Standard Accessibility Training
Welcome!
We're excited you're taking time to learn about digital accessibility. Making accessible content means equal access to education and employment, the services we provide, and above all, the Western experience. We can do our part by factoring accessibility into each step of creating digital content—from planning to publishing.
This training will cover:
- The accessibility features that help people with a range of abilities and disabilities,
- What web accessibility means, and
- How to make web content, documents, and other digital content accessible for all users.
Ready to get started?
Who should take the course?
We encourage anyone interested in learning more about digital accessibility to take the course. This course is also required by policy for anyone at Western maintaining websites and applications, or creating digital content. This can include, but isn't limited to:
- Current or newly appointed website editors
- Web or application developers
- Staff in marketing, relation, or communication roles
- Digital and graphic designers
Prerequisites
There are no prerequisites to take this course. Familiarity with the basics of Microsoft applications, Adobe applications, web content editing and HTML can still help.
Training Topics
The standard training covers the following topics:
- How People with Disabilities Use the Web: an overview of different types of disability, and the features that help make web and digital content easier to use.
- What is Web Accessibility?: a definition of accessibility, who's responsible for it, and how it compares to universal and inclusive design.
- Making Accessible Web Content: features and patterns that make web pages more accessible, and testing tools available for checking accessibility.
- Making Accessible Microsoft Documents: features and tools available to make Microsoft documents accessible.
- Making Accessible PDFs: features and tools available to make PDF documents accessible (provided by the YouTube channel MSFT Enable).
- Making Accessible Video and Multimedia: features and tools available to make video and other non-text content accessible.
Ready to get started?
Finished the standard training?
There are more digital accessibility and website training opportunities available.
Advanced Accessibility Training
While an optional training currently, this course is highly recommended for web and web app developers. The advanced training covers accessibility topics around HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and using ARIA.
Sign up for Siteimprove
Anyone managing a site can enroll into our web governance system Siteimprove. This tool can scan for accessibility and QA issues automatically, and suggest fixes that improve your content for all users.
Get Drupal Training
If you'll be editing on a Drupal site, there are beginning and advanced trainings available.
1-on-1 Sessions
If you have an accessibility question that the trainings didn't answer, or need a manual review of your webpage, site, application, etc., reach out to Western's accessibility specialists: