Franklin College of Arts & Sciences is dedicated to creating an inclusive and accessible environment for everyone involved in its programs or services, including students, staff, faculty, and visitors, as outlined in the University Accessibility Statement. This commitment includes ensuring that all Franklin College provided website is accessible to users with disabilities. Guidance on achieving this accessibility is provided by UGA policy, Georgia state law, and federal regulations. To comply, developers and web content creators must adhere to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1, level AA. 

What is WCAG 2.1 Level AA? 

WCAG stands for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. The guidelines are created by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and help make web content accessible to all users, including those with disabilities. They are organized under the four principles of accessibility. Below is a simplified list of the requirements organized under the principles.  

Perceivable 

Review WCAG 2.1 Principle 1- Perceivable

• Text Alternatives: Provide text descriptions for images and other non-text content. 

• Time-based Media: Offer captions for videos and transcripts for audio. 

• Adaptable: Ensure content can be presented in different ways without losing meaning. 

• Distinguishable: Make it easy to see and hear content, like using good color contrast and allowing text to be resized. 

Operable 

Review WCAG 2.1 Principle 2 – Operable

• Keyboard Accessible: Make sure everything can be used with a keyboard. 

• Enough Time: Give users enough time to read and use content. 

• Seizures and Physical Reactions: Avoid content that can cause seizures, like flashing lights. 

• Navigable: Help users navigate and find content, such as using clear headings and labels. 

Understandable 

Review WCAG 2.1 Principle 3 – Understandable

• Readable: Make text readable and understandable. 

• Predictable: Ensure web pages appear and operate in predictable ways. 

• Input Assistance: Help users avoid and correct mistakes, like providing clear error messages. 

Robust 

Review WCAG 2.1 Principle 4 – Robust

• Compatible: Ensure content works well with current and future technologies, including assistive technologies. 

Evaluate your site for WCAG 2.1 Level AA Compliance

Web accessibility evaluation tools are software programs or online services that help you determine if web content meets accessibility guidelines. This page provides a list of such tools.

While we won’t make a specific recommendation, Franklin College Web team prefers to use WAVE Accessibility tool. You can put in a your URL to their web site or install their browser plugins for quick testing of any page of your site. Here are links to their tools

Website: WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tools

Download Plugin: WAVE Chrome, Firefox, and Edge Extensions

Correcting issues on your site

• Start with Errors and Alerts. Errors and Alerts are identified within the WAVE tools but are probably identified similarly in other tools. Errors and Alerts are also identified using the WAVE tool. Errors and Alerts are the most critical and create significant barriers for people with disabilities.  

• Review and manually check all Warnings.

  • Common warnings we have seen include lazy alt tags.

    • Repetitive Image Alt Tags
      Some people put the same alt tag like “image” in all their images. Alt tags should do their best to describe the image if it is important to the content its related to be left blank if it is just for decoration and isn’t context specific like borders, corners, or design features or if the image is a decorative styled set of words in the image are also in the text. There is a web site app where you can upload an image it will generate useful and descriptive alt tags. We have tested this application and find it is very good at describing images. You can try it out here: https://imagecaptiongenerator.com/

    • Missing Heading levels
      Some people skip heading levels because they like the way certain heading styles look better. You should use headings in order. For example H1, H2, H3, etc. Think of headers as an outline structure. Do not use a H1 heading followed by a H3 or lower heading number because you prefer the look. Do not skip heading levels. Review details on heading levels.

    • Redundant Links
      When adjacent links go to the same location (such as a linked product image and an adjacent linked product name that go to the same product page) this results in additional navigation and repetition for keyboard and screen reader users. Just have one link for both items, and merge menu items together if they both go to the same link.

• When possible, replace attached documents (PDFs, Word Docs, etc) with web pages if appropriate. If you need a downloadable document, create a web page and have a “download this page as PDF” linked in the document. External documents that require downloading can create barriers for all users. There are many reasons why PDFs and other documents should not be posted online as the exclusive method for conveying content including the following:  

  • A web page or online form is  almost always a better option  

  • They hinder web performance in search, which is bad for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) 

  • Additional steps and even software may be necessary to access their content  

  • They are not mobile friendly  

  • They are harder to track in analytics unless special reports are developed  

  • They cause difficulty in navigation, affecting the user experience  

  • They are less likely to be kept up to date because it takes extra steps to update the file, export, then re-upload . Sometimes old copies remain on the web and can be found in search indexes.

Continue monitoring your site regularly

Commit to checking your pages every time you make a change and you can stay ahead of the game!

Ask for help

If there is any part of your site (top header, top menu, site footer) that is producing errors, please notify the Franklin College Web Team via our helpdesk at http://helpdesk.franklin.uga.edu. We regularly check our theme files for problems with accessibility but Drupal server updates can cause issues that we don’t see right away.