When it comes to choices, we all try to make the best ones. In the digitally driven world, the easiest way to compare options is via the internet. Thousands of students, as well as their parents browse through the college websites to find which platform offers the best higher education. If any of them are disabled, the role of digital accessibility can create barriers to engaging with the content.

Today all higher educational institutions have a multitude digital platforms where students can log in, attend classes, find study resources and submit assessments. Using an online portal has become an inseparable part of the life of college and university students, thus it is important for educational institutes to navigate through the requirements of ADA compliance Education.

What Is The Significance Of Digital Accessibility In Education?

Blended learning programs are a top priority of most students. Earning credits through e-learning is convenient for a majority of students. It offers freedom and flexibility to pursue their dreams. However, disabilitiescan create a major challenge for students.

It is the responsibility, both legally and ethically,  of the college to ensure that the content made available via the official website and all other digital properties is easily accessible. Form filling, downloading the assessments, searching for library tools and every other activity should be completed without any hassle. No matter if the student is dealing with physical, cognitive or neurological disability.

• Universities and colleges are bound to follow accessibility regulations under ADA and Section 504.

• Failure to achieve digital accessibility education might result in expensive lawsuits.

• It even creates barriers for students and the consequences can be low student strength or reputational loss.

How To Practice Digital Accessibility?  

Overcoming the digital accessibility barrier and incorporating a supportive framework is not easy. It requires scrutiny, it requires a proactive approach, and most importantly, it requires expertise to understand what it takes to develop an ADA compliant platform for everyone.

With the increasing number of lawsuits, more and more educational institutions have realized the significance of best practices to attain ADA compliance. The easiest and most viable solution for barrier identification and remediation is to test digital accessibility in education. To examine the possible pitfalls in digital accessibility, college and university websites can be tested using automated software and manual audits.

Automated scans: A faster and easier way to address the accessibility issues is to run your website’s code through software programs. The software scans for red flags and provides an accessibility report. Based on the results, you can remediate the addressed problems and ensure that the website is accessible to everyone.

Manual testing:Using a tool sounds convenient, although, accessibility experts suggest that one should not rely solely on software to attain the education accessibility goals.

Needless to say, software testing is fast but the results generated are only 30% accurate. In simple words, you are catching only basic errors which don’t provide high level protection against lawsuits while also running the risk of false positives.

Keeping the legal angle aside, making a website only 30% accessible is also bad for the user experience. To attract and retain students, it is important to hire accessibility audit specialists. They can conduct thorough manual audits and guide through the remediation process according to the desired success criteria of ADA regulations.

Final words

Understanding the digital accessibility regulations for universities and colleges is important to minimize the risk of legal exposure. Visit the link given below to explore the options for maintaining accessibility compliance guidelines.