about Ann McMeekin
Ann McMeekin is passionate about accessibility and good design (whether on the web or in the real world) and doesn’t believe that one has to be sacrificed to achieve the other. This is something she’s promoted for several years to anyone who’ll sit still long enough to listen (and often to those who don’t).
the early years
Born and brought up in the West of Scotland, Ann developed an interest in computers before she reached double digits in age, and got online relatively early, in 1995.
With personal and family experience of disability, her commitment to accessibility grew with her knowledge and enthusiasm for web design, and led to her taking the role of Senior Web Designer for an internet startup, creating attractive, accessible websites for clients in the hospitality industry.
the RNIB years
In late 2001, Ann moved to London, and began working for RNIB, joining the well respected Web Accessibility Consultancy in mid-2003 and becoming a Consultant in early 2005.
At RNIB, she was able to use all her skills and experience to carry out audits and assessments, give practical advice, devise pragmatic solutions, influence policy, and deliver inspirational training for clients of all sizes across all industry sectors.
career achievements
- designing and building the HTML version of the RNIB See it Right book (distributed on CD-ROM).
- presenting or participating in expert panels at a number of conferences and workshops.
- contributing to the development and delivery of a very successful series of training courses.
- contributing to large scale benchmarking exercises, such as the UK Government report on the eAccessibility of public sector services in the European Union and several SOCITM Better Connected Reports.
- being a member in good standing of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative's (WAI) Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines Working Group (AUWG).