Accessibility Guide

Sighted people view a webpage by almost instantaneously scanning it for layout, style, color, and basic content.  Screen readers convert text to an audio presentation which is linear, one item at a time. It progresses from beginning to end in a step-wise manner. When sighted learners hear the audio of a screen reader at the normal rate of speech of 180 words per minutes they think it is very fast; but most experienced visually impaired users of screen readers use a reading rate of 300 words per minute.  They can quickly move through content.  However, they can't skim for content without some added design elements.

How to Meet WCAG (Quick Reference)

Accessibility Recommendations

Hypertext links accessibility is an important component of web accessibility.  Standard hypertext links work with all technologies and platforms and users of all abilities can access them, whether directly or through the use of some sort of assistive technology. Some types of links are more accessible than others, and some types of links are completely inaccessible to people with certain types of disabilities. 

Links in terms of Keyboard Accessibility and Screen Readers

 There are two different definitions that you might be thinking of with regards to navigation; how someone navigates while on a page, and the navigation (or navigation menu) one uses to find way their way through a website.

Navigation within a page happens in a variety of ways, including: headings, descriptive links, skip links and keyboard access.

This video demonstrates how keyboard navigation works and gives some quick tips for accessible navigation.

Video explaining Keyboard Accessibility for navigation

One way is to use the Tab key to jump from link to link. This gives the user an idea of where the page links to, and can be a useful way to run through the content if the user is looking for a specific link. A related technique is to obtain a list of the links on the page, arranged alphabetically. The drawback of these methods is that the user does not hear any of the non-link content, and may miss important information this way.

Implication: Links should make sense when read out of context. Also, the distinguishing information of the link should be at the beginning of the link.

Below are guides and instructions for making hyperlinks accessible for documents:

• Hyperlinks
• Meaningful Hyperlink Text
• Video 2013 & 2016: Hyperlinks

Another way to skim the page to get an overall impression of a page's content is to jump from heading to heading. Users can hear an outline of the page's main ideas, then backtrack to read the parts they are most interested in. The main drawback to this technique is that too many pages lack headings. Without headings, this method of skimming through content is completely useless.

Implication: Authors should organize content with headings. To the extent possible, the headings should represent an accurate outline of the content.

Headings allow screen-reader and assistive technology users to skim the structure of a page and navigate to or skip over sections.

Use headings for:

• The structure of page content
• Sections and sub-sections of an article
• Navigation menus
• Breadcrumbs
• Any other consistent sections that users may want to find or skip

Every page should have an h1 (main title) heading.  Make sure you keep your headings in the proper order (don't skip from h1 to h3 for example).  Headings are meant to divide content into meaningful sections.  

Below are guides and instructions for creating accessible lists, columns, headings, and table of contents:

• Built-in Formatting: Lists, Columns & Headings
• Video Word 2013 & 2016: Lists, Columns, and Tables of Content
• List and Columns

Below are guides and instructions for creating accessible headings for documents:

• Video Word 2013 and 2016: Templates and Styles, The Basics
• Video Word 2013 and 2016: Templates and Styles (Headings/Structure)
• Templates and Styles

Users can navigate via ARIA landmarks and HTML5 sectioning elements, such as <main>, <nav>, <header>, etc.

Implication: Define appropriate ARIA landmarks and use HTML5 elements appropriately.

Users can jump from paragraph to paragraph, listening to the first sentence or two before moving on to the next paragraph. This technique is most like the visual skimming technique used by some sighted people. Users can also jump from element to element, such as <div> tags, links, form elements, list items, or other units of content.

Implication: When possible, place the distinguishing information of a paragraph in the first sentence.

Skip links at the top of the page which allow users to skip over the navigation links aren't exactly a method of skimming the content, but they are a method of getting straight to the main content of the page. Such links speed up the reading process and help users distinguish between the main navigation and the main content.

Implication: Where appropriate, allow users to skip over repetitive navigation links.

In addition to the methods above, screen reader users can also navigate by tables, lists, buttons, forms, links, images, etc.

Implication: Use proper HTML semantic structure with elements marked up appropriately.

IMPORTANT: Design elements, graphics, videos, etc. in Microsoft Word and PowerPoint and Adobe PDFs follow the same accessibility rules.

Below are guides and instructions for how to create accessible documents

• Click on the ADOD Project to access the site and specific step-by-step instructions.
• Video on how to create Accessible Microsoft Word 2010 Documents
• PDF Instructions - Requirements to Make a Document Accessible
• PDF Instructions - Templates & Styles, the Basics
• Make your Word docs accessible (Microsoft)
• Word Accessibility Guide (WebAim)
• 7 Steps to Creating Accessible Word/PDF Documents
• Document Structure

What are some common design elements that should be considered in making digital content accessible?

• Text color, size, and contrast
• Images, graphics, tables, etc.
• Flicker elements
• Hyperlinks
• Navigation
• Descriptions

In terms of font accessibility, there are a number of principles to keep in mind:

• Use real text rather than text within graphics.
• Select basic, simple, easily-readable fonts.
• Use a limited number of fonts.
• Ensure sufficient contrast between the text and the background.
• Avoid small font sizes.
• Use relative units for font size.
• Limit the use of font variations such as bold, italics, and ALL CAPITAL LETTERS.
• Don't rely only on the appearance of the font (color, shape, font variation, placement, etc.) to convey meaning.
• Avoid blinking or moving text.

Basic Standards for font sizes in web pages consider two parameters:  One is ensuring that default font sizes are not too small. Another is ensuring that text can be expanded to 200% on Web sites.

Below is a guide for making the font style and size of text accessible

• Font style and size

Except for captions and images of text, text can be resized without assistive technology up to 200 percent without loss of content or functionality.

For traditional computer monitors, a size of 12-14 points/pixels for body is generally recommended for body text (depending on audience).

Ensure that default fonts are no smaller than 9 points/pixels. Smaller sizes may be illegible beyond the Windows platform.

The WCAG Guidelines recommend ensuring that text can be zoomed to 200%. Along with that goes a recommendation for liquid layouts which can accommodate 200% text.

When using CSS, most font sizes should be made in relative terms (e.g. %, em). This allows fonts to be displayed relative to a particular monitor setting or device.

For most documents, body text should be around 12 points. Fonts at smaller sizes may be illegible for some audiences.

If a document contains footnotes or endnotes, the minimum size should be about 9 points.

If a PowerPoint file is meant to be projected before a live audience (e.g. during a class lecture), the minimum font size should be about 24 points. At smaller sizes, the text becomes illegible on a screen.

Headers and sub headers can be much larger, between 40-60 points depending on the slide layout.

For online reading, sans-serif fonts (e.g. Arial, Verdana) are generally considered more legible than serif fonts (Times New Roman), narrow fonts or decorative fonts. Decorative and narrow fonts in particular should be reserved for headlines and decorative texts only.

Web pages shall be designed so that all information conveyed with color is also available without color, for example from context or markup.

The use of color to convey a meaning creates problems when those colors cannot be displayed by a browser or seen by the user. A user may be using a computer monitor with few colors, a text-only reader, or a handheld device which renders information with no color context. In addition, many people are color blind and may not be able to see the colors used to convey meaning.  And, of course, there may be users who cannot see the screen at all. This priority specifies that information conveyed through the use of color also be represented in a secondary manner. One example can clarify this problem.

A fictional website lists all of its departmental offerings for this semester. A note above the list states that all new offerings are indicated in red text. Offerings from prior semesters are in black text. Clearly, this list relies upon color to mark new offerings.

 Once again, a solution is to provide an alternative.

• In an example such as the new offerings example presented earlier, the color red can remain as an indicator. An alternative could be as simple as an asterisk that precedes the offering or a graphic that is accompanied by alt-text notifying the user the offering is new.
• If color is used to emphasize text, it may be prefaced by text such as 
• If directions or a question is included that relate to images that are colored, provide appropriate alt­ text for those images. Look at the following example. Note: The HTML code, including ALT text, is included.

Always consider contrast when choosing colors. Individuals with color blindness may not see the same color tones, but sufficient contrast correlates to readable content.

Here is a graphic of a table telling the status of three projects. The first "completed' column conveys information sufficiently.  Most people would assume 'green' would indicate a positive and 'red' a negative.  A person with color-vision issues or someone using a screen reader might not recognize this distinction.  The second completed column offers an alternative.  The 'Y' indicates yes/complete; the 'N' indicates no/incomplete while incorporating the color distinctions.

An important aspect of color for both low vision and colorblind users is sufficient contrast between the background and foreground (text or graphics). Color schemes can be changed in most documents, but it is most commonly a factor in PowerPoint, HTML Web pages, and Flash.

Below are some general recommendations with some references to PowerPoint.

The maximum contrast is black vs. white but other options are available such as navy/white, cream/dark brown, yellow/black and similar color schemes. Generally speaking, a color scheme is considered legible if it can be read in grayscale/black and white mode.

Orange should ONLY be used with large text and as a highlight. Because orange is neither very dark nor very light, it is difficult to contrast it with another color.

Red vs. Green - This particular combination can be problematic because many color deficient viewers cannot distinguish these two colors. They are also both about the same level of darkness which is problematic for contrast.

Large blocks of brightly colored text should be avoided. Adjacent areas of bright colors can cause issues with both visual vibration and, ironically, value contrast.

Instead use colors like red, royal blue and emerald green for decorative blocks, large headlines, highlighting words or for links.

A slide or background with a texture (including a gradient) can also interfere with legibility. The more subtle the background, the more likely it is that the text will be legible. See the Color and Background Texture page for some examples of good and bad textures.

Examples include contrasting light grey versus middle grey, middle pastels versus darks, or white versus light cyan (blue-green).

If you plan to use a subtle color palette, again make sure that a black and white printout can be read.

1. Never rely on color alone to convey information or meaning, and
2. Use sufficiently contrasting foreground and background colors.

The Color and Contrast Checker is an effective tool for deciding if the color contrast is accessible.

Below are guides to help make color and contrast accessible for documents:

• Word 2013 & 2016: Color and Contrast
• Color and Contrast
• Video Word 2013 and 2016: Colors and Contrast
• W3C Colors with Good Contrast Video

Images can present a major obstacle to individuals that are blind or have low vision.  Fortunately, there are several relatively simple techniques that if implemented correctly can make an image accessible. Section 508 Standard (a) addresses proper use of an image.

Below are guides and instructions for making figures and images accessible for documents:

• How to add ALT text to Word
• Figures and ALT Text
• Word 2013 and 2016: Figures and ALT Text
• Video Word 2013 and 2016: Figures and ALT Text
• Go to Alt Text Basicsfor a tutorial on writing alt text

A text equivalent for every non-text element shall be provided e.g., via "ALT-TAG" or in element content "D-Link".

The key principle is that computers and screen readers cannot analyze an image and determine what the image presents. When a user reads or views a web page with a text browser, screen reader, or a browser with the image loading function turned off, images are displayed/read as "IMAGE" or as the name of the image file unless some additional steps have been taken to describe that image. Text must be provided to the user which presents the content and function of the images.   Failure to use one of the following techniques makes it difficult for users to know what information the image is trying to convey.

The alt-text attribute provides a description phrase for each image.  Short for alternative text, alt-text is simply a way to provide text equivalents to non-text elements on a page.  This include images, graphical representations of text including symbols, image map regions, animations, scripts, and images used as list bullets, spacers, graphical buttons, etcetera.

The alt-text attribute is a text string of up to 256 characters, (10 words or less is recommended - some say no more than 5 words) enclosed in quotation marks.  Although including alt-text is an essential part of building accessible sites, what the alt-text says is equally important.

• Be accurate and equivalent
• Be succinct
• Do not be redundant
• In the description, leave out "image of" or "graphic of"

What about the long description (longdesc) attribute? This attribute contains the url of the long description page, not the description itself.  Unfortunately, the longdesc attribute currently only provides access to the long description page to some screen reader users. Sighted users will not generally be aware that the description is available, even though they could benefit greatly from it. The longdesc attribute is also currently not part of HTML5. For these reasons, it is recommended that if longdesc is used that a standard link to the long description page also be present.

Sometimes writing a description of the image within the surroundings of the image is useful to both visually disabled using screen readers and unimpaired learners.

Mac users: choose Ribbon from the View menu - this will make the interface similar to Windows versions of Word, so you can follow the instructions below.

Make sure all of the slide text content appears in the outline view. Students with visual disabilities may prefer not to bother with the more visual slide view.

Recommended best practice: Compose your outline in the outline view, and then move to the slide view to add images and design.

The Slide View

Use the slide layouts (not the blank one though) provided on the Home tab. This will help to ensure your slide's reading order remains intact.

The order that text and objects are inserted into the slide, will be the default reading order unless you manually change it.

Don't use animations or slide transitions on the PowerPoint presentation that you post online

Alternative text for images and graphics, tables and graphs

Color for Contrast, not meaning

Format lists as lists

Meaningful hyperlinks

Reading order on slide (using pre-set formatting helps with this)

Tables with column headings and linear presentation

Any other typical document settings.

Check for Accessibility:

• Go to the File tab.
• Select Info from the sidebar menu.
• Click on the Check for Issues button.
• Select Check Accessibility from the drop-down list.

In order to check accessibility for PDFs and fix accessibility errors, must have a paid version for Acrobat Pro.

Same rules as documents apply to PDFs. Must be accessible:

• Text font and size
• Text color
• Colors and contrast
• Images, graphics, tables, graphs, etc. must have alt text
• Tables and graph headings
• Audio must be closed captioned
• Navigational documents-headings, links, etc.

Below are guides and instructions for making accessible PDFs:

• PDF Instructions - Converting to PDF
• Accessible PDF (Adobe)
• Adobe Product Accessibility Tutorials (Adobe)
• Create Accessible PDFs (Microsoft)
• PDF Accessibility (WebAim)

Same rules as documents apply to PowerPoints. Must be accessible:

• Text font and size
• Text color
• Colors and contrast
• Images, graphics, tables, graphs, etc. must have alt text
• Tables and graph headings
• Audio must be closed captioned
• Navigational documents-headings, links, etc.

In addition for PowerPoints:

• Use content placeholder to fix reading order of slides. If not, you will have to check and fix reading order on each page.

Below are guides for creating accessible PowerPoints:

• WebAIM Guide for Accessible PowerPoints
• Cheat Sheet for Accessible PowerPoints
• PowerPoint Accessibility (WebAim)
• Make your PowerPoint presentations accessible (Microsoft)
• PowerPoint 2013 & 2016: Part 1, Designing Accessible Presentations
• PowerPoint 2013 & 2016: Part 2, Delivering Accessible Presentations
• Designing Accessible Presentations
• Delivering Accessible Presentations

Web designers use tables to hold data and they also use tables to structure page layout. The Section 508 standards inform designers that data tables must be accessible. Using tables for layout isn't addressed within the 508 standards, but is a consideration all designers are encouraged to understand and examine.

Creating an accessible data table can be one of the most challenging tasks for a designer. This isn't meant to imply that all data tables will be time-consuming tasks of frustration for you. Simple data tables pose little additional work. Complex data tables will require a thorough understanding of the issues of accessibility and the techniques that can be employed. Section 508- Standard (g) provides guidance for simple data tables. Section 508- Standard (h) addresses more complex data tables.

• Accessible Tables and Graphs
• Word 2013 & 2016: How to Make Accessible Tables
• Video Word 2013 & 2016: How to Make Accessible Tables
• Make your Excel spreadsheets accessible (Microsoft)
• Creating Accessible Tables

Row and column headers shall be identified for data tables

Markup shall be used to associate data cells and header cells for data tables that have two or more logical levels of row or column headers.

A simple table can be defined as having one row of headings or one column of headings, or both.

Before discussing the accessibility issues that exist with a simple data table, it is necessary to understand the manner by which assistive technology reads a table. Assistive technology reads the table in its linear order. Linear order can be imagined if the table is examined by individual row and then by reading columns from left to right within each row.

The three basic table concepts are:

1. Simple data tables have either one row of headings or one column of headings or both.
2. Tables are read by assistive technology in their linear form.  Linear form is gathered from starting in the first row of the table, then progressing left to right across a column.  When the row ends progression continues to the start of the next row.
3. Assistive technology will assume that the first row of data and the first column of data contain heading information, even if they don't.

Several techniques can ensure that assistive technology is recognizing the correct cells as headers.

Simple data tables such as the sample used in this section don't pose a barrier to individuals with disabilities. However, proper use of HTML table markup tags is required.

The structure of a table consists primarily of three HTML tags.

• <table> is the indicator that directs the browser to understand that a table will be used
• <tr> directs the browser to begin a new row in the table
• <td> indicates data in one cell

Markup shall be used to associate data cells and header cells for data tables that have two or more logical levels of row or column headers.

What is a complex data table? A complex data table includes more than two levels of headings. Complex data tables are not common on the web. If the complexity of the concepts presented in this section overwhelm you, don't panic. Complex tables are really just a combination of several simple tables.

Multimedia includes video, audio, and animations. Multimedia that isn't accompanied by an accessible alternative can be a major obstacle to an individual that is not able to see or hear. Two Section 508 standards relate to multimedia. Section 508- Standard (b) presents requirements for making multimedia accessible. Section 508- Standard (m) indicates that designers using multimedia need to provide users with a location to download a plug-in to run the multimedia file.  These standards are expanded in each appropriate application area.

Equivalent alternatives for any multimedia presentation shall be synchronized with the presentation.

When a web page requires that an applet, plug-in or other application be present on the client system to interpret page content, the page must provide a link to a plug-in or applet that complies with §1194.21(a) through (1).

• (a.1) Can the user navigate and use all aspects of the application with the keyboard?
• (a.1.a) Do context menus have keyboard or redundant methods of access such as hotkeys?
• (a.1.b) if contiguous and noncontiguous text and data can be selected, copied, and/or pasted via the mouse, can these tasks be accomplished with the keyboard?
• (a.1.c) Can objects/windows be moved, resized, and manipulated via the keyboard?
• (a.1.d) Can meaningful rollover content be triggered by keyboard actions?
• (a.1.e) Can drop-down lists be opened via the keyboard?
• (a.1.f) Can users navigate between application panes via the keyboard?
• (a.1.g) is focus order equivalent to the visual reading order?
• (a.1.h) is toolbar functionality keyboard accessible or duplicated in menu structure?

The sense of hearing is needed to comprehend meaning in an audio file. A video may be understood by the user through either the sense of vision or the sense of hearing or both. Animations produced by software such as Macromedia Flash, are similar to video in that understanding the output relies on vision, hearing, or both.

It is important to provide alternatives for individuals who are blind or have partial vision and for people that are deaf or have hearing loss.

Ask the following questions when considering the accessibility of multimedia:

• Could I gather meaning if I can't see the multimedia?
• Could I gather meaning if I can't hear the multimedia?

After answering these questions, you can begin to construct alternative content.  The sections below teach about alternate content for various multimedia types.

The alternative for simple audio files is a text transcription.   The text transcription should be in HTML form. Rather than listening to the content in the audio file, the user will read it as they would any other content. This text transcription needs to be placed in the near vicinity of the audio file. Ideally, the link to the audio file is accompanied by a second link that transports users to a web page where they can read the text transcription.

Standard (m) requires that if a plug-in is required to view information, the user needs to be able to acquire the necessary plug-in. Plug-ins include the QuickTime player, Real player, Macromedia's Flash player, etc.

This requirement is easily satisfied. A designer needs to place directions for plug-in download near any link that activates a plug-in.

Here are some extra resources, videos, and instructions for creating closed captioning to make video and multimedia accessible:

• Videos on How to Create and Use a YouTube Account (TEXT GUIDE)
• Create Accessible Video, Audio and Social Media (Section508.gov)
• Captions, Transcripts and Audio Descriptions (WebAIM)
• YouTube Closed Captioning Handout
• Closed Captioning in YouTube-PowerPoint with Screenshots
• How the ADA Impacts Online Video Accessibility
• The ADA and Online Video Captioning Standards 
• Captioning FAQ from Media Access Group at WGHB

Audio descriptions that accompany video type multimedia provide access to multimedia for learners who are blind or visually impaired.  The descriptions are of the relevant action taking place on the screen. This transcript should describe the visuals, including action, scene changes, graphics, and on-screen text.

The narration should be carefully written to fit precisely into the natural pauses in the program dialog. In cases where a longer description is necessary but there is not a sufficient pause in the program audio to accommodate it, consider authoring extended audio descriptions. In this situation, the program dialog and video are paused while the audio description plays. When the description has finished playing, the video and dialog resume playback. Extended and "regular" descriptions may be mixed in a single multimedia presentation.

Section 504 declares civil rights for individuals with disabilities [extended to various sectors by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)].  Section 508 [an amendment to the Rehabilitation Act] sets requirements for accessible technology.  The ADA applies to public entities and commercial entities that can be construed as "places of public accommodation".  The Rehabilitation Act applies to Federal agencies and federally funded programs.

The World Wide Web Consortiums collection of Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) is more detailed and comprehensive than the 508 standards.  The WCAG has levels of compliance and testable provisions.

In 2014, section 508 standards were refreshed to reflect more documents, more technology and more people.  The technical standards now state;

All analog, and digital television displays, as well as all computers, must be equipped with the technology necessary to properly decode and display closed captions.  Further, any video - online or otherwise - that is not raw footage, is used for training or information purposes, contains audio that is essential for understanding the presentation, and/or supports the organization's mission, must have open or closed captions.  Captions should incorporate important non-speech sounds.

Open captions are "burned into the video" and can't be turned off.  Closed captions appear with a "CC" button that allows the viewer to turn the captions on or off.  Transcripts are not sufficient for video content as they are not time synchronized with the media.

Captions allow deaf viewers to understand the spoken content of videos by displaying words in sync with audio. Below are some generally accepted captioning standards for ADA best practices and compliance.

• Each caption frame should hold 1 to 3 lines of text onscreen at a time, viewable for a duration of 3 to 7 seconds. Each line should not exceed 32 characters.
• Each caption frame should be replaced by another caption.
• All caption frames should be precisely time-synched to the audio.
• A caption frame should be repositioned if it obscures on screen text or other essential visual elements.

• Spelling should be at least 99% accurate.
• When multiple speakers are present, sometimes it is helpful to identify who is speaking, especially when the video does not make this clear.
• Both upper and lowercase letters should be used.
• The font should be a non-serif, such as Helvetica
• Non-speech sounds like [MUSIC] or [LAUGHTER] should be added in square brackets.
• Punctuation should be used for maximum clarity in the text, not necessarily for textbook style.
• Captions should preserve and identify slang or accents.

Please take time to read through this resource thoroughly. Topics include standards and examples for quality captioning, text formatting, language mechanics, presentation rate, sound effects and music, speaker identification, and more.

Use the "contents" tab at the top of the web page to navigate through all of the captioning information.

There are several possible approaches to captioning educational video, each with its own advantages and disadvantages. Below are the most common approaches.

Often schools will start by trying to do the entire captioning process themselves, with little or no workflow automation. With this approach, you listen to the recorded video and transcribe it verbatim, and simultaneously work on inserting the timing information. For background, a simple caption file might look like this:

     100:00:00,506 --> 00:00:05,656 [ Music ]
          200:00:06,156 --> 00:00:08,406 >> Michael Levin: We selected Automatic Sync Technologies
          300:00:08,406 --> 00:00:09,766 and their     CaptionSync service
          400:00:09,806 --> 00:00:12,916 because they have been serving the education industry
          500:00:12,976 --> 00:00:15,716 for a number of years, they were experts in the field,
          600:00:15,956 --> 00:00:17,866 and they were able to prove
          700:00:17,866 --> 00:00:19,786 that this is something they could enable
          800:00:19,786 --> 00:00:23,136 within our service cost effectively and quickly,
   

A caption file contains very precise time codes, which indicate when the captions should pop on and disappear from the screen, along with the actual text that appears on the screen. In practice, you would not be able to do these precise time codes manually. You might use an application that you download to your computer, such as MovieCaptioner (http://www.synchrimedia.com/), or a web-based tool like Amara (amara.org).  With these tools you can transcribe the video while hitting the space bar or some other keys to indicate when you want to start and end each caption.

Even with tools like MovieCaptioner the process of transcribing and captioning a video is painfully slow. Even someone with great typing skills and a lot of practice with the tools would typically take 8 - 10x as much time to caption a video as the actual duration of the video. In other words, it might take 10 minutes to caption a one minute video.  Imagine doing that for a 50 minute lecture!

This method has very low out-of-pocket costs, but it is extremely resource-intensive. 

Another approach is to transcribe the video yourself, but let somebody else worry about the timing and creation of the caption files. There are several services that will accept your video file, along with a verbatim transcript in text form that will synchronize the transcript with the audio track of the video, breaking up the dialog into timed captions and creating the appropriate output files. CaptionSync, by Automatic Sync Technologies, provides such a service.

This is better than the first option (transcribing and doing the timing yourself), but it is still quite time-consuming. A trained, experienced transcriber can typically transcribe a video in about 4-5x the duration of the video. If you are transcribing something that you recorded yourself, and you do it shortly after doing the recording, you have some advantages that may allow you to keep pace with these professional benchmarks; you have the advantage of knowing what you said, you are familiar with the content, and you understand your own accent.  However, if there was more than one speaker in the video, or the audio wasn't very good, or you need to strain to understand someone's accent, it will take longer. 

In the previous section we compared captioning that is done fully in-house (i.e., you or your staff both transcribe the content and also break up the content into perfectly timed captions) with a hybrid method where you transcribe the content in-house but you let someone else create the caption files using a synchronization process (sometimes called "alignment").  Both methods are very time consuming, especially if you have videos that are longer than a couple minutes.  

After trying transcription and/or captioning yourself, you will likely find yourself looking for ways to automate the process, or to outsource it entirely. After all, your time is valuable; if you spend 15 minutes creating an educational video in order to flip your classroom, but then need to spend two hours or more to caption it, you may start to wonder "was creating this video worth the effort?" That's where two additional methods are often considered.

Most of us have been exposed to speech recognition, often through the features offered on mobile devices such as Apple's Siri.  It's natural to think that this might be a good alternative to manual transcription.  However, here are a few of the pitfalls associated with transcription and captioning generated by speech recognition tools:

• Accuracy is usually very poor, especially if your content is complex or academic in nature. Common words are often substituted for more unusual words, and names and places are rarely recognized correctly by speech recognition engines, unless you have trained the engine to your voice and your content.
• If there is more than one voice in the recording, accuracy drops further.
• Speech recognition performs especially poorly with second language accents.
• Speech recognition does not do well when there is background noise, music, or poor audio quality (such as speech that was recorded over the telephone or other limited mic'ing conditions).  
• Speech recognition usually fails to include proper punctuation and capitalization.

The quality of your captioning is critical. Remember that the intent of the relevant statutes such as the ADA and the Rehabilitation Act is to prevent discrimination against people with disabilities. In order to accomplish that you need to provide "equally effective communication" and "fair and equal" treatment to those who don't have the ability to hear the audio. Research has shown that even an error rate of 3-4% is dramatically less intelligible than verbatim closed captions.  Thus if you do not provide accurate, high quality captions, you are not following the intent of accessibility laws.  

A great way to begin checking the accessibility of your Microsoft Word 2010 or 2013 document is to use the built-in accessibility checker   

Below are guides and instructions for checking accessibility:

• PDF Instructions - Using the Accessibility Checker
• Instructions for checking accessibility for Office and Adobe
• Video Word 2013 & 2016: Using the Accessibility Checker
• Video Word 2013 & 2016: Converting to PDF
• Save as PDF/Check for Accessibility

Please Note: The accessibility checker only checks .docx files

1. Go to the File
2. Select Info from the sidebar menu.
3. Click on the Check for Issues
4. Select Check Accessibility from the drop-down list.

The Accessibility Checker panel will open to the right of the document. The accessibility checker provides you with a list of errors, warnings and tips. When you click on an error or warning, instructions on how to fix it appear below in "Additional Information"

In order to create and check the accessibility of PDF files, Adobe Acrobat Pro will need to be purchased and downloaded.

Use the checklist below to know what needs to be accessible:

• Checklist for ADA Compliant