University Web Services
Best Practices
Accessibility
The Federal government and the State of Idaho both mandate that our web pages must be accessible to everyone, regardless of their disabilities, or else appropriate accomodations must be made. The University agrees with this mandate.
"Accessible" is defined as "compliant with the WCAG 2.0 standard." That standard is defined by the World Wide Web Consortium, Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
The relevant governmental sites are:
- Americans with Disabilities Act
- Section 508 of the Vocational Rehabilitation Act
- Telecommunications Act of 1996
- State Web Publishing Policy (Sections IV.1 and IV.2)
You can check to see if your website is accessible by going to online validation sites. Certain desktop editors will also check for accessibility.
In either case, however, accessibility can only be assured by a thorough check by actual humans. There is no way for a program to ensure accessibility!
Web Services offers a workshop on web accessibility each semester. Check the Workshops link for the current schedule.