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How to create an accessibility statement

This self-guided training empowers system owners to assess their digital products and draft compliant accessibility statements. An accessibility statement should clearly outline how a system meets accessibility standards, where it falls short and what is being done to fix it.

  • Time commitment: four hours (approx)
  • Delivery: This training was delivered by accessibility consultant Alistair McNaught in 2024. We have permission to share these recordings internally to help system owners meet their requirements.

To arrange an introduction on assessing systems for accessibility compliance (typically 1.5 hours), please contact Lilian Joy (lilian.joy@york.ac.uk).

Before you begin

Sign in to your University Google account to access the slides and recordings. 

The training references browser plug-ins to help with assessments. For many of these, we are now able to recommend that you instead use:

Keep these personas in mind when procuring, designing or testing systems and process:

Part 1: Legal framework, practical tests and strategic approaches

This session explains how and why we do accessibility testing.

Key topics:

  • The difference between the Equality Act (Disability) and PSBAR (Accessibility).
  • Navigating government audits and managing your findings.
  • How to perform keyboard, magnification, media and navigation tests.

Resources:

Watch the recording (part 1)

Part 2: Communicating with stakeholders

This session focuses on the who and what when drafting the statement.

Key topics:

  • Identifying key stakeholders in the accessibility process.
  • Moving from ‘technically compliant’ to useful.
  • Reviewing best-practice examples.

Resources:

Watch the recording (part 2)

Next steps: drafting your statement

Once you have completed the training and assessed your system, use the resources below to draft and publish your statement.

If you need an accessibility statement because you are planning a new system, you need to follow University processes first.

  • Speak to the Enterprise Architecture team.
    The team will help ensure new systems and services work well with the University’s existing technology, data and processes. 
  • Read the Procuring accessible systems guide.
    If procuring a system, you must ensure it meets all accessibility requirements, as well as having an accessibility statement. Find out what you need to do if you're involved in a procurement process and who can help.

Use the template

Download the template to ensure you include all legally required sections:

Review examples

See examples of published accessibility statements for University services.

Publish the statement

When complete, this statement should be added to a suitable location for users. For example:

  • The system's login screen
  • A web page about the system, eg within the list of Tools, software and services. To request a new web page about the system, use the web request form (select ‘an IT service reference entry’).

Support

For ongoing support, you can consult with other system owners on the #accessibility-statements Slack channel (email digacc-support@york.ac.uk for access).

You can also contact the Digital Accessibility Support team directly (digacc-support@york.ac.uk).