JASPO is committed to making our information accessible to Americans with disabilities.
Our process to meet this commitment has three components:
- Analysis
- Design
- Modification
JASPO continually analyzes our web content in light of section 508 accessibility requirements.
We then design new web content or redesign old content so that alternate media forms are available for all JASPO web site users. This can be as simple as adding ATL-tags to graphics or as complicated as offering text file narrations of audio files or presenting mpeg sound files to describe video media forms.
As additional lessons regarding web site accessibility issues are learned, JASPO modifies its internal content. This modification includes making navigation menus more useful for all users, creating Portable Document Format (PDF) files with Adobe accessibility features, and offering a help “point of contact” if any users has trouble receiving information from the site.
The JASPO compliance plan is organized according to the following priorities:
- Providing text equivalents for every nontext element, including, but not limited to, image maps, animations, GIFs, JPEGs, MPEGS, applets, frames, audio files, video files, and other streaming media forms.
- Ensuring all information conveyed with color is also available without color.
- Organizing documents to ensure they may be read without the use of style sheets.
- Ensuring that equivalents of dynamic content are updated when dynamic content changes.
- Using clear and simple language for the site’s content.
- Providing client-side image maps rather than server-side image maps.
- Providing row and column headers for all tables.
- Titling each frame to facilitate frame identification and navigation.
- Ensuring that pages are usable when scripts, applets, or other programmable objects are turned off or not supported.
- Providing audio descriptions of any streaming video media files.
- When other accessibility measures fail, providing a link to an alternate page that features equivalent information.
- Ensuring all foreground and background color combinations have sufficient contrast when viewed by someone having color vision deficits or when viewed on a black and white screen.
- Useing header elements as appropriate to convey document structure.
- Informing users if they chose a selection that will generate a pop-up window and/or provide the means to close the pop-up window.
- Providing metadata to add information about the general content of each web page.
- Creating a logical tab order through links, form controls, and objects.
- Creating keyboard shortcuts to important links.
- Enabling search functions for different skill levels and user preferences.
- Providing redundant text links for each active region of a client-side image map.
- Providing summaries for tables.
- Providing abbreviations for header labels.
- Including default, place-holding characters in edit boxes and text areas.
JASPO’s information accessibility plan is not a linear “waterfall” scheme where the requirements are fulfilled once and then never reevaluated: JASPO’s plan of action is a spiral of continually analyzing, designing, and modifying all web content to make sure that it is available and useful for all users.
For further information or questions, please e-mail us.