Ally: On Demand Training Video

Introduction

Hi I’m Sam Wyman, System Lead with the Digital Education Systems Team here at Leeds. In this video we’ll be demonstrating how to use Ally as an instructor to improve accessibility of your modules and organisations. We’ll also cover how Ally supports your students with Alternative Formats. But first, let’s briefly cover what we mean by Accessibility, and why it’s important in Higher Education.

Accessibility is Inclusivity

When we think of accessibility what first comes to mind may be of more apparent physical disabilities such as vision, hearing or mobility impairments. Accessibility covers a much wider range however, and individual needs can vary greatly even within a single category of disability. Approaching building content with accessibility in mind from the start helps us avoid pitfalls of reworking content with too narrow of a focus or making assumptions of the type and level of support required for someone's disability.

Similarly, learners from marginalised backgrounds can face additional cognitive exclusion where content is designed with only a narrow approach to learning available. Designing accessible content allows for content to be adaptable to different learning styles, language barriers and environmental factors.

Not all students who can benefit from accessible content identify as disabled, and those who do sometimes report feeling singled out by individual adjustments compared to with more universal strategies. Content that is accessible from the start means students can learn how best suits them, without stigma. And this is reflected in student performance.

Why is it important?

• Accessibility Supports All Students
• Not all students disclose
• Not all students can get diagnoses
• Many disabilities are hidden
• Some disabilities are situational
• These benefits aren’t just for declared disabilities

So to summarise, for a range of reasons, accessibility makes sure your modules are their most effective. The less time it takes for students to access our tools and materials, the more time and energy they’ll have in understanding it.

Now I'm sure you're already convinced, but we should also include that it's also a legal requirement

• Public Sector Bodies Accessibility Regulations 2018
• Not just that the University that’s accountable, but you personally.

As a public institution, we have a responsibility to ensure our content is accessible to a baseline standard before there is a student in need. This is where the regulation differs from reasonable adjustments where a more individual solution may be required.

With the variety and complexity of disability, we’ll never have 100% accessibility. Our responsibility is to ensure we’re working towards that accessibility goal: that we’re checking our content, fixing what we can, and informing students of what can’t be fixed or what we’re still working on. For more information on that last part, see our separate guidance on our module templates and the module accessibility statement.

But for identifying and resolving fixable issues, we have Ally.

Introducing Ally

Ally provides two useful utilities: a staff tool for scanning content for accessibility issues with guidance on fixes, and a tool for accessing content in a variety of accessible alternative formats. Ally reports can be accessed for your module as a whole, or with individual content either created in, or uploaded to, Minerva. Let’s jump into our demo organisation and explore further.

Ally is integrated into all our module and organisation spaces in Minerva, and automatically scans content created within Minerva, or files uploaded to the learning space. Based on any issues found, Ally provides each piece of content with a percentage-based accessibility score.

We'll note here that this is an advisory score for improving accessibility, and not used as a performance metric. We all have a responsibility for providing accessible content, and Ally is one tool in getting us there, not the goalpost. Getting your overall score into the green is a great way to get started towards an accessible learning environment, though.

Navigation the Ally Interface

In existing areas, it's best to start with Course Accessibility Report, which provides us with a full overview of our accessibility. This is accessed from the Reading Lists & Tools menu.

Here you are presented with an overall accessibility score based on all your scannable content.

Next up, we have an overall summary of the types of content Ally has found and scanned. With a shortlist of easy-to-fix issues and our lowest-scoring content. These are great starting points if you're not sure where to begin. Finally, we have a list of all issues, broken down by severity: severe, major or minor.

In addition to this overview, staff can also view their accessibility scores for individual items as they're building their module or organisation. Minerva documents scores can be viewed when editing a document section. Clicking on the score indicator will open the Ally interface.

Uploaded files are also scanned. Their scores are shown to staff directly beside the file's title. Clicking the score icon opens the file in the Ally interface.

Understanding Issues and Uploading Fixes via Ally

Now that we know how to navigate through the Ally reporting, we can show the real power of Ally - helping to fix these accessibility issues.

Here we can see the Ally interface offers additional info on the accessibility issues it has found. Explaining the terminology and the benefits to resolving these issues, then showing you the steps needed to fix them. For many issues, this will include step-by-step instructions for fixing the issue within the original file, with more detailed guidance being added regularly. You can then upload your new file all in one place.

From this same interface we can find a list of all the issues identified in the file. In this instance, the file also doesn't have a language set. But, if we have access to the original file and save it with tagging, we'll resolve both issues at once. This can be helpful to see which fixes will have the greatest impact, or finding which you have the time and experience to fix first.

Some issues can be fixed right from the interface without needing to reupload the file, such as with image text descriptions. Here we can see the image in context with the rest of the document, and add a fitting description. Check out the guidance on the Digital Accessibility website on how to write useful alt text, and when it's best to mark an image as decorative.

Another fix we can do right from the interface is to add a library reference. If a document can't be made more accessible, maybe because it's a scanned historical document or there's copyright, we can still guide students to the appropriate resources. This doesn't fix the underlying issue though - so make sure to also mention this in your module accessibility statement. Find useful phrasings for this and other issues ready to be copied and pasted into your statement, again on the Digital Accessibility website.

And that's the power of Ally supporting staff. Remembering we'll never be 100% accessible, what matters is we're

• Checking for issues
• Fixing what we can
• Informing where we can't
• Approachable and adaptable

Ally in the Student View

Before we close this video, we'll take a few more minutes to show one more feature of Ally and how it supports all our users. Earlier in this video you may have caught the Ally "A" icon beside some of the accessibility scores. This "Download Alternative Formats" button is available to all users and allows for Ally to create different formats for users to access their material, including ePub, Braille and text-to-speech audio.

Some students will still have reasonable adjustments where their needs go above and beyond these baseline features, but these ensure a higher level of accessibility regardless of formalised support or diagnosis.

If there's any issues such as copyright where transforming the original file isn't appropriate, Alternative Files can be disabled, but ensure you note this in your module accessibility statement alongside any other unfixed accessibility issues so students are informed in advance and know what to do if they need additional support.

And if *you* have any questions or would like further support, you can reach out to your local School Academic Leads for Inclusive Practice, the Digital Education Enhancement team, or get in touch with me directly. Further resources and contact details can be found in the description.

The Minerva Module Template: top tips for building modules.

The Digital Accessibility website has extensive resources for making teaching content accessible, including on image descriptions and for developing your Module Accessibility Statement.

School Academic Leads for Inclusive Pedagogies (SALIPs) are available to provide disciplinary insight into inclusive practices tailored to your subject area.

The Digital Education Enhancement Team work within Faculties, offering specialist advice on digital technologies in student education, including in digital accessibility.