Directory

Jonathan Lazar

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Jonathan Lazar

Professor
jlazar@umd.edu
301-405-2825
 Hornbake Building, South Wing, Room 2117-J

Dr. Jonathan Lazar is a professor in the College of Information at the University of Maryland. Dr. Lazar joined the University of Maryland in 2019, after previously serving as a professor in the Department of Computer and Information Sciences at Towson University, where he led the information systems program. At the University of Maryland, Dr. Lazar is the executive director of the Maryland Initiative for Digital Accessibility and is a faculty member in the Human-Computer Interaction Lab. He regularly teaches courses at UMD on human-computer interaction, user-centered design, accessibility law and management, inclusive information institutions, and legal research methods.

Dr. Lazar has authored or edited 17 books, including Research Methods in Human-Computer Interaction (2nd edition, co-authored with Heidi Feng and Harry Hochheiser), Foundations of Information Law (co-authored with Paul Jaeger, Ursula Gorham, and Natalie Greene Taylor), Ensuring Digital Accessibility Through Process and Policy (co-authored with Dan Goldstein and Anne Taylor), Disability, Human Rights, and Information Technology (co-edited with Michael Stein), Accessible Technology and the Developing World (co-edited with Michael Stein), Universal Usability: Designing Computer Interfaces for Diverse User Populations, and Web Usability: A User-Centered Design Approach. He has published over 200 refereed articles in journals, conference proceedings, edited books, and magazines, and has been granted two US patents for his work on accessible web-based security features for blind users.

Dr. Lazar frequently serves as an adviser to government agencies and committees, regularly provides testimony at federal and state levels, and multiple US federal regulations cite his research publications. He has been on the Executive Board of the Friends of the Maryland Library for the Blind and Print Disabled (LBPD) since 2009, has served as the co-chair of the Cambridge University Workshop on Universal Access and Assistive Technology (CWUAAT) since 2012, has been on the program committee of the ACM Conference on Accessible Computing (ASSETS) most years since 2006, and served on the executive committee from ACM SIGCHI from 2010-2015. Dr. Lazar was the general chair of the ASSETS 2021 conference.

Focus

Dr. Lazar is involved in research and teaching in human-computer interaction, with a focus on ICT accessibility for people with disabilities, user-centered design methods, assistive technologies, and law and public policy related to accessibility and HCI.

Current Research Interests

  • ICT accessibility in developing countries
  • Accessibility for blind users through non-visual modalities
  • Accessibility for users with cognitive impairments
  • Ballot accessibility in voting
  • New legal frameworks for enforcing ICT accessibility
  • Automated tools for accessibility testing
  • Accessibility beyond just web pages (including PDF documents, multimedia files, mobile accessibility, and technologies of the future)

Education

  • LL.M. (Master of Laws), University of Pennsylvania Law School
  • Shutzer Fellowship, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University
  • Ph.D., Information Systems, University of Maryland Graduate School Baltimore (UMBC)
  • M.S. in Information Systems, University of Maryland Graduate School Baltimore (UMBC)
  • B.B.A. in Management Information Systems, Loyola University Maryland (Recipient of the Father Daniel McGuire, S.J. Alumni Association Award)

Affiliations outside UMD

Recognition

Video Lectures