Make your MyPCCC announcements accessible

Owned by Bradley Morton
Last updated: Feb 25, 2021
2 min read

Announcements and discussions on the MyPCCC portal are an important means for our students, faculty and staff to stay informed and connected with our College community. This is no less important for those in our community who are blind or visually impaired. We must ensure the content we create and publish on the College portal and other online services works well with access technology (e.g., screen readers).

There are many online resources related to web accessibility, and they are well worth exploring. Below are some basic tips for content that will immediately improve accessibility.

Proper use of images

Access technology is able to easily consume text, but images can be a problem. Follow these guidelines when using images.

  1. Important information should be provided as text outside of an image.
  2. Images can be used to add an extra dimension to content such as event announcements, but should not serve as a replacement for text content.
  3. If an image is used, ALT TEXT should be provided to describe the image. Screen readers will look for ALT TEXT and use it to describe the contents of the image to the user. The MyPCCC portal does not yet support ALT TEXT for images.
The name of the link should be descriptive. Using link text such as "Click here" is meaningless for someone using a screen reader. 

Users of screen readers often jump through the links on a page as a means of navigating the content. This increases the importance of links.

Incorrect use:

Correct use:

Accessibility Resources