Accessibility and Maintenance

Proofreading

You are responsible for editing and proofreading your site's content. You may wish to create text in a word processing program (such as Microsoft Word) that has grammar and spell checking capabilities. Do not add your formatting and special characters or symbols in your word processor because they may not translate to the Web. Bulleted lists, dashes, copyright symbols, etc. should be added to the content in Sitebuilder.

Your website represents an Educational Institution -- all webpages should be free of factual, grammatical, inconsistency and spelling errors. Be sure to double check phone numbers, statistics, dates, titles, etc. It is a good idea to read your content out loud or take a break and review it later with fresh eyes to catch mistakes.

Page Integrity

Verify that links are accurate and working properly. Review your page for broken links often to make sure your resources are up to date. Make sure all photos and graphics aren't subject to copyright protection.

Maintenance

To make sure that information on the website is current and accurate, please review and edit your content often. This may be daily, weekly or monthly depending on the nature of your content. We thank you for your time, since the Delta College website could not be maintained without your efforts. We appreciate the workload you have taken on by agreeing to manage your department's website, and will be glad to discuss proper content formatting, style usage and any other help as needed.

Accessibility

Web authors should be aware of the following laws, standards and guidelines for designing an accessible website. WebAIM's: United States Laws provides an overview.

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)
ADA does not specifically address the Internet. It was written in 1990. On September 9, 1996, the U.S. Department of Justice issued a policy ruling that ADA applies to webpages.

• U.S Department of Justice policy ruling September 9, 1996 ·
• Posting at the W3C website from the National Disability Law Reporter, Vol. 10, Iss. 6, par. 240
• WebAIM: United States Laws - Overview of the American with Disabilities Act

Section 508 Accessibility Standards
On December 21, 2000, The Federal Access Board issued accessibility standards for electronic and information technology under section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, as amended.

• Section 508: 508 Law
• Section 508 - 1194.22 Standards applicable to websites
• WebAIM's Section 508 Web Accessibility Checklist

W3C Guidelines
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) was founded in 1994 and has more than 400 member organizations from around the world. It is recognized for developing common protocols for the World Wide Web, such as HTML, CSS, XML and MathML. In 1997, the W3C created the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) to promote access to the Web for people with disabilities. In May 1999 the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0, which explains how to author accessible webpages and sites, was published. The Guidelines include:

1. Provide equivalent alternatives to auditory and visual content (graphics, video, audio, Flash, etc.)
2. Don't rely on color alone.
3. Use markup and style sheets and do so properly.
4. Clarify natural language usage
5. Create tables that transform gracefully.
6. Ensure that pages featuring new technologies transform gracefully.
7. Ensure user control of time-sensitive content changes.
8. Ensure direct accessibility of embedded user interfaces.
9. Design for device-independence.
10. Use interim solutions.
11. Use W3C technologies and guidelines.
12. Provide context and orientation information.
13. Provide clear navigation mechanisms.
14. Ensure that documents are clear and simple.

W3C's Guidelines: Checkpoints and priority levels
Checkpoints are provided and are assigned based on the checkpoint's impact on accessibility. Here is the description from the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0: Priorities section:

• Priority 1: A Web content developer must satisfy this checkpoint. Otherwise, one or more groups will find it impossible to access information in the document. Satisfying this checkpoint is a basic requirement for some groups to be able to use Web documents.
• Priority 2: A Web content developer should satisfy this checkpoint. Otherwise, one or more groups will find it difficult to access information in the document. Satisfying this checkpoint will remove significant barriers to accessing Web documents.
• Priority 3: A Web content developer may address this checkpoint. Otherwise, one or more groups will find it somewhat difficult to access information in the document. Satisfying this checkpoint will improve access to Web documents.