365 Days of Pure Awesomeness

365 Days of Pure Awesomeness

Since it's a thing now to write a blog post on the last day of the year about the events, projects, and initiatives the organization ran in that respective year, we've got to keep up with it. So here it is: 2015 was the BEST year EvoXLabs has had so far. And the only one, for that matter.

EvoXLabs launched on January 1st, 2015 to carry out research on Web Accessibility. We launched our first jQuery tool evoFonts to allow people with vision limitation to be able to change the text size on Web pages dynamically without comprising the aesthetic look of the page. In February, we launched the FAWN Initiative to make free and accessible websites for nonprofits of Philadelphia. In April, we organized evoHaX - our first Hackathon on Web Accessibility as part of the Philly Tech Week 2015.

In May, we presented our research on evoGraphs (jQuery plugin to create accessible graphs) at the WWW 2015 conference in Florence, Italy and won the Delegates Award for the Most Significant Accessibility Research. In June, we did a poster presentation of evoGraphs at Google, CA. In July, we helped our friends at Philly Touch Tours to create their accessible website and their promo video. In September, we presented an extended version of evoGraphs at the Graphical Web Conference in Pittsburgh.

In October, we organized our second evoHaX (special edition) with the theme of accessible wearable technologies to celebrate the Disability Awareness Month. In November, we spoke at the Start.Stay.Grow Summit and the Technically Speaking Panel. In December, we organized a Web Development Workshop for Middle School Students at the Overbrook Education Center, and presented Five Ways to make a Community more Accessible at the RISE Conference.

We've been busy doing things that matter. But not enough. 2016 will be a better year. Together with our friends and the community of Philadelphia, we're aspiring for bigger projects in 2016 that will change lives. Goodbye, 2015. And hello there, 2016.

Created: 31 December, 2015