Philly Tech Week 2018

Mikey Ilagan is an Accessibility Specialist at Think Company. He works full-time as part of the Comcast Accessibility Team. He's spent the past decade building digital experiences using a lifetime of passion for technology. Today, he uses a diverse background to work with product teams to ensure Xfinity's offerings are usable and well-designed for customers using assistive technology.

Mikey's Talk at Introduced by Technical.ly:

Digital Accessibility: What You Say vs What I Hear

If accessibility is essential for some and useful for all, then why is it regarded as a feature instead of a requirement? Why do we have the perception that accessibility is so difficult to design and develop for? And how does compliance actually fail people with disabilities?

To answer those questions, let’s reframe the conversation. Instead of focusing on compliance, let’s look at the personal and cultural changes we can make that will influence our work. With that, we'll come to an understanding of where we fail the people who may need us most. When thinking about my history as a developer, I regret much of my attitude and inexperience. I’ll share real-life anecdotes of working with engineering teams from the perspective of a developer-turned-accessibility specialist.

Evan Lutz is a 24 -year-old social entrepreneur from Baltimore, Maryland who is passionate about food justice, entrepreneurship, and the Baltimore Ravens. He's a frequent guest on NPR, the Washington Post, and Baltimore News stations. He's been recognized in Forbes 30 under 30 in the social entrepreneurship category, Baltimore's 40 under 40, and Montgomery County Emerging Business of the Year Award, previously won by Honest Tea, Sweet Green, and Comcast. He was also featured on ABC's Shark Tank, where he made a deal with Robert Herjavec.

Josh is the founder and CEO of Bluecadet, an experience design agency that works with cultural institutions, universities, and mission-driven organizations.

With offices in both Philadelphia and New York, Josh built Bluecadet’s interdisciplinary team to unite revolutionary innovations with a sense of human craftsmanship. He has overseen the design and development of interactive experiences and planning strategies for clients such as MoMA, The Smithsonian Institution, Doctors Without Borders, National Geographic, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

As a pioneer in the technological transformation of the cultural sector, Josh is a frequent speaker at industry conferences and symposia, has appeared on CNN, CBS News, and NPR, and has been featured in publications including The New Yorker, USA Today, HOW magazine, Communication Arts, and People magazine. His work has been widely recognized with top awards including an Emmy from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, as well as honors from the American Alliance of Museums, the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, The American Institute of Graphic Arts, and South by Southwest.

Josh holds a B.A. from Tufts University and studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts. He lives with his wife and two children in Philadelphia, where he is an active member of the design and technology community.

Pavel Veller serves as EPAM’s CTO, Digital Engagement Practice, where he brings nearly 20 years of diverse experience building and releasing complex software systems and digital products using Java, C#, Ruby, JavaScript and more. Over the course of his 13-year career at EPAM, Mr. Veller has successfully led large global teams on end-to-end implementations for leading consumer products, hospitality, retail and healthcare companies. A few highlights of his work include building customer engagement, eCommerce and customer support bots with Microsoft, Amazon Alexa and AWS Lambda; integrating, customizing and extending digital products, such as Adobe AEM and Marketing Cloud, SAP Hybris, Sitecore, SDL Tridion/Web, Salesforce, for companies in North America and Europe; and migrating a large, complex loyalty system off of a DB2 mainframe and onto a modern Java-based micro/macro-services architecture.

In her role on the Innovation Management team, Eliza oversees a portfolio of initiatives that increase the City’s internal capacity for innovation, creative problem solving, and cross-sector engagement. Her core work involves managing the Innovation Lab, Innovation Academy and Innovation Fund; and leading Innovation Consulting, a program that leverages specially trained City employees to provide internal consulting services for internal and external stakeholders seeking to address challenges in new ways. Prior to joining the City, Eliza worked at Project HOME; she attended the University of Virginia, where she studied history and religious studies, and pursued a Masters degree in Public Policy from the University of Michigan. When she’s not innovating, Eliza can be found exploring new restaurants in Philly with her husband and rescue pit bull, Brew.

Eric is a user experience designer who helps create straightforward solutions that address a person’s practical, physical, cognitive, and emotional needs using accessible, performant, device-agnostic technology. You can check out his work at ericwbailey.design.

Valeisha Butterfield-Jones is the Global Head of Women and Black Engagement for Google and the co­founder and CEO of the Women in Entertainment Empowerment Network (WEEN).

A well-rounded business leader, Valeisha has a deep passion for diversity and inclusion. The evidence is in her portfolio of work, spanning two decades of driving social responsibility campaigns and community engagement programs for corporations, government agencies and nonprofit organizations.

Valeisha’s accomplishments have been recognized by Forbes, Glamour, Marie Claire, and Essence.

Valeisha is a graduate of Clark Atlanta University and a North Carolina native, but now splits time between New York City and Los Angeles. She’s married and the mother of two sons.

Tonya Adams, a Comcast employee for over 16 years, currently manages a team of network engineers that supports Comcast Business Enterprise Ethernet services nationwide. Ms. Adams has developed a reputation for strong and engaging leadership both inside and outside of cable. She began her career as a network engineer before becoming a voice engineer where she helped launch Comcast’s first digital voice services offering and going on to support and lead strategic planning on various other projects and products. Outside of work, Ms. Adams is a proud and active member of her community with membership inWICT, NAMIC, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated, Upsilon Delta Omega, and served as a former youth leader for her church, as well as several other community and professional organizations.