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Digital Accessibility

Department of Justice Title II ADA ruling

The DOJ’s Title II ADA ruling requires that all digital content provided by public institutions must be accessible to individuals with disabilities. The compliance deadline for this ruling is April 24, 2026. Digital content created or modified on or after this date must meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1, Level AA. 

For more information, see the ADA Title II page on UMB's Digital Accessibility site.

What is Digital Accessibility?

Digital accessibility is the practice of ensuring that digital content and technologies is usable for everyone, regardless of ability. For digital content to be accessible, it must be perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust. The video below provides a brief overview.

What the FCTL Is Doing

The Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning supports faculty in creating accessible, inclusive learning environments by:

  • Focusing on accessibility in teaching and learning
  • Participating in the USM Digital Accessibility Working Group
  • Providing consultations, workshops, and hands-on support
  • Sharing tools, templates, and practical guidance
  • Escalating instructional concerns to the UMB Accessibility Task Force when needed

Our goal is to make accessibility approachable, practical, and sustainable for faculty.

 

Faculty Responsibilities

Accessibility is a shared institutional responsibility, and faculty play a key role. The primary responsibilities for faculty are to: 

  1. Ensure new content is created accessible: Learn how to create content accessible from the start will be the number one thing you can do to make a significant long-term impact.
  2. Review course materials and remediate/replace as necessary: Learn how to recognize accessibility issues in existing materials and how to remediate them.

We recognize that there is a learning curve to acquiring these skills, so we highly encourage you to become familiar with the resources, support, and training that is available to you. This page and UMB's Digital Accessibility site are good places to start.

 

Resources and Support

Request a one-on-one FCTL consultation: FCTL Consultation Form

March 6, 2026 - Online Teaching Community Presentation: Opening Doors: Accessibility in the Wake of DOJ Title II Ruling, 12PM - 1PM

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Digital content includes any information or experience a user can access with a computer or device. This includes:

  • Websites
  • Web and mobile applications
  • Procured tools, software, and third-party services
  • Electronic documents and communications
  • Media

Visit the Digital Accessibility in Teaching and Learning page one UMB's Digital Accessibility site to learn more about the types of digital content that may be present in a teaching and learning context.

The ADA Title II ruling not only requires new digital content created after the April 24, 2026 deadline to be accessible, but also that pre-existing digital content be remediated by that date. We recommend faculty prioritize current and upcoming courses and materials.

There are some exceptions can be made for certain pre-existing digital content, but in general, if students must use the content to engage in your course, it needs to be accessible.  Refer to the ADA Title II page of UMB's Digital Accessibility site for more information.

There are a variety of tools available to help you check the accessibility of your digital content and to assist with remediation, including:

  • Built-in accessibility checkers in Microsoft Office applications (e.g., Word, PowerPoint)
  • Blackboard Ally for Blackboard course content (see the Course and Learning Platforms page for more information)
  • Captioning features (e.g. auto-captioning and the ability to edit captions) are available in Zoom cloud recordings, VoiceThread, and YouTube
  • Equidox is available for PDF remediation
  • Check to see if your department has an Adobe Acrobat Pro license as an additional PDF remediation tool

Check the Tools and Testing page on UMB's Digital Accessibility site to learn more.

We recommend faculty prioritize current and upcoming courses and materials. Here's seven "quick wins" you can develop into habits that will make a significant impact:

  1. Use accessibility checkers for new and existing content.
  2. Review your course for materials that are no longer needed.
  3. Avoid using PDFs that require remediation (especially scanned PDFs).
    • Can you find the same resource in a different format? (e.g., ePub, HTML).
    • Can you provide the document in its native format instead?  (e.g., Word, PowerPoint).
  4. When creating new presentation videos, try listening to your narration with your eyes closed.
    • Does it make sense for someone who can't see the slides?  Elaborate if needed.
  5. Provide edited captions for all videos.
    • Auto-captions are a great start, but must be edited to meet WCAG 2.1 AA accuracy standards.
  6. Provide useable alternative text for visual content.
    • Consider whether a short alt text description is sufficient, or whether a short alt text and a long description is needed (e.g. complex images, charts, graphs, diagrams).
    • AI tools can help you get started.
      • Sample prompt: "Describe this image for a screen reader. Format it as alt text for a PowerPoint presentation."
      • Elaborate on your original prompt and/or edit the generated alt text as needed.
  7. Apply heading & list styles within digital content.
  8. Use descriptive text for links (instead of the URL or "click here").

Accessibility is a collective and ongoing effort here at UMB. The UMB Digital Accessibility site contains a lot of useful information and resources. In addition, the following groups may be able to help answer questions or provide support:

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