Accessibility statement

This accessibility statement applies to the New College Swindon website [newcollege.ac.uk] as the main website for the college.

This website is run by New College Swindon. We want to ensure that as many people as possible can use our website.

For example, that means you should be able to:

  • 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:

  • PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software.
  • our videos and live video streams do not have captions.
  • missing text alternative for images.
  • YouTube videos that are embedded within the site are not fully accessible to screen reader software.
  • course details content are not semantic.

What to do if you have problems accessing the site

If you need information on this website in a different format then please email marketing@newcollege.ac.uk. We’ll consider your request and get back to you as soon as possible.

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, please email marketing@newcollege.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).

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

New College Swindon 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 non-compliances listed below.

Non-accessible content

The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

Images

Some images do not have a 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 add text alternatives for all images. When we publish new content, we’ll make sure our use of images meets accessibility standards.

Course details

Most of the course details content has incorrect formatting and no consistent page structure.

  • This fails WCAG 2.1 Success Criterion 1.3.1 Info and Relationships
  • This fails WCAG 2.1 Success Criterion 2.4.4 Link Purpose
  • This fails WCAG 2.1 Success Criterion 2.4.6 Headings and Labels

We plan to resolve these issues by ensuring all course details content is semantic and has a clear page structure.

The website also contains a range of different third-party content and functionality. This may direct you to a related service, or partner we work with, where we are not responsible for the accessibility of this content.

Disproportionate burden

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. 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.

Live video

We do not plan to add captions to live video streams because live video is exempt from meeting the accessibility regulations.

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

  • Add video captions to any new videos, remove older videos without captions.
  • Update essential PDF documents.
  • Provide text alternative for all images.
  • Ensure all course details content is formatted correctly and semantic.

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was prepared on Monday 5th October 2020. It was last reviewed on Tuesday 6th October 2020.

This website was last tested on Friday 2nd October 2020. The test was carried out using the WebAIM Wave accessibility tool, as well as manual checks.