Accessibility Statement for Education Authority website

The site works with various assistive technologies by:

• Using good colour contrast
• Enlarging text and reading it out aloud
• Blocking distractions on screen with a tinted mask
• Displaying pictures related to the text selected on the page (Picture Dictionary)
• Converting selected text into MP3 audio
• Using a simple, uncluttered page layout
• Allowing navigation using a keyboard
• Providing Written and Spoken Translations in multiple languages
• Conforming with accessibility standards and usability best practices

Maintaining an accessible website is an ongoing process and we are continually working to offer an accessible and user friendly experience.

If you need information in a different format, please email us at [email protected] and tell us:

• the web address (URL) of the content
• your name and email address
• the format you need, for example, accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille

We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 5 working days.

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website.

If you find any problems that are not listed on this page or you think we’re not meeting the accessibility requirements, please email us at [email protected]

If you contact us with a complaint and you’re not happy with our response, you can contact the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland.

Equality Commission for Northern Ireland
Equality House
7 - 9 Shaftesbury Square
Belfast
BT2 7DP

Phone: 028 9050 0600
Text number (for deaf and hard of hearing users only): 028 9050 0589
Fax: 028 9024 8687
Email: [email protected]

The Equality Commission for Northern Ireland supports people with disabilities in securing their rights.

The Education Authority is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.


Under Article 14 of the 1986 Education and Libraries (NI) EA is required to publish development proposal documents from Council for Catholic Maintained Schools (CCMS), sectoral bodies and individual voluntary schools. These documents are not EA documents but EA is a conduit for their publication.

We know that parts of this website are not yet fully accessible.

• some pages and document attachments are not clearly written
• some tables do not have row headers
• some pages have poor colour contrast
• some heading elements are not consistent
• some images do not have good alternative text
• some buttons are not correctly identified
• some error messages are not clearly associated with form controls
• some older documents are in PDF format and are not fully accessible
• some videos do not have captions
• some of the online forms are difficult to navigate using just a keyboard
• there is a limit to how far you can magnify the maps on the website

Navigation and accessing information

• There’s no way to skip the repeated content in the page header (for example, a ‘skip to main content’ option). This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 2.4.1 (bypass blocks).
• It’s not always possible to change the device orientation from horizontal to vertical without making it more difficult to view the content. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.3.4 (orientation).
• It’s not possible for users to change text size without some of the content overlapping. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.4.4 (resize text).

Interactive tools and transactions

• Some of our interactive forms are difficult to navigate using a keyboard. For example, because some form controls are missing a ‘label’ tag.

We’ve assessed the cost of fixing the issues with navigation and accessing information, and with interactive tools and transactions. We believe that doing so now would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations. We will make another assessment when the supplier contract is up for renewal, likely to be in 2020.

The following content does not need to comply with the accessibility requirement until September 2020, because it was published before September 2018.

Images on pages do not always have suitable alternative text. Some images are missing alternative text, some have incomplete text and some have ‘placeholder’ as alternative text. This fails WCAG 1.1.1A success criterion (Non-text Content). We plan to identify and fix these by September 2020.

Headings on some pages are not in a logical nested order. We plan to identify and fix these by September 2020.

In addition to the pages identified above, some other pages have content in different languages where the language is not identified. This fails WCAG 2.1 A 3.1.1 success criterion (Language of Page). We plan to identify and fix these by September 2020.

Buttons on some pages do not have a correct role identified, which affects how they work with assistive technology. This fails WCAG 2.1A success criterion (Name, Role, Value). We plan to identify and fix these by September 2020.

Error messages on some forms are unclear or lack clear association with particular form controls. This fails WCAG 2.1A 3.3.1 success criterion (Error Identification).

Guidance will be created to help content authors understand the requirements for captions and audio description for all new videos. This is related to WCAG 2.1A success criteria 1.2.2 (Captions (Prerecorded)) and 1.2.3 Audio Description or Media Alternative (Prerecorded).

Many of our older PDFs and Word documents do not meet accessibility standards - for example, they may not be structured so they’re accessible to a screen reader. This does not meet WCAG 2.1 success criterion 4.1.2 (name, role value).

Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services, and forms published as Word documents. By September 2020, we plan to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.

The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services.

Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.

View the Education Authority's accessible document policy to report any problems or request documents in an alternative format.

Live video streams do not have captions. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.2.4 (captions - live).

We do not plan to add captions to live video streams because live video is exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations.

This website was and is currently being tested for compliance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines V2.1 level A and level AA, and these tests have been carried out internally.

We used the Website Accessibility Conformance Evaluation Methodology (WCAG-EM) approach to deciding on a sample of pages to test.

We plan to identify and fix issues according to the timescales shown for each area above.

This statement was last updated on 14 November 2019.