With the friendly permission of the author, I'm forwarding a message that
crossed my path some two months ago.
Also, I found a few articles discussing courseware accessibility:
http://library.uwsp.edu/aschmetz/Accessible/pub_resources.htm#courseware. If
you know of other articles or studies on this issue, please let me know.
Thanks!
Axel
-----Original Message-----
From: Dr. AnnMarie (Paulukonis) Johnson [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Wednesday, December 06, 2000 11:27 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Blackboard 5 accessibility
I just tried out Blackboard 5 with JAWS (screen reader) and IBM Home
page reader (screen reader just for web pages). Blackboard 5 runs pretty
miserably on both. On the latter, it is impossible. The first page frame
set gives no alternative text so it is impossible to find the login
button. I visually went into the Portal and then into the workshop 4
class. It continues to be unreadable.
In the former (JAWS), you can hit the tab button and find the login
button...but it isn't labeled "Login" so you haven't a clue if you can't
see the button (that is, there is no alt text on the image). In the
portal, it's better, because it reads *everything* straight across the
page. However, this means the first line of every table (?) is read
first, then the second line, then the third. So you hear "Announcements
Welcome Calendar Today's announcements My course tasks dot.edu's online
education using Blackboard courses you are teaching Tasks etc." Inside a
course, not all of the images (navigation) have alt text, so they aren't
read either. On the one I'm looking at, only Assignments, Books, Groups
and Web Sites have alt text out of 12 total buttons.
......
The letter sent to us this morning via Kathryn appears to indicate
Blackboard will not be address ADA compliance and accessibility until
version 6. At this time, unless there are revisions to Blackboard 5
making it accessible, I am not certain we could support it on this
campus.
AnnMarie
-----Original Message-----
From: Adrian Higginbotham [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Tuesday, January 30, 2001 6:28 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: BlackBoard application
hi list:
our department uses BlackBoard quite a bit for its distant taught courses
but as one of our courses coming online later this year is on designing (in
the built environment) for accessability we want to be absolutely sure that
we're practicing what we preach.
is BlackBoard "accessible" ?
are some versions better than others.
other than the usual web design guidelines what particular features of this
application might give us problems?
and of course what if any are the better alternatives.
Adrian Higginbotham,
SURFACE
Salford University, Research Focus on AcCessible Environments.
E-mail [log in to unmask]
tel: 0161-2954939
fax: 0161-2955011
web: http://www.scpm.salford.ac.uk/surface/
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