A recent conversation with a colleague reiterated the importance of confirming whether your organization’s website has any requirements to comply with Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 standards.
If you aren’t already familiar with web accessibility standards, drop by the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 site. Although not overwhelming, there is a good bit of material there, some of which you’ll need to speak with your developer about. At the same time, there are some critical elements that are very easy for anyone to check, such as color contrast is distinguishable for visually impaired site visitors.
Did you know that a routine boilerplate included in many grant agreements (especially those from government sources) stipulates the receiving organization agrees that their website complies to accessibility standards?
In early 2017, the Federal government updated Section 508, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. According to an article by Hiram Kuykendall from the February 2017 issue of Mealey’s™ Litigation Report: Cyber Tech & E-Commerce, those changes include adopting most WCAG 2.0 standards.
Although enforcement and inspections are not as rigid as they certainly could be, you probably don’t want to wait around to find out what happens.
Fortunately, there are some super easy tools you can use that are free of charge and and I wrote an article for ArtsHacker.com almost one year ago to the day pointing out a number of valuable resources along with walking you through how to use them.
