Quality Matters General Standard 8

Quality Matters Standard 8
Accessibility and Usability

8.1 Course navigation facilitates ease of use.

8.2 The course design facilitates readability.

8.3 The course provides accessible text and images in flies, documents, LMS pages, and web pages to meet the needs of diverse learners.

8.4 The course provides alternative means of access to multimedia content in formats that meet the needs of diverse learners.

8.5 Course multimedia facilitate ease of use.

8.6 Vendor accessibility statements are provided for all technologies required in the course.

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Statement on Disability Accommodations

Include a statement on disability accommodations in your course and syllabus. For example, “Contact the Office of Disability Services (ODS) as detailed in the Online Catalog.”

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Toolkit

• Use course navigation that is clearly labeled, consistent, and intuitive.
• Be sure the course reflects strong readability practices, like choosing uncomplicated fonts, ensuring there is a high contrast between text and background, using proximity to connect related information, and using white space in between paragraphs.
• Incorporate universal design principles, including using alternative text descriptions of images and presenting content in multiple formats when possible.
• Provide alternative means of access to course materials, particularly multimedia, to meet the needs of a diverse population of students.
• Ensure that multimedia are easy to use and are playable across multiple devices.
• Provide links to vendor accessibility statements for all the technologies used in the course.

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Next Steps

See our other Course Quality Checklists for more information:

• Standard 1 – Course Overview and Introduction
• Standard 2 – Learning Objectives (Competencies)
• Standard 3 – Assessment and Measurement
• Standard 4 – Instructional Materials
• Standard 5 – Learning Activities and Learner Interaction
• Standard 6 – Course Technology
• Standard 7 – Learner Support