These projects are now closed.
NNELS is excited to announce two new projects: Partnering with NNELS for Ebook Accessibility and Braille for Forthcoming Publications, and we are once again looking for Canadian books to purchase for our collection. These projects are funded in part by a grant from the Government of Canada’s Social Development Partnerships Program - Disability Component. Publishers are invited to apply for the new projects, and/or get in touch about having us purchase your books. Read about the projects below; you will also find links to the applications.
Partnering with NNELS for Ebook Accessibility
We want to hear from Canadian publishers who might be interested in partnering with us to work toward ebook accessibility. Whether we have worked with you before, or this is your first time hearing about us, we would love to hear from you! Publishers of any size are welcome to sign up.
For this project, we will partner our accessibility advisors with publishers. They will be sent to your offices where they will work with you and your publishing team for a few days. During this time, they will work with you to learn about your publishing workflow, and – from their expert perspective – offer suggestions about where and how accessibility can be built into your publishing process.
Publishers who wish to be a part of this project should be open to modifying their workflow in order to make their books more accessible.
Deadline to Apply: September 30, 2019
Braille for Forthcoming Publications
Our Braille Production Coordinator is looking for publishers who would like to see a new title be published in braille, at the time of publication. In order to be considered for this project, the story line or core concepts of potential book candidates should not be heavily reliant on pictures, images, or graphs. Potential books can have illustrative images, as long as the text, as written, can be fully understood without viewing the images. To make the production possible, the publisher will need to provide us with electronic files (PDF, DOC, or EPUB) of the title a minimum of 6-8 weeks in advance of the release date.
If you have publications planned with release dates falling between October, 2019 and March, 2020, that you think would be suitable for this project, please apply. Please note that, while we are excited to produce as many books as possible, time and budget constraints may not allow us to work with every publisher who applies.
Deadline to Apply: September 30, 2019
Purchasing from Canadian Publishers
We are once again able to purchase ebooks and audiobooks and make them available to eligible users (readers with print disabilities) through our catalogue. Content purchased for the NNELS collection is licensed under an unlimited, perpetual use license and is DRM-free, so it can be consumed by various readers and devices. Access to our collection is limited to eligible readers who have print disabilities — the general public does not have access. Generally, we purchase content at retail price.
We purchased content from a number of Canadian publishers in 2018 and early 2019, and if we missed you, we’re interested in your books! For those publishers we have purchased from in the past, we are also interested in purchasing your new titles released since the last purchase. We are able to purchase from DeMarque, eBOUND, and directly from publishers; we would also be interested in talking to other Canadian distributors.
Deadline to Apply: December 31st, 2019