e-Pedagogium 2016, 16(4):53-68 | DOI: 10.5507/epd.2016.044

Accessibility of Digital Platforms at Universities for Students with Visual Impairment and Blindness

Vojtech Regec, Milan Regec
doc. PhDr. Vojtech Regec, Ph.D., Institute of Special Education Studies, Faculty of Education, Palacký University Olomouc, Žižkovo nám. 5, Olomouc, Czech Republic, E-mail: vojtech.regec@upol.cz

The aim of this paper is to define selected key determinants of accessibility of a digital platform in tertiary education of students with several visual impairments. In the context of tertiary education, it deals with important aspects of the use of semantic HTML tags and elements which to describe an electronic document in an accessible and structured form. We observed the theoretical as well as practical scopes of the use of selected semantical HTML tags for headings and lists from the point of view of blind students. The paper separately elaborates issues related to the implementation of the WAI-ARIA 1.0 landmarks into HTML 5 specification. We conclude through the means of combined qualitative and quantitative research that the accessibility level of digital platforms of universities is unsatisfactory. 63% of universities did not use correct headings and lists in their digital platforms in 2015, and we did not find a single institution which would be fully compliant with the WAI-ARIA landmarks.

Keywords: digital platform, e-Accessibility, visual impairment, blindness, tertiary education, HTML, HTML 5, WAI-ARIA

Published: August 1, 2016  Show citation

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Regec, V., & Regec, M. (2016). Accessibility of Digital Platforms at Universities for Students with Visual Impairment and Blindness. e-Pedagogium, 16(4), 53-68. doi: 10.5507/epd.2016.044
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