Accessibility Resources

Table of Contents

Council Of Ontario Universities (COU)

The Council of Ontario Universities (COU) provides a forum for Ontario's universities to collaborate and advocate in support of their shared mission to the benefit and prosperity of students, communities and the province of Ontario.

Educators Accessibility Toolkit - Council of Ontario Universities

  • Contains tools for course planning, teaching tips, and accessible education.

Accessibility In E-Learning - Council of Ontario Universities

  • Part of the Educators Accessibility Toolkit that contains specific tools for e-learning

Creating Accessible Documents

All web content posted on Lakehead University's Website must be compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines also known as WCAG 2.1. These standards make web content accessible to people with disabilities and medical conditions, in accordance with the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act or AODA. Learn more about WCAG 2.1 standards.

Check out the Resources Section of the National Center on Disability and Access to Education website for helpful tips on creating accessible documents. The Cheat sheet section also has information on Word Documents, PowerPoint and PDF's.

Microsoft Word Documents

For an introduction on creating accessible Documents using the Microsoft Office suite specifically Microsoft Word, see their web page to make your Word documents accessible to people with disabilities. 

The COU has also created a document to guide users called the COU Educators Tools: Using Word Documents and/or PDFs.

Microsoft PowerPoint

COU Educators Tools: Using PowerPoint
  • Tools for using PowerPoint and making it accessible for all from the Council of Ontario Universities.

Microsoft has also created a resource for making Microsoft Powerpoint presentations accessible.

PDF Files
Adobe has its own list of resources that can be used to make documents accessible called Adobe Acrobat Accessibility Training Resources.

Infographics

Infographics are not accessible because they are images of text which makes them unreadable for screen readers and difficult to zoom in on for people who have low vision. If you wish to use infographics there are a few steps you must take to make them accessible.

The first step to making an infographic accessible is ensuring that the colour contrast, size, and font follow Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) standards. This link to the WebAIM contrast checker and this link to the WebAIM Typeface and Font Tips are a good place to start checking your infographic while you are creating it, to make it as readable as possible.

The next step to making your infographic accessible is to create a PDF version that is readable, which you can check using the link to Adobe Accessibility Training or the link to WebAIM's PDF Accessibility document.

Finally, create a long form text version of the infographic. The text version should contain all the same information as the infographic in plain text. You can do this as an accessible word document that is linked, or directly on the page. WebAIM has an example of an accessible infographic and a list of more tips.

WebAIM

WebAIM provides tools and training for organizations to expand the potential of the web for people with disabilities by empowering individuals and organizations to create accessible content. They have many tools to use for both documents and web pages.

WebAIM Tools
WebAIM Accessible Fonts 
  •  Describes what kinds of fonts to use and how to write to make content more accessible.

WebAIM Contrast/Colour Checker

  • A tool that allows the user to enter hexadecimal colour codes and check to ensure the contrast between a background colour and text colour aligns with the standard set by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).

WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool by WebAIM

  • WAVE can identify many accessibility and Web Content Accessibility Guideline (WCAG) errors, but also facilitates human evaluation of web content. There is a website URL search tool on the web page or users can download a Chrome/Firefox browser extension to check content for accessibility.

WebAIM on Accessible Microsoft Word Documents 

  • A guide for how to use the built-in accessibility checkers and tools in Microsoft Word with specialized instructions for each version.

WebAIM on Accessible PDFs

  • A guide for creating an accessible PDF and using Adobe accessibility checkers.

WebAIM on PowerPoint Accessibility 

  • A guide for creating accessible PowerPoints with links to tips for each version of the software.

Universal Design For Learning (UDL)

Universal Design is the design and composition of an environment so that it can be accessed, understood and used to the greatest extent possible by all people regardless of their age, size, ability or disability. If an environment, product or service is accessible, usable, convenient and a pleasure to use, everyone benefits.

Ontario Human Rights Commission Policy on accessible education for students with disabilities Section 8.2 Inclusive design 

  • Examples of UDL features and inclusive design principles

Universal Instructional Design (UID) Implementation Guide - University of Guelph

  • a guide to implementing Universal Instruction Design in education according to the Seven Principles of UID.

Ten Steps Toward Universal Design of Online Courses - University of Arkansas at Little Rock 

  • A list of steps to take in order to make online courses accessible for all.

Zoom

SAS has created instructions for setting up ZOOM captioning and transcription. This service is automatic and allows participants to turn on captions and to receive a transcript. We have also created a slide with instructions on using captions and transcripts that can be shared with students in your course.