At a large university, managing accessibility isn’t a one-time project. It’s an ongoing commitment, and since Carleton is a Canadian university, we’ve got the will to meet that commitment.
We also have hundreds of websites and even more content editors. So the real challenge is maintaining consistency over time: editors change roles. Sites change owners. Tools change. And through it all, the responsibility to meet accessibility standards remains.
In Canada, accessibility is more than a recommendation. It’s both a legal requirement and a cultural expectation. Clear guidelines like WCAG do help—but keeping every site compliant takes more than checklists. So we invest a lot of energy in education, support, and a shared understanding across both technical and non-technical teams.
One thing we don’t do: tack accessibility on at the end. We do work every day on building a culture where accessibility is how we work — where everyone, from developers to content editors, understands the why behind the requirements and feels equipped to meet them.
Which means we build processes that keep accessibility top of mind. And as we do, we create better digital spaces, not just for compliance, but for real people with real needs.
The Three Pillars of Accessible Web Projects
Accessibility lives across the entire lifecycle of a web project—and across its three interconnected pillars: design, development, and content. Overlooking any one of them can often make accessibility falter.
Design: Start with Inclusive Thinking
Design decisions lay the foundation for accessibility. Baking inclusive practices into the visual language, from colour contrast to interaction patterns, is the fastest and very least expensive time to do it. And it makes those practices a standard part of the user experience—not a big deal, not a discussion, not a special thing for a special group. It’s just there.
Like any big brand, a university reuses most of its designs across departments. That’s where building a strong design system helps everyone get it right, upstream and downstream, and gives us a formal place to document those early decisions that account for accessibility from the start. Then, moving forward, everyone can see the results: keyboard focus states are visible. Typography is legible. And layouts adapt across devices and screen sizes.
Accessible design isn’t just about meeting standards, it’s about anticipating a wide range of users and building with empathy.
Development: Code That Communicates
Development brings design to life, but it also adds meaning. Semantic HTML, appropriate ARIA use, and consistent markup help assistive technologies deliver content that means the same thing to everyone.
Lots of people think of accessibility mostly in terms of development, and mostly in terms of WCAG compliance. But accessible development means more than checking boxes. It means making every reusable component work predictably. Supporting keyboard navigation by default. And making sure dynamic content and error messages tell users exactly what to do next.
And if scaling all that across hundreds of sites sounds like a lot in a distributed environment, here’s our secret sauce: shared themes and libraries.
Content: Everyday Accessibility
And then there’s content. In a university, content is constantly changing hands. Staff turnover, student contributors, and departmental transitions all make it difficult to maintain consistent standards.
That’s why we teach that accessible content must be simple and repeatable. Clear headings, meaningful link text, descriptive alt text, and plain language are the tools of communication. (And communication is the goal. Not intimidation. Not obfuscation.) We aim to offer tools and training that demystify these practices and integrate them into everyday publishing.
When an editor understands why something matters, not just how to do it, accessibility becomes second nature, not just another checkbox.
Looking Ahead: Evolving with Purpose
Accessibility continues to move forward; it’s never one-and-done. Standards evolve, tools change, and user needs will forever shift. Which means accessibility needs to become a mindset, grounded in empathy, adaptability, and universal responsibility.
For educational institutions across Canada, that means keeping on keeping on: investing in education, improving systems, and listening to the people who use our websites. It means recognizing that accessibility is more than compliance: it’s about care, inclusion, and building digital campuses that work for everyone.
Leave a Reply