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Re: Chronicle of Higher Education article "Colleges Lock Out Blind Students Online" Chronicle Article and form control labeling

for

From: Gunderson, Jon R
Date: Dec 15, 2010 6:09AM

No I do not look for the use of MathML in the review.

Typically MathML would not be found on the administrative websites that I reviewed.

I would expect MathML to be found more on instructional websites, which are usually behind pass word protections.

Jon

On Dec 14, 2010, at 1:00 PM, Birkir Rúnar Gunnarsson wrote:

> Jon
>
> I hardly dare ask *grin* but was use of MathML or accessible math
> considerred at all in your survey (I know, I will read the details of
> the rules you crated later, was just wondering if you could give me
> the quick and dirty answer to this).
> One would hardly expect accessible math on pages that do not have
> their form fields in order, but I am very worried about the future of
> STEM education as we move from the traditional campus environment with
> readers or visual interpreters to online studies.
> Thanks
> -B
>
> On 12/14/10, Julie Romanowski < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>> Not outraged, but disappointed. Creating accessible form controls is not
>> rock science, and we should expect better from our universities.
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: <EMAIL REMOVED>
>> [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Gunderson, Jon R
>> Sent: Tuesday, December 14, 2010 12:19 PM
>> To: WebAIM Discussion List
>> Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Chronicle of Higher Education article "Colleges Lock
>> Out Blind Students Online" Chronicle Article and form control labeling
>>
>> I find it interesting that people on this list were not outraged that less
>> than 30 percent of the 19,722 pages tested with form controls had accessible
>> labels.
>>
>> http://webaccessibility.cita.illinois.edu/data/
>>
>> I can't think of a more basic accessibility feature than using a label
>> element or title attribute to label a form control.
>>
>> The lack of form control labeling was my biggest conclusion from the pages
>> tested and my biggest worry is how to address this issue.
>>
>> I think everyone agrees that form control labeling is a part of WCAG 1.0,
>> WCAG 2.0, Section 508 requirements and almost any other web accessibility
>> standard developed.
>>
>> If higher education can't even label simple form controls correctly, how are
>> they ever going to make Dynamic HTML widgets accessible?
>>
>> Jon
>>