Accessibility known issues
Issues with video and images
Video
- A few videos appearing in our News are not hosted on our channels; some channel owners do not fall under UK's regulation, and those videos don't have transcripts or captions.
- A few videos posted on our website don't have captions. All those videos were published before the 23rd September 2020 and thus don't fall under accessibility requirements
Issues with navigation, structure, links and keyboard operability
Navigation
- Not all forms have labels indicating the purpose of the field that they relate to, which can result in people with reading difficulties having problems understanding the purpose of the content and users of screen readers being unable to easily navigate the form.
We are working to fix pages containing this issue
Structure
- Not all headings are hierarchical, making the site more difficult for users of assistive technology such as screen readers to access. This fails the WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.3.1.
We are working to fix pages containing this issue.
Keyboard operability
- Carousels do not have obvious controls for users to stop the auto-rotate, which can cause people with cognitive disability that affect focus and concentration to be distracted making the site less accessible. This fails the WCAG 2.1 success criterion 2.2.2.
We are working with our developers to implement fixes for these keyboard operability issues. - Some menus, links, buttons, and other controls cannot be operated using the keyboard alone, which can cause problems for people who are blind, have low vision and/or hand tremors. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 2.1.1.
We are working with our developers to implement fixes for these keyboard operability issues.
Issues with contrast, use of colour and visual characteristics
- Some elements have low contrast levels (e.g. links), which can result in text being difficult to read, especially for people with low vision, poor eyesight or colour blindness. This fails the WCAG 2.1 success criteria 1.4.3.
We are working with our developers to implement a fix for this issue.
Issues with language and content
- Where the language of all or part of a page isn’t English this isn’t defined in the html, which can result in screen readers being unable to correctly read the text. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 3.1.1 and 3.1.2.
- The line height, spacing between paragraphs and letter and word spacing cannot be changed without loss of content or functionality. This means that people with low vision, dyslexia or cognitive disabilities may struggle to read the text, or lose content or functionality. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.4.12.
- When using mobile or tablet devices, it may not be possible to dismiss or interact with some extra content (i.e. pop-up images) without moving focus, losing functionality, or it disappearing. This may cause problems for disabled or sight impaired users as pop-up content may be accidentally triggered or pop-up content may not stay on the screen. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.4.13.
- Third-party content might interrupt a page viewed without style sheets.
We are working with our developers to implement fixes for these issues.
Issues with documents, including Word files, PowerPoints, PDFs
- Some documents on this site do not meet accessibility standards, which could result in them not being fully accessible to users of screen readers.
Documents that are essential to the service we provide will be either converted to HTML pages or replaced with accessible versions.
Issues with Content Management System (CMS)
- The CMS code is being checked to ensure that it meets the robust accessibility criteria 4.1.1, 4.1.2 & 4.1.3.
This will be done as part of an accessibility upgrade of the Haiku Content Management System.
Disproportionate burden
- As resources, we have posted recordings of conferences, seminars and presentations as videos, as well as accompanying PDFs of seminar slides. It would be a disproportionate burden to create transcripts or captions for conference, seminar or presentation recordings, and to ensure that all accompanying PDF slides are accessible.
- As resources, we have posted PDFs of presentations. It would be a disproportionate burden to ensure that these documents are fully accessible.
- As resources, we have posted Presentation summary drawings that were designed during a conference. It would be a disproportionate burden to add full descriptions of the content.
- As recources, we have posted PDFs for News. It would be a disproportionate burden to ensure that these documents are fully accessible.
Read more about disproportionate burden for accessibility on the UK Government website
Content that is not within the scope of the accessibility regulations
Third-party content
Our site includes third party content and functionality. This may direct you to a related service, link to another site or supporting documentation. We are not responsible for the accessibility of third-party content or to other sites we link to. This includes:
- Vimeo videos
- YouTube videos
- Google maps
- Open Street maps
- Collaborators maps
We will provide an accessible alternative to any third-party content that isn’t compliant.
Third party platforms
We often create content which is hosted on third party platforms. This includes content we create for social media and videos which we host on YouTube or Vimeo.
We are responsible for ensuring the content we supply meets accessibility requirements; however, we are not responsible for the accessibility of the platform itself.
PDFs and other documents
This site has a number of Word and PDF documents which were published before September 2018. These aren’t essential to the service we provide and won’t be replaced. If you experience any difficulties accessing these documents, please email claire.escherkessler@ndm.ox.ac.uk
Video and audio content
This site has pre-recorded audio and video content that was published before 23 September 2020, which is exempt from the accessibility regulations.
Archived content
This site contains archived content, which is exempt from the accessibility regulations. The archived content is all internal announcements and external news stories published prior to 23 September 2018, but which have not since been updated.