PDFs represent one of the greatest accessibility challenges at Chemeketa. An inaccessible PDF can create severe barriers for people with disabilities – especially those using assistive technologies such as a screen reader or magnifier.
Because PDFs were originally designed for print rather than responsive web formats, PDFs lack native text reflow, forcing low-vision users to scroll horizontally when magnifying text. Assistive technologies like screen readers rely on an underlying tag tree to determine structure and reading order. Untagged, poorly exported, or scanned PDFs render text invisible or disjointed to screen reader users. Additionally, floating text boxes, multi-column layouts, and unformatted graphics frequently disrupt reading order and navigation.
Our current document accessibility score for PDFs in Canvas is only 39%! This is well below the scores for all other formats and less than half of our overall goal of 85%.
With the new Title II deadline only 6 months away, we have some serious work to do. Help us reach our goal of a 60% score (or more) for PDFs by April 2026.
We are asking all faculty and staff to take a look at their PDFs and focus on making them more accessible. Here are a few practical suggestions to help get you started:
- If the document is yours – go back to the original document and make it accessible before you convert it to a PDF.
- If you are using Google Docs or Slides – be sure to use the Grackle Tool to check for accessibility and convert to a PDF. If you are using Office – take advantage of its Built In Accessibility Checker.
- Ask yourself if the document NEEDS to be a PDF – if not, leave it as an Office or Google document – they are generally going to be easier for students to use and can be easily converted to a PDF using the Alternate Formats Feature by the student should they want a PDF.
- If the document is not yours – reach out to the author or publication and request an accessible copy. You can also check with the library to see if they can find a better copy.
- If you can’t find an accessible copy, take advantage of the PDF Max tool in Canvas (it is part of the Panorama Accessibility Checker). It can help fix your document directly in Canvas. It is quick and quite easy to use. However, keep in mind that a natively accessible PDF is always the best option.
- If your PDF is a complex or long document – you may want to take advantage of the Library’s CZUR Book Scanner – it can quickly take your document and turn it into a Word document that is much easier to work with.
By following these guidelines, you will be well on your way to a more accessible course. If we all take a few minutes to work on and evaluate our PDFs, we can easily achieve that 60% accessibility goal.
We appreciate your continuing efforts to ensure that all of our students can access and use our documents – regardless of ability. By creating accessible and usable documents, you are helping to promote student success and inclusion.
Thank you for all of the great work you do to make your materials accessible for all students.