The goal of universal design is to make products and services that are accessible and usable for the largest possible audience without the need for adaptation or specialized design. In this workshop, we’ll explore ways to make your communications – whether digital, print, or social media – more useful for your audience without compromising the design. Find resources and files below so that you can follow along during the presentations.
Wednesday, August 7th
Universal design for digital communications
Downloads
- Creating accessible documents (and fixing ones that aren’t) outline handout
- Example document 18: Color contrast & APCA Quick Tip Sheet
Legal Requirements
Links
- The Southeast ADA Center offers technical assistance and legal advice on complying with ADA requirements.
- Maltron Keyboards – Single hand
- NVDA (NonVisual Desktop Access) – Free screen reader software for Windows computers
- NVDA Keyboard Commands
Quick reference guide - The Real Reason You Use Closed Captions for Everything Now | WIRED
- Matt May, Inclusive Design Lead at Adobe
Wednesday, August 7th
Universal design for meetings and webinars
Downloads
Thursday, August 8th
Universal design for print documents
Thursday, August 8th
Universal design for web & social media
Tools
- ANDI (Accessible Name & Description Inspector) is a free web accessibility testing tool maintained by the US Social Security Administration.
- NVDA (NonVisual Desktop Access) – Free screen reader software for Windows computers
- PDF Accessibility Checker (PAC) 2021 – Free tool for analyzing PDF accessibility from the PDF/UA Foundation. Indicates errors but doesn’t fix them.
Other tools and external resources
Color Contrast
Section508.gov
The US General Services Administration maintains Section508.gov, a portal stuffed with free training resources to help agencies meet accessibility requirements. Below is a sampling of courses related to document and media accessibility. To access other accessible electronic document technical resources, visit Accessibility Testing for Electronic Documents.
- Video training – Accessible Microsoft Word Documents
- Video Training – Accessible PDF Training
- Create Accessible Video and Social Media
- Create Accessible Software and Websites
- Create Accessible Digital Products
- Test for Accessibility
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)
- A very helpful, customizable quick reference to WCAG 2.0 requirements and techniques. WCAG Quick Reference provides a Filter tab to determine which success criteria and techniques are displayed/apply. The Contents tab provides a quick link to requirements with buttons that allow users to “show a full description” of the SC, “show techniques and failures” for the SC and display its “understanding” information.
- A guide to understanding and implementing WCAG 2.0, Understanding WCAG 2.0 contains links to content for understanding Success Criterion, information about how to successfully implement the criterion, and guidance about techniques for developers for success and failure.



