Accessibility Testing

person, cloud, and gears representing the use of technology as adaptive tools

Automated Accessibility Testing

The DCP offers access to Siteimprove, an automated accessibility tester, to all units of the campus for automated scanning of their websites.  The Siteimprove tool will scan every page on your website, under a specific domain name, for accessibility. Siteimprove will continually track an aggregate accessibility score for the website and produce detailed reports on the issues. The results are thorough yet easy-to-read and are categorically aligned to the WCAG 2.1 success criteria, an widely-accepted international standard.  Clients can choose to also opt into consulting meetings where the DCP will also walk clients through the results and provide recommendations and priority issues to fix. Siteimprove and WAVE also offers browser extensions for quick, surface-level accessibility feedback for developers and content editors.

Manual Testing

The DCP testing team offers hands-on manual testing of websites, web applications, mobile applications, educational and instructional programs, hardware, kiosks, wearables and other emerging technologies to ensure inclusion for all people. Manual testing will likely take longer than automated testing but is a more reliable test of accessible usability than automated scans. Lead tester at the DCP, Sal Santa Ana, has over 20 years of experience testing websites and is a native screen reader and assistive technology user. All tests results are documented in a short report aligned to the WCAG 2.1 AA.

Testing Training

Every academic quarter the DCP offers many trainings, one of which is an hour-long training on accessibility testing that is available to the UCLA community free of charge (currently via Zoom). This training reviews the tools for automated scanning and provides the best practices for manual testing including how to tab-test your website, check for code for header structure, alt-text, and color contrast.