Report 2017-102 Recommendation 16 Responses

Report 2017-102: California Community Colleges: The Colleges Reviewed Are Not Adequately Monitoring Services for Technology Accessibility, and Districts and Colleges Should Formalize Procedures for Upgrading Technology (Release Date: December 2017)

Recommendation #16 To: Foothill-De Anza Community College District

To ensure that it promptly addresses any complaints it receives related to web accessibility and alternate media requests, De Anza should follow its new procedures for tracking and reviewing complaints related to accessibility.

Annual Follow-Up Agency Response From October 2022

The college still believes it has provided extensive evidence of its commitment to website accessibility and practices. Again, these are located on our Website Accessibility page at https://www.deanza.edu/communications/web_accessibility. To date, we have still not received an accessibility complaint about our website. Were a web accessibility issue reported, the listed procedure would be followed:

- A record would be created in the online database, the user's report would be acknowledged, and the web administrator would be notified.

- The web administrator would review the complaint and notify the technical support personnel to be attached to the issue.

- Personnel would review the complaint and correct the issue(s) found and test corrected page(s) with accessibility checking tools.

- Notes would be added to the database, and the user who reported the issue would be immediately notified of the correction.

The college considers it a hallmark of its own documented dedication to accessibility that no complaints have been lodged. Once again, should a complaint be registered, it would be immediately acknowledged and addressed as above. We wish to note, respectfully, that it is impossible to respond to an assertion that De Anza's process cannot be assessed if that assessment is predicated solely on the receiving of a complaint. It is the college's goal to ensure that the accessibility of the website continues at the highest possible level, at which no complaints would reasonably arise. Please advise how - with the continued absence of complaints -- we can respond to the item in a manner deemed satisfactory.

California State Auditor's Assessment of Annual Follow-Up Status: Pending

De Anza states that no website accessibility complaints have been received to date. Therefore, we cannot yet assess whether it is following its new procedures for tracking and reviewing complaints related to web accessibility and alternative media requests.

Annual Follow-Up Agency Response From October 2021

The college believes it has provided extensive evidence of its commitment to website accessibility and practices. Again, these are located on our Website Accessibility page at https://www.deanza.edu/communications/web_accessibility. Were a web accessibility issue reported, the listed procedure would be followed: A record would be created in the online database, the user's report would be acknowledged, and the web administrator would be notified. The web administrator would review the complaint and notify the technical support personnel to be attached to the issue. Personnel would review the complaint and correct the issue(s) found and test corrected page(s) with accessibility checking tools. Notes would be added to the database, and the user who reported the issue would be immediately notified of the correction.

The college considers it a hallmark of its own documented dedication to accessibility that no complaints have been lodged. Once again, should a complaint be registered, it would be immediately acknowledged and addressed as above. We wish to note, respectfully, that it is impossible to respond to an assertion that De Anza's process cannot be assessed if that assessment is predicated solely on the receiving of a complaint. It is the college's goal to ensure that the accessibility of the website continues at the highest possible level, at which no complaints would reasonably arise. Please advise how - with the continued absence of complaints -- we can respond to the item in a manner deemed satisfactory.

DSPS implemented a landing page that is accessible to all students for alternative media complaints. The website now includes an alternative media complaint form: https://www.deanza.edu/dsps/dss/alt_media_reportform.html. The Disability Information Student Handbook (DISH) has also been updated and redesigned, with a table of contents added, for a more user-friendly experience: https://www.deanza.edu/dsps/dss/dish_2020_2021/dish_welcome_3column.html

California State Auditor's Assessment of Annual Follow-Up Status: Pending

De Anza states that no website accessibility complaints have been received to date. Therefore, we cannot yet assess whether it is following its new procedures for tracking and reviewing complaints related to web accessibility and alternative media requests.

Annual Follow-Up Agency Response From October 2019

From the Office of Communications:

As noted in previous responses, while website accessibility measures were in place prior to the audit, the De Anza College website has been redesigned and is now more systematically assessed, with the process, results and follow-up formally recorded for regular review and analysis.

The content management system (CMS) for the college's new website, launched May 1, 2018, has been intentionally configured to permit publication of webpage content -- developed by hundreds of decentralized users -- only if it is free of accessibility errors. Web accessibility requirements are presented in all trainings on the content management system (CMS), which approximately 200 faculty and staff members have taken to date. Additional trainings are currently scheduled.

As also noted in previous responses, the website undergoes an automated, monthly accessibility scan using a quality validation tool - RocketValidator, engineered specifically for large websites - with a second tool, tenon.io, utilized as required. The reports are generated, captured and reviewed by the web administrator, who follows up with all appropriate actions and records them in an ongoing, cumulative spreadsheet. According to RocketValidator's published rankings, De Anza College is always at or near the top in accessibility among college and universities nationwide, routinely ranking higher than Yale, Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, Brown, Cornell, Johns Hopkins, UC Berkeley, UC Irvine and UC Santa Barbara, among others. As of this response date, De Anza College remains number one, with an average accessibility error per page of 0.00 (https://rocketvalidator.com/leaderboards/united-states-education).

As with the website accessibility scan reports, any complaint to the web team about an accessibility issue would similarly be noted and promptly attended to, with follow-up recorded. No website accessibility complaints have been received to date.

California State Auditor's Assessment of Annual Follow-Up Status: Pending

De Anza states that no website accessibility complaints have been received to date. Therefore, we cannot yet assess whether it is following its new procedures for tracking and reviewing complaints related to web accessibility and alternative media requests.

60-Day Agency Response

Foothill-De Anza Community College District did not submit a 60-day response for this recommendation.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 60-Day Status: No Action Taken

The district did not submit a response.

6-Month Agency Response

Foothill-De Anza Community College District did not submit a 6-month response for this recommendation.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 6-Month Status: No Action Taken

The district did not submit a response.

1-Year Agency Response

Foothill-De Anza Community College District did not submit a 1-year response for this recommendation.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 1-Year Status: No Action Taken

The district did not submit a response.

All Recommendations in 2017-102

Agency responses received are posted verbatim.