Campus Suite Launches School Website Accessibility Education Center

CINCINNATI – In response to changing federal requirements for school districts to make their websites ADA compliant, SchoolNow Academy has launched the School Website Accessibility Education Center. This free website contains a collection of resources for school administrators to understand, implement and manage web accessibility and ADA compliance for their web and digital communications.

The Website Accessibility Education Center is designed for use by school communications, public relations and IT professionals responsible for publishing content on their school websites to insure all website content is accessible to individuals with disabilities.

Schools are joining U.S.government agencies being required to make their websites fully accessible and ADA compliant. Website accessibility is being enforced nationally by the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) U.S. Department of Education, which has jurisdiction over schools receiving assistance from the federal government.

“As digital communications continue to expand and we all become more dependent on websites for accessing and sharing information, many schools are unwittingly creating obstacles for people with disabilities,” said Jay Cooper, director of the SchoolNow Academy. “This website helps answer the questions school administrators and school boards are asking about how to make their websites ADA compliant.”

Schools are being asked to comply with requirements of Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act (29 U.S.C. 794d) covering information technologies accessibility for individuals with disabilities. Settlements are being reached between the OCR and education institutions across the country.

“As schools, school districts, states, and territories turn to the internet as a way to provide relevant and up-to-date information to their audiences, they must make sure they are not inadvertently excluding people with disabilities from their online programs, services, and activities,” said Catherine E. Lhamon, assistant secretary for civil rights, U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, in a recent press release from the OCR.

The Website Accessibility Education Center contains articles, infographics and videos for school administrators to understand what it takes to make their school websites ADA compliant. In addition, it contains guides and templates for schools to develop their own step-by-step process to put a web accessibility process in place. School content managers and IT professionals can determine what part of their websites are non-compliant, how to fix issues, and how to keep their websites accessible.

The Website Accessibility Education Center was created and is managed by the SchoolNow Academy, the educator professional development arm of the SchoolNow school communications cloud. SchoolNow provides website content management systems, text and voice notification systems, mobile apps and online spirit shops to schools and colleges, including K-12, public, private and charter schools, and community and small colleges.

Visit the Website Accessibility Education Center

For more information, contact: Jay C. Cooper, jay@schoolnow.com