Technology Center

Accessible Courses

Design Courses with Accessibility in Mind

Designing accessible courses may seem a daunting task, but we believe is the right choice to empower learning for the population we serve. An accessible course is a course designed to include all students by offering a flexible learning environment, that can be explored and interacted with using multiple devices, and that is also machine readable. We are writing this page to try to help you to navigate the available resources to reach these goals.

The easiest way to start this accessibility journey is to start making “accessible choices” as soon as you start looking at your course contents.

  1. Accessible documents: Contents displayed as web pages are your best pick for this. Librarians are a great ally to find if the contents are available in our libraries, or to locate a suitable alternative. We have prepared a longer section with more detailed recommendations.                                                                                                                                       
  2. Accessible Presentations: If you are using PowerPoint, start by following styles and heading structures. Remember to caption your images and use the built-in tools to check document accessibility
  3. Audiovisual Media: If you need to use this kind of resource, this in having an alternate way of conveying this information (use video captions or have a transcript available). Be mindful of learners who may not have access to broad band internet connection, or may be accessing your contents from a smaller device (like a phone screen)

Help Resources for You

  1. Library: We have multiple accessible documents accessible at our libraries, and a librarian ready to help: Andy Andrews (andy4@uw.edu)
  2. Help desk: Our college’s Help Desk s available to help you to improve the accessibility of your documents. Contact us at edhelp@uw.edu, or open ticket in our website.
  3. Captioning Services: There are multiple alternatives for captioning your videos. Zoom and MS Stream have integrated captioning functionality. Other video tools would require a secondary service to add captions.
  4. There are multiple resources offered through Central IT and DSS.