dimensions.)

The course also explains the status and proper application of these ADAAG supplements, which have not yet been incorporated by the Department of Justice into the enforceable standards.  For further guidance on these or other Board guidelines, visit Technical Assistance.