I have the most experience with Zoom, so that is mostly what I will focus on here. I have recently heard that the auto-captioning on Microsoft Teams is preferred by many. For an overview of different meeting platforms and accessibility, check out these links:
The National Association of the Deaf has a ton of info on accessibility for D/HH people.
Zoom Basics
-If someone is calling in, let them know who else is in the meeting. I have also had a lot of success just using the Zoom phone feature when meetings have a blind participant–this way, we’re all on the same page with regard to taking turns, etc.
-If there is visual information and anyone who is not seeing it (for any reason), that information must be described.
-Zoom has a feature which allows a host to order participants and then for that participant order to be enacted on everyone’s device. I have found this extremely useful for settings where there is ASL and English. This has also been really helpful in ASL classes–directional signs suddenly make a lot more sense!
From Zoom:
“When in Gallery view, you can click and drag videos to create a custom video order. After the first change, all other participant tiles will remain in place until moved. New participants will be added to the bottom-right, on the last page if multiple are present. Your custom order will be seen only by you, or the host can deploy their custom view to all participants. This order can be released and the order will revert to the default.
Click and drag any participant video to the location on screen you want.Continue as needed to achieve your desired on-screen order.”
Link here: https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/201362323-Changing-the-video-layout-Speaker-view-and-Gallery-view-#h_01EJ7EVXH61CK63G23CJFBQY3C
-Also, for ASL contexts, be aware of screen mirroring! Link explaining what screen mirroring is and how to change: https://www.pocket-lint.com/apps/news/152025-why-is-zoom-video-backwards-and-how-to-fix-it
Rachel Levit Ades 