By Sean Claes¹

The Internet has become a frequently used medium to reach a large, diverse audience for a nominal cost. Web sites communicate information about your product, service, or business as well as offer a place to gain knowledge and share research results. Adhering to Web accessibility standards helps ensure as many people receive your message as possible. Whether it be the executive with a hand-held personal device, the student checking e-mail who prefers a text-only Web site or a person with a visual disability using a screen-reader; with an accessible web site, everyone has equal opportunity access.

Consider the Content

An important aspect of Web accessibility is the content. Useful and informative content is most critical for a Web site to be effective. It should be clear, simple and informative.

The World Wide Web Consortium's Web Accessibility Initiative (W3C / WAI), a project supported in part by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR), published the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 in May 1999. These guidelines are helpful to explain how to make Web content more accessible to people with disabilities.

The introduction to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 contains a fairly complete picture of what a Web content developer should keep in mind when designing a new web page.

For those unfamiliar with accessibility issues pertaining to Web page design, consider that, many users operate in different contexts. People see, hear, move, or process some types of information in a variety of ways that affect the way they use computers. These can include:

• Difficulty reading or comprehending text
• Inability to use a keyboard or mouse
• Access to a text-only screen, a small screen, or a slow Internet connection
• Inability to speak or understand fluently the language in which the document is written
• Situations where eyes, ears, or hands are busy, interfered with, or lack functionality (e.g., driving to work, working in a loud environment, various disabilities.)
• Use of an early version of a browser, a different browser entirely, a voice browser, or a different operating system

On March 11, 2004, the W3C/WAI published a working draft of Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 on their Web site. You can access their web site through the following link: http://www.w3.org/WAI/.

Another consideration to take is to be sure to have a page on your Web site for your Web policies and make it available to visitors. This states the accessibility guidelines to which you are adhering, your Web site disclaimer, and privacy statement, among other things. An example of this is the Web Site Policy page of the National Center for the Dissemination of Disability Research (NCDDR): http://www.ncddr.org/about/policy/index.html

How to Increase the Accessibility of a Web Site

In the technical realm of accessibility, incomplete or "sloppy" coding can cause problems. Validating your code (HTML being the most common code used) is a good start and it checks for possible problems on your Web pages. Validation sites, such as the W3C HTML Validator (http://validator.w3.org/) CAN help with this process.

People access your Web site from a number of different Web browsers. You want to insure they can access the contents of the page. Every person is unique, and with those unique traits comes an assortment of preferences, abilities and accessibility needs.

While it is perfectly acceptable to provide graphics in a Web site, it is helpful to provide an alternative text or "ALT tag" describing any graphic element on a Web site to ensure users who prefer to exclude graphics or people with visual disabilities can obtain the information in a text format. A picture of a girl playing in a universally designed sandbox would be associated with an ALT tag stating: "This is a photo of a girl playing in a universally-designed sandbox."

Also, a transcript is needed for all audio additions in order to assist a person who prefers to read text, can't access audio on their computer, or a person who is deaf, hard of hearing or has trouble understanding sound. If you have provided the audio to an interview on your site, having a text-based version would give people an alternate way to access the information.

If you couple an alternate format, like an ALT tag or transcript, with any non-text based inclusion, you will reach more people - people who are looking at a site in text-only, on a hand-held personal device, and persons with disabilities.

Web sites with complex language can be difficult for a person for whom English is a second language or a person with a cognitive disability. When planning a Web site, be sure to provide the information in the simplest form. This way more people will be able to access and gain understanding about the information contained within your site.

The actual design of a Web site can hinder accessibility. Web sites that are designed without enough contrast to the colors (like light text on a light background) make the information hard to read or understand. High contrast is desirable, like black and white or yellow and black. If it seems difficult to read the content on a Web page this way, it is likely that some color alterations should be considered.

A popular way to share information is through a Portable Document Format (PDF). A PDF is a good way to preserve fonts, graphics, and the look of a paper-based document. However, PDF format is often not accessible to people who use screen reader programs. If you have placed a PDF on your Web site, consider providing the information in a way that is accessible to people who cannot utilize it- like an HTML or a plain-text version.

In 1998, Congress amended the Rehabilitation Act to require Federal agencies to make their electronic and information technology accessible to people with disabilities. Inaccessible technology interferes with an individual's ability to obtain and use information quickly and easily. Section 508 was enacted to eliminate barriers in information technology, to make available new opportunities for people with disabilities, and to encourage development of technologies that will help achieve these goals. The law applies to all Federal agencies when they develop, procure, maintain, or use electronic and information technology. Under Section 508 (29 U.S.C. ' 794d), agencies must give disabled employees and members of the public access to information that is comparable to the access available to others (http://www.section508.gov/).

Does this mean that you should have a text-only white page with black text? Certainly not. There are many ways to obtain a colorful graphics-rich Web site that is accessible to people of all abilities. With a few changes, most Web sites can be accessible with minimal time and expense to the benefit of everyone involved.

References:

National Center For The Dissemination of Disability Research (1997, 1998, 2001). The Research Exchange newsletters. Southwest Educational Development Laboratory. http://www.ncddr.org/du/researchexchange/index.html

World Wide Web Consortium (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, European Research Consortium for Informatics and Mathematics, Keio University) (1999). Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0. http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10/

See our Resources section to find additional information on web accessibility.

1 Sean Claes is a Communications Specialist with the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory. He works with two NIDRR funded projects - the National Center for the Dissemination of Disability Research (NCDDR) and Research Utilization Support and Help (RUSH).