PDF Accessibility for Universities & Colleges

Accessibility Obligations for Higher Education Institutions

Public universities and colleges across the EU face binding accessibility requirements under the Web Accessibility Directive (2016/2102), which came into effect for existing content in September 2020. This directive mandates that all digital content published by public sector bodies—including educational institutions—must conform to EN 301 549, the European accessibility standard that references WCAG 2.1 AA.

For higher education, this means every PDF document published on university websites, learning management systems, or student portals must be accessible. Course syllabi shared via Blackboard or Moodle, research papers in institutional repositories, examination papers, and student handbooks all fall within scope.

Private universities are not exempt. While the Web Accessibility Directive primarily targets public institutions, the European Accessibility Act (effective June 28, 2025) extends accessibility requirements to private sector services including e-learning platforms. Universities offering online courses or digital learning resources must ensure accessibility regardless of their public/private status.

Beyond EU regulations, many countries have national legislation reinforcing these requirements. The UK's Public Sector Bodies Accessibility Regulations, similar national implementations across EU member states, and disability discrimination laws all create legal exposure for universities with inaccessible materials.

Common Accessibility Failures in Educational Documents

Educational institutions face unique accessibility challenges due to the diversity of document types, the volume of materials produced, and faculty who create content without accessibility training.

Lecture Slides and Presentations PowerPoint and PDF slides frequently lack proper reading order, making them incomprehensible when linearized for screen readers. Images—diagrams, charts, photographs—often have no alternative text. Slide content relies on visual layout rather than semantic structure, meaning screen readers announce disconnected fragments instead of coherent information.

Course Syllabi and Handbooks Syllabi created in Word and exported to PDF often lose their accessibility features. Heading structure may appear visually correct but lack proper tags. Tables listing course schedules, grading criteria, or reading lists frequently have no header cell markup, making them difficult to navigate with assistive technology.

Research Papers and Academic Publications Mathematical formulas, scientific notation, and complex figures present significant accessibility barriers. Equations as images without text alternatives are completely inaccessible. Multi-column layouts common in academic papers create reading order problems. References and footnotes often lack proper structure.

Examination Papers Exam papers face all the above issues plus time-sensitivity concerns. Students using screen readers may need additional time simply to navigate poorly structured documents. Form fields for answers may be inaccessible or have no labels.

Document-Specific Accessibility Challenges in Higher Education

Different document types in higher education present distinct accessibility challenges requiring tailored remediation approaches.

STEM Materials Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics content is particularly challenging. Mathematical equations require MathML markup or equivalent accessible representation—images of equations are not sufficient. Chemical structures, circuit diagrams, and scientific graphs need detailed alternative text that conveys the same information as the visual. LaTeX-generated PDFs often have severe accessibility issues including broken Unicode mapping.

Historical and Archival Documents Universities maintaining digital archives face the challenge of scanned historical documents that are essentially images. These require optical character recognition (OCR) with manual verification, proper tagging of the resulting text, and consideration of whether original visual layout should be preserved or linearized for accessibility.

Multimedia and Interactive Content Lecture recordings, video tutorials, and interactive simulations require captions, transcripts, and audio descriptions. PDF documents embedding video or interactive elements must ensure those elements are also accessible or provide accessible alternatives.

Multilingual Materials Universities serving international students often publish materials in multiple languages. Each language version must be independently accessible, with proper language tags so screen readers pronounce text correctly. Documents mixing languages must mark language changes inline.

Implementing Document Accessibility Across Your Institution

Achieving comprehensive document accessibility in higher education requires systematic institutional change, not just one-time remediation.

Phase 1: Immediate Compliance Identify documents that must be accessible immediately—materials for students with current accommodation requests, high-enrollment course syllabi, and public-facing documents. EqualXS can remediate these priority documents while you develop longer-term processes. For examination papers, establish a workflow that ensures accessible versions are ready before exam dates.

Phase 2: Faculty Training The only sustainable approach is ensuring faculty create accessible documents from the start. We provide training covering: accessible Word and PowerPoint creation, proper PDF export settings, alternative text writing for academic content, and accessible LaTeX workflows for STEM faculty. Training should be integrated into existing faculty development programs.

Phase 3: Template Development Create accessible templates for common document types—syllabi, assignment sheets, examination papers. When faculty start from accessible templates, they're more likely to produce accessible final documents. Include accessibility checkers in document approval workflows.

Phase 4: Repository Remediation Address legacy documents in institutional repositories and learning management systems. Prioritize by usage data—remediate frequently accessed documents first. For historical archives, consider whether full accessibility is required or whether accessible summaries/alternatives are appropriate.

Phase 5: Ongoing Monitoring Establish processes for monitoring accessibility of new publications, responding to student accessibility requests, and maintaining your public accessibility statement as required by the Web Accessibility Directive.