Lake Forest College is committed to ensuring that everyone is able to access all relevant information from course materials and admissions requirements to sports schedules and faculty achievements.
What is digital accessibility?
Digital materials are accessible if they can be consumed by anyone regardless of ability. For example, accessible videos have subtitles, accessible websites don’t use color combinations that may be difficult to read for color-blind people, and content is structured in such a way that someone using a screen reader can navigate it.
Why is Lake Forest College striving to meet digital accessibility standards?
First and foremost: because it’s the right thing to do. The College cannot claim to “foster creative talent and independent research” or “enable students… to solve problems in a civil manner” if a portion of the College community is unable to fully engage in debate, discourse, and learning simply because it finds accessibility standards too burdensome.
And secondly: because a new regulatory deadline is approaching. The Justice Department announced that Title II of the ADA applies to digital accessibility, and mandates that state and local governments have accessible websites and apps by May 11, 2027. Many colleges, Lake Forest included, are taking the opportunity to improve their digital accessibility standards.
What are the digital accessibility standards?
WCAG, or the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, are the gold standard for measuring and ensuring web accessibility. These guidelines were first released in 1999 and are continually updated.
The standard that Lake Forest College strives to reach is WCAG 2.1 AA.
What needs to be accessible?
In short, anything that ANYONE needs to interact with or consume in order to fully participate in the College. This includes course materials that a student is required to use for class, a handbook or policy that must be followed, or software that is used in the course of a class or someone’s job.
The College has identified four buckets that need to be addressed:
- Websites. This includes lakeforest.edu, goforesters.com, my.lakeforest, and more.
- Canvas LMS. Course pages, assignments, quizzes, course materials, etc. will need to be made accessible. Going forward, the aim is to keep accessibility front-of-mind for course-building and course-refresh workflows.
- Documents. PDF, Word, Powerpoint, Spreadsheets, course readings, and more. Active course materials should be prioritized, and habits and practices for creating accessible documents will become part of the College culture.
- Vendor Review. Software, platforms, products, and services employed by the College will be reviewed for accessibility before being purchased or renewed.