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    What is Accessibility?

    Accessibility is the practice of making digital content accessible to everyone, including those with disabilities.

    In practice, this means using specific techniques when we create documents, videos and all other digital content in order to remove barriers and allow people with disabilities to perceive, understand, navigate and interact with the content.

    Anyone who helps create, share, and publish digital resources for our district must make it accessible.

    Why are we responsible for accessibility?

    It's the law

    Accessibility is a legal requirement under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and we are required by law to ensure our digital content is accessible for students, staff and the public.

    It helps our community

    We celebrate our diverse community and want to make sure our digital content can be used by all members. Just like wheelchair ramps, accessibility helps everyone, not just those with visual, auditory, physical or cognitive disabilities.

    While accessibility is necessary for some groups to use the web, it benefits everyone. Explore the impact and benefits for everyone in the Web Accessibility Perspectives video series.

    What needs to be accessible?

    Accessibility applies to all online content, including images, documents, writing and digital resources on:

    • The district website
    • Our campus websites
    • The staff intranet
    • Staff-created Google sites
    • Online newsletters (ex. Smore)
    • Social media
    • Any digital communication tool (ex. email)

    How do I make digital content accessible?

    Creating or improving digitally accessible content is simple:

    How do I measure accessibility?

    Just like in other disciplines, there is a set of standards that provide a guideline for measuring accessibility. These standards are determined by experts in the industry:

    • Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1
      • These guidelines relate to general content added to web pages such as text, images, documents, videos, etc.  We are required to meet both Level A and Level AA (WCAG 2.1 Quick reference).
    • Web Accessibility Initiative-Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA) 1.0
      • WAI-ARIA defines a way to make web applications more accessible, especially dynamic content and advanced user interface controls developed with Ajax, HTML, JavaScript, and related technologies (WAI-ARIA 1.0).

    See below for specific instructions and further information about making digital content accessible.

    Resources

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    Contact us

    For more information about accessibility, contact: