Website accessibility statement

Shrewsbury Colleges Group is committed to providing web pages that are accessible to all users.

The Shrewsbury Colleges Group website aims to meet a minimum of WCAG 2.0 AA compliance in line with the Web Accessibility guidelines (WCAG 2.0) standards.

Documents on our website, such as policies, are being replaced as PDFs in a format that meets accessibility standards.

Please contact the Webmaster if you have any issues with accessing the information on this website or if you wish to provide any feedback.

When websites are designed, developed and edited, all users can have equal access to the sites' information, functionality and benefits. We aim to make our website accessible and usable for people of all abilities and disabilities.

We aim to audit our website every six months and resolve any conflicts that may have arisen since the last audit (January 2020).

August 2020 Audit

After testing the website in July 2020 and auditing any issues arising, the following actions have been taken:

• More informative ALT text has been added to logos and images on the website to help visitors who use screen readers
• All logos and illustrations have been replaced with Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) versions which are more accessible to a wider group of users, including users with low vision, colour blindness and users of assistive technologies
• All pages have been updated to provide enough contrast between text colour and its background making the website more accessible to people with low contrast sensitivity and colour blindness
• Word and PDF documents that do not work well with assistive technologies are now being published in HTML format wherever possible so that our documents can use the custom browser settings of our visitors

March 2021 Audit

Since the August 2020 audit we have continues to improve the accessibility of the website and after auditing any issues arising, the following actions have been taken:

• All page templates have been run through the AXE automated testing tool recommended by the Government Digital Service’s (GDS), with all Critical, Serious, Moderate and Minor issues resolved.
• Removal of automatic carousel movement to make banners easier to navigate via a keyboard
• An HTML HE course specification template has been produced to replace the existing PDF documents
• Where possible, online forms have been created to replaced Word and PDF forms

Accessibility issues that we are unable to resolve

Some third-party content fails accessibility tests and as it is not part of the SCG system, we are unable to resolve the issues.

Embedded YouTube videos
Website landmarks help to organise the various types of content on a page for users of assistive technologies. There is currently no method of adding landmarks to embedded YouTube videos.

Embedded Google Maps
Embedded Google Maps are not screen-reader accessible so we have used code to hide them from screen readers and included a more accessible link to our campuses on Google Maps.

Many people use assistive technologies to allow them to view websites in easier-to-read colours, larger fonts or as spoken text. They can also help to navigate around a site using the keyboard only.

The following items have been prioritised to assist with consistency and accessibility:

• Consistent Shrewsbury Colleges Group Header and Footer navigation
• Navigation - Website navigation is coded as lists to ensure that all menu navigation can be read by screen readers.
• Heading elements (H1, H2, H3) etc. are used throughout the website.
• Images - All images are coded to use an ALT attribute. Blank alt attributes are used for decorative images such as bulleted-list images, spacer images, etc.
• Font-sizing and Stylesheets - Content and presentation are separate with presentation being controlled by Stylesheets. The default font is set to a sans-serif for main webpage content and fonts can be resized in each browser (see table below for detailed instructions).
• Forms - All forms are coded where labels are explicitly linked to relevant input field

This website can be customised to suit your own needs and preferences by changing basic appearance settings in the following browsers:

Additional Learning Support

To find out the range of support options available to our students please visit the Additional Learning Support section of the website.