Accessibility Statement
This accessibility statement applies to www.thedeafacademy.ac.uk
This website is run by the Deaf Academy. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:
- change and invert colours, contrast levels and fonts
- zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
- navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
- navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
- listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver)
We’ve also made the website text as simple as possible to understand.
AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.
How accessible this website is
We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:
- you cannot modify the line height or spacing of text
- most older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software
- some of our online forms may be difficult to navigate using just a keyboard
Feedback and contact information
If you need information on this website in a different format:
Phone: 01395 203130
BSL users, text only to: 07398248306
reception@thedeafacademy.ac.uk
We’ll consider your request and get back to you in five days.
If you cannot view the map on our ‘contact us’ page, call or email us www.thedeafacademy.ac.uk/contact-us/ for directions.
Reporting accessibility problems with this website
We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, email: marketing@thedeafacademy.ac.uk
Enforcement procedure
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).
Contacting us by phone or visiting us in person
We provide a text relay service for people who are D/deaf, hearing impaired or have a speech impediment.
Find out how to contact us www.thedeafacademy.ac.uk/contact-us
Technical information about this website’s accessibility
the Deaf Academy is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.
Compliance status
This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to areas listed below.
Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations
Some images do not have a relevant text alternative, so people using a screen reader cannot access the information. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.1.1 (non-text content).
We plan to review images and add text alternatives to relevant images by September 2023. When we publish new content we’ll make sure our use of images meets accessibility standards.
Disproportionate burden
Navigation and accessing information
It’s not possible for users to change text size without some of the content overlapping.
Interactive tools and transactions
Some of our interactive forms are difficult to navigate using a keyboard. For example, because some form controls are missing a ‘label’ tag.
We’ve assessed the cost of fixing the issues with navigation and accessing information, and with interactive tools and transactions. We believe that doing so now would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations. We will make another assessment in the near future to see if this is possible.
Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations
PDFs and other documents
Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services, and forms published as Word documents. By September 2023, we plan to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.
The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before 23 September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services.
Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.
What we’re doing to improve accessibility
We are constantly observing and adapting our processes to ensure that our website is as accessible as possible.
Preparation of this accessibility statement
This statement was prepared on 1 October 2022. It was last reviewed on 1 October 2022.
This website was last tested on 30 September 2022. The test was carried out using Silktide. We decided to test a sample of 100 pages to core pages and a selection of internal pages with varying layouts.