Web progress for diversity and inclusion! Not only have we updated our website to be more accessible for people with varied visual abilities, but also we offer our visitors a free virtual test drive and share how we made it happen.

Quite a few of our readers are no doubt familiar with ensuring websites are accessible for screen reading programs and apps. Screen reader programs “read” the screen aloud, hence the name!

Many people who are visually impaired or blind use screen readers to navigate computers, tablets and smartphones. Similarly, perhaps you have seen “Voiceover” features in your devices – these embed such screen reader capabilities! 

Step one in increasing a web site’s accessibility is to use a screen reader compatible platform. The next step is to review the site through special accessibility sites and correct any identified issues.

What is the new icon in the upper right corner?

However, not all people with visual limitations use screen readers. Therefore, step three in our website update included adding an icon and menu to address color blindness, “low vision”, or other conditions which make it difficult to read and navigate traditional websites.

In the upper right hand corner of each page of the website, there is now a round, blue “digital accessibility icon”. When it is clicked, a menu appears which allows users to adjust the website’s font size, contrast, colors, etc.

Go for a “Test Drive”!

Go ahead and click the round, blue “accessibility icon”. (Think of it as a virtual test drive!) You might discover that changing one or more of these features creates a more pleasant reading and browsing experience for you. After all, we spend a lot of time online, and our eyes get tired!

Please let us know if there are other accessibility needs we can address.

Pay it Forward

If you have a website, please explore accessibility needs and accommodations. If WordPress is your platform, you can follow all three steps with fabulous plugins. There are several very easy and effective ones from which to choose.

 

 

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First posted 5/19/2019

Updated 5/10/2020