Digital Accessibility

It is required of all instructors to ensure their online courses meet digital accessibility standards; please see the Digital Accessibility Procedure Manual and the Digital Accessibility Policy E-XV. 

It’s important to ensure that all digital materials are compliant at the time of creation. It is often easier and less time-consuming than having to go through all your materials later to improve. Practicing principles of Universal Design means that digital materials will be helpful to all students, not just those needing accommodations.  

For more information on ADA compliance contact the Instructional Design and Innovation team at online@mclennan.edu 

Disability Services pages can be accessed at http://www.mclennan.edu/disability/. If you have difficulty accessing information from the Disability Services web pages, please call 254-299-8122 for assistance. 

Title II Department of Justice Ruling 

The Department of Justice determined that there needed to be an official technical standard to the Americans with Disabilities Act to include the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines using the 2.1 AA Standards. They updated Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The final rule has specific requirements on how to ensure that web content and mobile applications are accessible to people with disabilities.  

When do these updates affect MCC? 

It’s currently in MCC’s Digital Accessibility Policy for instructors to meet WCAG 2.1 Level A and AA standards. With the Title II update, instructors will need to ensure that their courses meet at least 2.1 Level AA. These standards have criteria that address low vision and cognitive and learning disabilities.  

It’s important to start improving digital materials at the beginning of course creation and throughout the semester.  

Academic Digital Accessibility (ADA) Committee 

The purpose of this committee is to support faculty with digital accessibility needs. The ADA committee consists of the following members: 

• Claire Wilkison, Instructional Design & Innovation (Chair) 

• Katie Vise, Accommodations (Co-Chair) 

• Claudette Jackson, Accommodations & Title IX 

• Jessica Shelton, Professor 

• Becky Parton, Assistant Professor 

• Bill Lockhart, Professor 

• Jarred Hankhouse, Program Director/Associate Professor 

• Glynnis Gaines, Dean Health Professions 

• Frank Graves, Dean Workforce & Public Service 

• Bradley Christian, Dean Arts & Sciences 

• Samantha Buerger, Associate Professor 

• Elizabeth Moss, Deaf & Hard of Hearing Services Specialist 

• Leslie Henderson, Professor 

ADA Certificate  

 Are you wanting to improve digital materials in your online courses? Complete the ADA Certificate through Professional Development. Instructional Design and Innovation will be teaching the following courses starting Spring 2026: 

• Accessibility Law  

• Document Compliance Word & PowerPoint 

• Document Compliance PDF 

• Yuja Video- Captioning 

• Yuja Panorama 

• WCAG 2.1 Guidelines 

Other Resources

• A Personal Look at Accessibility in Higher Education: https://youtu.be/PQGFshzLPXE
• WebAIM has created a checklist to see if your online classes are compliant: http://webaim.org/standards/508/checklist
• Disability Services pages can be accessed at http://www.mclennan.edu/disability/. If you have difficulty accessing information from the Disability Services web pages, please call 254-299-8122 for assistance.