Digital accessibility is more important than ever before
Many people are relying on digital services for everyday activities including shopping, remote work, education, healthcare, and banking.
People with disabilities need these services more than ever before. Websites, mobile apps, video/audio conferencing, electronic documents, emails, and social media posts need to be accessible to them.
Let’s come together to ensure that everyone has access to technology. Our best practices, quick tips, and free resources are curated on this page for you.
On-Demand Webinars
Webinar resources include the recorded, slides, and transcript.
The Impact of COVID-19 on People with Disabilities
Learn how COVID-19 and the resulting reliance on web and mobile self-service adds new challenges for people with disabilities, and simple steps every organization can take to minimize the impact and support users of all ages and abilities.
Access Resources for the Impact of COVID-19 Webinar
Making Communications Accessible for Remote Audiences Series
In this 3-part webinar series, Chief Accessibility Officer Jonathan Avila shares common issues and practical tips for ensuring your presentations, emails, social media, and electronic documents are fully inclusive and accessible.
- Creating and Hosting Accessible Online Presentations
- Creating Accessible Emails and Social Media
- Creating Accessible Digital Documents
1 Hour Pro Bono Consultation
for COVID-19 Resources
Do you have COVID-19 related resources (information page on your website, content, etc)? Request an appointment with one of our accessibility specialists to get guidance on how to make these resources accessible to people with disabilities.
Additional Resources
- Online Education and Website Accessibility- video reiterating the importance of technologies to be accessible to all students, including those with disabilities. U.S. Department of Education, Office of Civil Rights (OCR)
- Coronavirus and disability: What you need to know- advice for employers on coronavirus and persons with disabilities. Business Disability Forum
- Disabled people have worked remotely for years, and they’ve got advice for you and your boss. The Washington Post
- Bulletin has reminded healthcare and other entities receiving federal funds that their anti-discrimination obligations under Section 1557 and the Rehabilitation Act remain in place at this time of COVID-19 emergency. The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)
- Anatomy of an Alert: Accessibility for COVID-19 Hospital Web Alerts Catharine McNally, Phase2Technology
How to Ensure Your Mobile Content is Accessible
Using smartphones to perform basic activities of daily living like banking, shopping, or scheduling appointments is no longer just a convenience—it’s become required during the COVID-19 quarantine. In this recorded presentation, you will learn about:
- Current trends in mobile usage
- Accessibility requirements for mobile applications and web
- Common mobile accessibility issues and their impact on users with various disabilities
- Testing and development strategies for mobile apps and content
Let Us Help – Quick Fixes for Accessibility Improvements
Here are some small changes that can make a big difference to people with disabilities:
Ensure all images have alternative text. Any image that conveys information should have an alt attribute. Alt text is read by screen reading software to people with visual disabilities or those who process information better when it is read to them.
You can download our ebook on Writing Meaningful Alt Text and learn how to quickly write effective alternative text for your images.
Remember that social media sites also support the use of alternative text – so include alt text in your posts on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
Test your site using only a keyboard. Use the tab and/or arrow keys to move and the spacebar and/or enter keys to click. If you cannot see where you are on the page, that means you need to add a visual indication of focus.
Sometimes, web designers remove these visual indicators because they consider them to be detrimental to the overall design aesthetic. But without them, people who cannot use a mouse are unable to see where they are on your website.
Go into your website’s CSS and look for the section on :focus. Add a visual indicator of focus.
Label all your form fields. The accessible name for a field needs to match the text of its visual text label. This seems like it wouldn’t be a problem, but it is a common problem that prevents people using screen readers or voice control software (e.g., Dragon) from using your form.
Check all of your essential forms to be sure the accessible name matches the visual text label.
Note: The placeholder attribute is not a substitute for an accessible label for a form field.
Check your content structure. A sighted person can skim a page of content to find headings. A person using a screen reader can press a key to skip from heading to heading.
If your content has proper semantic markup (e.g., h1, h2, h3), then it is accessible. If you are using your heading tags out of order or using text size or formatting (e.g., bold) to indicate headings, then that person will have to listen to the entire page and hope to find what they need.
Fixing semantic markup in your content is not an exciting task, but it can be easily accomplished by folks working at home while watching their children and/or binge watching Netflix.
Check out our Best Practice Resources
Free testing tools, browser extensions, ebooks, and more.
Page Tester
Want to know if your website is accessible to persons with disabilities? Use the free community editions of our best tools to start evaluating your digital properties
Accessible Color Picker
The color contrast checker provides a quick and easy method for testing color combinations for validity under leading accessibility standards such as the WCAG 2.0 requirements.
Understanding Assistive Technology
Ever wondered, “How does a blind person use an iPhone?” In this series, you’ll learn about the assistive technology (AT) that enables people with disabilities to use the web.
Accessibility Glossary
An easy to read, printable glossary to all the terms, abbreviations, and acronyms related to digital accessibility.
Learn definitions of common terms, from A11y to ZoomText and everything in between!
Writing Alt Text
A quick guide to help you write meaningful alternative text for images and pictures. Alt text is used by screen readers to describe images to people with visual disabilities.
Ask yourself two questions. Write a few words based on your answers. Done!
Business Case for Accessibility
Get a comprehensive overview of the risks, benefits, and impact of accessibility across a range of broader business goals and functional areas which are critical to all organizations.
Develop a framework for securing internal buy-in on accessibility initiatives.