Report an Accessibility Concern
Colorado Mesa University is committed to providing an institutional website that can be accessed by all visitors to the site. It is our goal to exceed the guidelines set by Section 508 and WCAG 2.0. Meeting accessibility standards is an ongoing process and we will continue to work toward increasing the accessibility of our site. We have included several features in our site to assist users with disabilities with accessing our site, some of these features are outlined below.
ARIA techniques
The CMU website uses HTML5 ARIA landmarks to allow screen readers and other assistive technologies identify content areas and their purpose on each webpage. ARIA labels are also utilized in accordance to WCAG recommendations to ensure all elements on the webpage are easily identified and their functionality is clear.
Keyboard tabbing
Focus
Active (or "focused") on-screen elements are visibly outlined throughout the entire website ensuring content focus is easily seen while clicking and/or tabbing through web content. While switching between elements, the focus animates across the screen, enabling users to easily track focus location changes.
Carousels
Rotating carousels, also known as sliders or galleries, utilize keyboard tabbing functionality. Since keyboard users cannot utilize the "pause on hover" feature, a "pause" and "play" button appear on focus to allow keyboard users to control the carousel rotation. Carousel navigations are controllable with tab, and selected by pressing the spacebar or enter key.
Skip to main content
At the beginning of every page are 'skip to' links that allow users who are using a screen reader or navigating with a keyboard to bypass certain content on the page. The two that are used are 'Skip to main content' which appears on every page and will take you to the body of the page and 'Skip to section navigation' which bypasses the site navigation on the top of the page and takes you to the navigation for that section if it exists on that page.
Screen Readers
Headings
Heading tags are used to create page architecture and layout. Heading level one tags are used for page titles and subsequent headings are used throughout the rest of the page.
Images
The images on our site contain 'alt tags' for site visitors who may be using screen readers or have their images turned off in their web browser. The alt text provides a text equivalence of the information that is conveyed in the image. Images used solely for decoration have a blank alt tag so that they are overlooked by screen readers.
"Screen reader only"
In order to allow extended usability for screen readers, certain functionality on this website includes text content that is only visible to screen readers. This is used as needed in areas where additional information may be necessary to improve usability.
Rotating carousel narration
Screen readers will announce carousel slide numbers and labels to the user as they rotate.
Other Accessibility Features
Color contrast
This website utilizes a white background and dark text to increase the contrast on the screen. This allows users with visual impairments to more easily read content on the webpage.
Reduced motion
Animated functionality on this website will honor the "prefers reduced motion" browser setting.
Cognitive assistance
Iconography, imagery and strategic planning of content hierarchy and layouts throughout this website are included to assist with cognition and understanding.
Page zoom
Page functionality will remain intact if users use page zooming features within their browser. All text content will increase or decrease based on user preference without sacrificing the usability of the webpage.
Closed captioning
Closed captioning is available on YouTube video and podcast embeds.
Contact Information
Colorado Mesa University welcomes comments on how to improve the site accessibility for users with disabilities. To help us to better serve you, please be specific in your comments, including the nature of the accessibility issue. Also, if you have any additional questions please contact:
Andrea Keck, Digital Communications Manager
[email protected]
970.248.1686
For more information on campus accessibility please contact:
Educational Access and Accessibility Services on Campus
noujcf.com/eas
970.248.1856