Digital Accessibility and Compliance Building LEA Capacity December 13, 2016 Alise Crossland and Devon Wellington American Institutes for Research

About the Center on Technology & Disability The Center on Technology and Disability (CTD) is a user-centered learning and technical assistance center designed to increase the capacity of families, school systems, technical assistance providers, SEA and LEA leaders, and other key stakeholders to understand, assess, acquire, and implement appropriate assistive and instructional technology strategies and tools. CTD is administered by FHI 360, American Institutes for Research, PACER Center, and Adirondack Accessibility and funded by the Office of Special Education Programs, U.S. Department of Education.

Accessibility Overview What do we mean when we’re talking about accessibility?

What Do We Mean When We Talk About Accessibility? Equal access and equal opportunity to access content, programs, resources, learning platforms Born accessible Digital is not always accessible Students and parents

Everyone is Responsible for Accessibility Commitment, vision, and leadership is critical Accessibility considerations must be a priority at all levels SCHOOL DISTRICT INSTITUTION AGENCY BOARD TEACHERS/ PROFESSORS WEB DEVELOPERS CONTENT CREATORS TECH COORDINATORS ADMINISTRATORS

Why Do We Care About Accessibility? Seven states: Alaska (Juneau) Guam Dept of Ed Montana (School for Deaf and Blind) New Mexico (Santa Fe) Nevada (Washoe County, Davidson Academy, Dept of Ed) Oregon Dept of Ed Utah (Granite School District) Washington (Bellingham School District, Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction)

OCR Review & Approval The 11 education groups voluntarily committed to make their websites accessible through a range of actions, including: COMMIT CONDUCT A THOROUGH AUDIT DEVELOP CORRECTIVE ACTION PLAN ADOPT POLICIES & PROCEDURES MAKE WEB CONTENT ACCESSIBLE POST INFORMATION ABOUT ACCESS PROVIDE TRAINING SELECT AN AUDITOR The 11 education groups voluntarily committed to make their websites accessible through a range of actions, including: Affirming their commitment to ensuring that people with disabilities have opportunities equal to those of others to enjoy the recipients’ programs, services, and activities, including those delivered online; Selecting an auditor who has the requisite knowledge and experience to audit content and functionality and identify barriers to access on the existing website for people with disabilities; Conducting a thorough audit of existing online content and functionality; Adopting policies and procedures to ensure that all new, newly added or modified online content and functionality will be accessible to people with disabilities; Making all new website content and functionality accessible to people with disabilities; Developing a corrective action plan to prioritize the removal of online barriers; Posting a notice to persons with disabilities about how to request access to online information or functionality that is currently inaccessible; and Providing website accessibility training to all appropriate personnel.

Definition of Accessible Content Content that people with disabilities can navigate, perceive, understand and interact with Content that considers physical, visual, speech, auditory, neurological, and cognitive disabilities

Potential Barriers for Your Users Disability Examples Potential Barriers Auditory Hard of hearing Deafness Deaf-blindness Audio content that lacks captions or transcript Audio content that lacks the ability to control volume Vison Low-vision Blindness Color blindness Color used as the sole means of conveying information Images and charts that lack meaningful text alternatives (alt text) Lack of clear and consistent navigational structure Site does not allow full keyboard navigation Images or text that cannot be resized

Potential Barriers for Your Users Disability Examples Potential Barriers Cognitive and Neurological Seizure disorders Learning disabilities Autism spectrum disorders Memory disorders Long and overly complex sentences and paragraphs of text Websites or digital content with moving, flashing, or blinking elements that cannot be turned off Sites with difficult or confusing navigation Insufficient time to respond to tasks and prompts Speech Apraxia Aphasia Disorders or injuries that can affect speech (e.g. brain injury, oral cancer, Huntington’s Disease) Applications or websites that require speech to interact Contact information on website is telephone only

Potential Barriers for Your Users Disability Examples Potential Barriers Physical Arthritis Cerebral Palsy Head injury Spinal cord injury Repetitive stress injuries Websites without full keyboard access Insufficient time to respond to tasks and prompts Confusing or overly complex navigation Learn more about how people with disabilities access the web and digital content: https://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/people-use-web/stories

Guidelines for Accessibility Shifting guidelines and growing understanding of expectations for digital access

Clear Shift to Include Digital Access Proposed changes to Section 508 would move to WCAG 2.0 and require compliance at both A and AA level Changes have been delayed; U.S. Department of Justice has provided guidance in two statements of interest in Harvard and MIT cases (2015): Existing case law and federal regulations make clear that accessibility is mandatory Schools, institutions, public accommodations, etc. are required to provide equal access to web-based services, programs, activities ADA explicitly written to keep pace with developing technologies

What is WCAG 2.0? Web Content Accessibility Guidelines Emerging as international standard for web accessibility Developed by World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to promote web accessibility 3 tiers of compliance: Levels A, AA, and AAA AAA level is advanced, and not likely to be necessary for most applications Proposed changes to Section 508 reference WCAG levels A and AA as standard for web accessibility in the United States

WCAG 2.0: PRINCIPLES & GUIDELINES Consists of 4 principles and 12 guidelines Perceivable (guidelines 1.1-1.4) Operable (guidelines 2.1-2.4) Understandable (guidelines 3.1-3.3) Robust (guideline 4.1) CONFORMANCE LEVELS Three levels of conformance (from lowest to highest): A, AA, AAA NOTE: Conformance to a standard means that you meet or satisfy the 'requirements' of the standard. Under each guideline, there are Success Criteria that describe what must be achieved to conform to the standard.

Implications for Education Leaders What does this mean for you?

Who is Responsible for Accessibility? TEACHERS WEB DEVELOPERS CONTENT CREATORS TECH COORDINATORS ADMINISTRATORS Ensuring equal access to learning opportunities and programs is a system-wide responsibility that requires commitment, leadership and vision Accessibility considerations must be a priority at all levels Everyone is responsible for accessibility! Ensuring equal access to learning opportunities and programs is a system-wide (school, district, institution) responsibility; commitment, vision, and leadership is critical Accessibility considerations must be a priority at all levels, not just thought about when problems arise or special educators must make accommodations

How Do We Get There? WEB DEVELOPERS CONTENT CREATORS EDUCATORS STAKEHOLDERS STUDENTS PARTNERSHIPS Be proactive in addressing accessibility, not reactive when a problem arises Work together to create a system-wide plan for addressing accessibility

Plant the Accessibility Seed… Moving towards accessible digital content is a process. As technologies continue to change, we’ll be faced with new challenges for ensuring that none of our users are digitally excluded. Ask: Do we have a clear accessibility policy posted on our website? How are people with disabilities currently using our content? What barriers do they encounter? What assistive technologies are they using? Are all of our staff aware of the need for accessibility? What are our primary needs and concerns around accessibility?

Considerations for Creating Accessible Content Resources for Training LEAs

Considerations: Accessibility Statement Schools and organizations should have a broad accessibility statement to address the needs of all users publicly displayed on homepage along with information about to access accommodations Example from disability.gov Accessibility Statement Generator Example Accessibility Statement from Disability.gov: https://www.disability.gov/accessibility-statement/ Accessibility Statement Generator: http://www.accessibilitystatementgenerator.com/

Considerations: Software Functionality Use the built-in functionalities of your software to build accessible content Semantic styles and structures should consider all kinds of disabilities in their formatting HTML, Word files, PDFs, PowerPoints, etc., can all be made accessible Use the formatting tools to provide structure – this will make it easier for screen readers to capture the content Use the software to create lists, columns, tables, change margins, insert a new page, and more

Considerations: Software Functionality HTML, Word files, PDFs, PowerPoints, etc., can all be made accessible CAST (center for applied special technology) page includes tutorials, checklists, policy briefs, guidelines for creating accessible online content and courses, 2016 Fed & state accessibility guidelines , best practices for social media: http://aem.cast.org/creating/best-practices-educators-instructors.html#.WE8GHrIrLIV

Considerations: Color Color should not be the sole means of conveying meaning When creating a document or website, avoid using red and green colors or highlighting text http://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/ Pass: 2B363C Fail: 60B8CE

Considerations: Cognitive Accessibility Turn large chunks of text into manageable sections Shorten sentences to ensure they’re not unnecessarily complex Use sans-serif fonts and nothing smaller than 12 point font Serif fonts have structural details and some extra flourishes Times New Roman v. Serif fonts can be more difficult to process for those with visual and cognitive disabilities

Considerations: Alternative Text Alt text is required for non-text content such as pictures, graphs, and charts Should be 120 characters or less that relays the meaning or purpose of the image (in an instance when more information or context is needed to provide meaning, an accompanying document or descriptive text surrounding the image may be included) Have a picture that’s just decorative? Use: alt “” Think about the context! NOT use the phrases "image of ..." or "graphic of ..." to describe the image. It usually apparent to the user that it is an image. And if the image is conveying content, it is typically not necessary that the user know that it is an image that is conveying the content, as opposed to text. If the fact that an image is a photograph or illustration, etc. is important content, it may be useful to include this in alternative text

Considerations: Alternative Text If the picture is on its own, with no contextual information, then for sure need alt text: http://www.webcredible.com/blog/writing-effective-alt-text-images/

Considerations: Caption and Describe Videos Videos should be captioned (this can be helpful for all people, not just those who are hard of hearing or deaf) Describe videos for people who are unable to see the video Video content should include a transcript YouTube video captions on CTD: https://www.w3.org/WAI/perspectives/understandable.html Being able to speed up and slow down is important for people with cognitive or neurological delays https://www.w3.org/WAI/perspectives/understandable.html

Considerations: Descriptive Hyperlinks Hyperlinked text should describe content to which it is linked and describe the destination Avoid terms like “click here” or “email” Users must be able to navigate hyperlinked text through the keyboard alone http://webaim.org/techniques/hypertext/

Considerations: Working with Developers Resources for developers to build accessible, cross-device, interactive sites that are useable via mouse, keyboard, & touch screens Menus Tabs Sliders Modal dialogs Column & grid layouts Color schemes http://aem.cast.org/creating/cast-figuration.html#.WE8H07IrLIX

Training Resources Accessibility training organizations: SSB Bart group Cryptzone WebAIM WCAG 2.0 Checklist: Perceivable: Web content is made available to the senses - sight, hearing, and/or touch Operable: Interface forms, controls, and navigation are operable Understandable: Content and interface are understandable Robust: Content can be used reliably by a wide variety of user agents, including assistive technologies Within each of the checklist sections, there are resources that can be used for training. For example, under perceivable, it details the need for alt text. Here’s a Youtube clip that shows how to do that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKPmZTTqxJk

Action Steps Learn more about your users with disabilities and how they currently use your content, the barriers they experience, and the assistive technology tools they use Incorporate personas with disabilities (fictional representations of your users) into your technology decision-making to help you think about potential barriers (http://www.uiaccess.com/accessucd/personas.html?_sm_au_=i VVf1PFqrD644W2r)

Action Steps Ensure your teams understand accessibility legislation at state and federal level Use checklists and guides (ex: WCAG 2.0 checklist) to perform an accessibility audit of your website, instructional materials, etc. and to review existing accessibility policies Request VPAT (Voluntary Product Accessibility Template) statement in all contracts and purchases for electronic content Review accessibility policies at other districts, schools, universities

Action Steps Develop and communicate institution-wide vision of accessibility for all and commitment to Universal Design for Learning Set goals and benchmarks with clear timelines for success Carry out regular accessibility audits and solicit feedback from students and stakeholders

Suggested Resources Accessibility Toolkit: What Education Leaders Need to Know: http://www.ctdinstitute.org/library/2016-10-11/digital-accessibility-toolkit-what- education-leaders-need-know Accessibility Tools and Resources: http://ctdinstitute.org/sites/default/files/file_attachments/AccessibilityQuickGuide_50 8.pdf Accessible Distance Learning: http://www.catea.gatech.edu/grade/index.php Accessibility Statement Generator: http://www.accessibilitystatementgenerator.com/ CANnect: http://www.cannect.org/accessibility-tips.html CAST Figuration: http://aem.cast.org/creating/cast-figuration.html#.WE8H07IrLIX

Suggested Resources CAST: Best Practices for Educators & Instructors: http://aem.cast.org/creating/best- practices-educators-instructors.html#.WE8GHrIrLIV Examples of accessibility policies in higher education: http://www.washington.edu/accessibility/requirements/example-policies/ Example Accessibility Statement from Disability.gov: https://www.disability.gov/accessibility-statement/ Getting Started with Accessibility: http://www.ctdinstitute.org/library/2016-10- 11/getting-started-accessibility How to Meet WCAG 2.0: https://www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG20/quickref/ Making Accessible Documents: http://www.doe.mass.edu/odl/videos/MakingAccessibleDocs/story.html National Center on Accessible Instructional Materials: http://aim.cast.org/

Suggested Resources National Center on Online Learning for Students with Disabilities: http://centerononlinelearning.org/ Temple University Guide to Accessible Purchasing: https://accessibility.temple.edu/guide-accessible-purchasing The PALM (Purchasing Accessible Learning Materials) Initiative: http://aem.cast.org/navigating/palm.html Web Accessibility Perspectives: https://www.w3.org/WAI/perspectives/ WebAIM: Introduction to Links and Hypertext: http://webaim.org/techniques/hypertext/ WebAIM Color Contrast Checker: http://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/ Writing Effective Alt Text for Images: http://www.webcredible.com/blog/writing- effective-alt-text-images/?_sm_au_=iVVsncFmjR6DhVhV