The main accessibility legislation affecting my work is the Equality Act 2010 (EQA). In summary, it  imposes a duty on service providers, including universities, to make “reasonable adjustments” to enable everyone to use their services.

In my work this is particularly applicable to the production of websites and other digital learning resources (e.g. learning objects, videos, PDF files). I am fully aware of the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) which provides guidance and standards on inclusive design practices, and my employer has a  website accessibility policy which states that it aims to  meet level AA standard set out in the WAI for its public websites. I also aim to meet the WAI AA standard in my work.

To a large extent, accessibility and usability go hand in hand with regard to website development and digital learning resources. A resource which is designed to be highly accessible to users with disability is also likely to be highly usable for all learners. A good example is my addition of transcripts and subtitles to videos in a recent MOOC I helped to produce which made the learning materials more usable for all learners, regardless of ability.

On web pages I use Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and semantic markup to reinforce the meaning of the information being presented. For example, using html heading styles rather than resizing/bolding text for headings; using ordered and unordered html lists where information is listed; and avoiding the use of html tables for page design and layout. These makes it easier for learners using screen readers, for example, to navigate and comprehend the content quickly and easily.

In the WordPress courses and learning environments I make I use responsive theme designs which adjust layouts according to screen size; I optimise images and other media to work well on low bandwidth internet connections; and I use high contrast sans-serif fonts with plenty of line spacing to enhance readability, which is particularly important for learners with dyslexia.

I am a keen user and advocate of Xerte Online Toolkits for making learning objects, in part because of the built-in accessibility features, such as the ability to easily change screen contrast and font.

Reflection

The accessibility of websites and other digital resources covers much more than just access for disabled people. It should include providing access from various devices (e.g. smartphones), different size screens, different browsers, low bandwidth Internet connections, for those who don’t have plugins (e.g. Silverlight or Adobe Flash Player) and for offline access.

I regularly advise university staff how to make their materials accessible and remind them of the legal obligation to do so. Often this is in relation to images (e.g. including text description in ALT tags for images) in their learning materials, or avoiding the use of decorative backgrounds to buttons in Blackboard’s course menu. I have found that noting these seemingly small points encourages staff to pay attention to other accessibility issues.

To provide accessibility for everyone  should, in my view, include using standard English, both orally and in writing, without the use of uneccessary jargon (jargon can be demoralising, distracting and alienating) and includes speaking at an appropriate pace for the audience, which may include people for whom English is a second language. It also includes laying out written documents, web pages and websites in clear ways, using consistent and meaningful heading styles and suitably clear fonts and colours, for example.

In my freelance work I see it as my responsibility to advise clients of their obligations to adhere to accessibility legislation and explain to them the benefits this brings to their end users and to their business reputation. I have to work within the budgets and priorities of my clients however, which, sadly, often means not making sites as accessible as I might wish.

Intellectual Property legislation

The current legislation dealing with copyright and intellectual property (IP) in the UK is the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (CPDA). This states that if you want to copy or use a copyright work you must get permission from the copyright owner, but there are some exceptions where you can copy or use part of a work without permission. In 2014 these exceptions were relaxed a little to make the legislation more suitable for the digital age and to help teachers do thier work without risk of copyright infringement. For example, minor acts of copying for teaching purposes, are allowed as long as the use is considered fair and reasonable. This means lecturers will be able to display webpages or quotes in their classes without the need to for additional permissions.

I frequently work with people who want to use material which is not their own intellectual property. This includes university lecturers uploading articles or images into their Blackboard module sites which they have downloaded from the web or scanned from printed materials. It also includes my freelance clients supplying me with unlicensed images  for their business website which they have found on the web.

To help them adhere to the CPDA, the two licensing schemes which I most frequently refer people to are the Copyright Licensing Agency’s (CLA) Higher Education Licence, and Creative Commons. I inform university staff of the digitisation service which the university library runs, which makes copies from an original of a book, journal or magazine owned by the university, which can then be legally uploaded to Blackboard.

I have written guidance on copyright for lecturers using Blackboard. I made sure this information was included inline in the template itself, so that lecturers could not fail to see it.

I also show lecturers and clients ways to search for licensed images, (such as using the Xpert repository, the advanced search functions in Google’s search engine, and searching Flickr for images with Creative Commons licenses).

Attributing licensed images correctly is another area which frequently causes concern. For Creative Commons images I encourage people to remember the acronym TASL (Title, Author, Source, License) when considering what information to use in an attribution. I also point lecturers and clients to the Flickr CC Attributor bookmarklet, which makes attributing images from Flickr very straightforward. To help teaching staff I have written two blog posts on this subject.

Reflection

It is interesting to reflect on what lecturers make of copyright in general. I am sure that if lecturers knew their intellectual property was being used by others without any acknowledgement whatsoever, they would find it unacceptable. Although this is a generalisation and does not apply to all lecturers I have worked with by any means, it seems that even when they clearly have an understanding of the law and of the need to acknowledge use of other people’s work, many have great difficulty doing so.

Despite teaching their students to use Harvard style referencing in their academic writing (where a misplaced full stop or comma is noted) and being fully capable of referencing other people’s work when writing academic articles for publication, for example, they frequently do not do so when using others’ IP in their teaching.

I think this is due to a combination of the following:

• it is inconvenient to find properly licensed material and to attribute it correctly (so I show them quick easy methods to help reduce the inconvenience)
• they believe they won’t fall foul of the law themselves (I ask them to think how they would feel if they saw their own work published but not credited to them)
• they see so many others breaching copyright law that they don’t feel it is important to adhere to it themselves (I say it’s a bit like littering – if many people do it it makes the world a less pleasant place to be)

I think that focusing on how to allow one’s own work to be used legally by others (e.g. making it available under a Creative Commons license) is perhaps a more fruitful approach in helping raise awareness of and adherence to copyright law in general. I intend to put more emphasis on this positive side of the equation in future when working with lecturers.

Evidence

For evidence of understanding and engaging with legislation, policies and standards see the following posts: