Most campus barriers live in the course, not on the home page.
The public website gets the redesigns and the scans. Students spend their time in the learning management system, in PDFs posted at midnight, in lecture recordings, and in tools a department bought last spring. That is where we test, and where we train the people who publish.
Title II reaches public campuses and the tools they require
Public colleges and universities are public entities under Title II of the ADA, so the Justice Department's web and mobile app rule applies to them. It sets WCAG 2.1 Level AA as the standard for web content and mobile apps an institution provides directly or through contracts, licenses, or other arrangements. That includes the learning management system, the course materials inside it, and the edtech tools students are required to use.
Which date applies depends on the public entity's total population. Many state universities are treated as part of a state, which points to April 26, 2027. Some community colleges are organized as local or special districts, which can point to April 26, 2028. Confirm your institution's date with counsel before you plan around it. Private colleges aren't covered by this rule, but most face similar expectations under Section 504 and Title III.
What we test, and the criteria that usually fail
| Content | Common barrier | Success criteria |
|---|---|---|
| LMS course pages | Headings faked with bold text, links named "click here", and embedded tools that trap keyboard focus | SC 1.3.1, SC 2.4.4, SC 2.1.2 |
| PDF readings and slide decks | Scanned pages with no text layer, untagged slides, and equations saved as pictures | SC 1.1.1, SC 1.3.1 |
| Recorded lectures | Automatic captions never corrected; no audio description of what appears on screen | SC 1.2.2, SC 1.2.5 |
| Live classes and public events | Streams with no live captions | SC 1.2.4 |
| Quizzes and assignments | Drag-and-drop and hotspot questions with no keyboard alternative; math typed as images | SC 2.1.1, SC 1.1.1 |
| Registration and financial aid | Sessions that time out mid-form, errors not tied to fields, and image CAPTCHAs at sign-in | SC 2.2.1, SC 3.3.1, SC 1.1.1 |
The dates campuses are planning around
is the technical standard in the Justice Department's ADA Title II web and mobile app rule, published April 24, 2024
U.S. Department of Justice, Final Rule, 89 FR 31320 (FR Doc. 2024-07758)is the ADA Title II web and mobile app compliance date for state and local governments with a total population of 50,000 or more
U.S. Department of Justice, Interim Final Rule, 91 FR 20902 (FR Doc. 2026-07663)is the ADA Title II web and mobile app compliance date for public entities with a total population under 50,000 and for special district governments
U.S. Department of Justice, Interim Final Rule, 91 FR 20902 (FR Doc. 2026-07663)The long tail is course material
A central web team can fix a template once and clear a thousand pages. Course content doesn't work that way. Instructors, teaching assistants, and instructional designers produce it every term, in whatever tool they know, and a single course can include dozens of PDFs, slide decks, videos, and links to publisher platforms.
So we work on two tracks. First, we fix what is shared: LMS theme customizations, course templates, the video player, and the institution's own web components. Second, we help you triage existing materials. Our document team remediates the readings used every term, converts others to HTML, and flags the ones best retired. For video, we check that captions are accurate, not just present, because automatic captions often garble names, technical terms, and formulas.
The work that lasts happens upstream, with faculty who know how to build an accessible document the first time.
Buying edtech without buying barriers
Every tool a course requires becomes part of the institution's obligation. We help procurement and IT accessibility teams review vendors before the contract is signed.
Ask for the right report
Request an Accessibility Conformance Report on the current VPAT® 2.5Rev template, in the WCAG edition, for the version you are buying. A report that is several releases old describes a different product.
Read it critically
We check whether each "Supports" claim is plausible, whether "Partially Supports" entries explain what fails, and whether the report says how and with which assistive technology it was tested.
Test what students actually do
A few hours on the student path, from sign-in to submitting work and reading feedback, usually reveals more than the report does.
Write it into the contract
Name the standard, require a remediation plan with dates for known gaps, and ask for an updated report with each major release. Your general counsel owns the wording; we supply the technical terms.
Training built for the people who publish
Workshops start at $2,200 per half day and use your own LMS, CMS, and documents as the material.
Faculty
Accessible syllabi, slides, and readings in the tools they already use, with time to fix one of their own documents before they leave the room.
Content editors and communicators
Headings, link text, alt text, tables, and captions in your CMS, plus how to spot a PDF that should have been a web page.
Developers and designers
Accessible component patterns, keyboard and screen reader testing, and automated checks in the build pipeline.
Procurement and IT accessibility staff
How to read an ACR, what to ask a vendor, and how to run a quick task-based test before a purchase.
Questions from accessibility offices and campus IT
Doesn't our disability services office already handle this?
Disability services handle individual accommodations, such as extended time or an alternate format for a specific student. The Title II rule is about making content accessible before anyone has to ask. Both matter, and they work best together, because accessible course materials tend to reduce the number of urgent accommodation requests each term.
Is content behind a login, like the LMS, covered?
Password protection doesn't take content out of scope. The rule has a narrow exception for certain individualized, password-protected documents, such as one student's records, but course materials and the systems that deliver them are generally covered. Review the details with your counsel.
Can you work with central IT and academic departments at the same time?
Yes. We structure campus engagements with a central track for templates, shared tools, and procurement, and a departmental track for courses, documents, and training. Each owner gets their own list.
Do you test lecture capture and video platforms?
Yes. We test the player's controls with a keyboard and screen readers, check caption accuracy on a sample of recordings, and review how live captioning is requested and delivered.
Keep reading
Tell us what your website needs to do.
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