The University of Michigan has released new guidance to support digital accessibility and compliance with the latest federal requirements across all university campuses and Michigan Medicine.
Updates to Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act clarify requirements for all large public universities to proactively deliver digital content and applications — including websites, course materials, videos, documents and social media posts — in formats that meet recognized accessibility standards by April 24, 2026.
MORE INFORMATION
Among the new U-M resources are updated guides for creating accessible content, including documents, presentations, spreadsheets and PDFs; course accessibility expectations for instructors for spring 2026 and beyond; and a step-by-step compliance roadmap for meeting the upcoming ADA requirements for faculty, staff and campus units.
“Providing an accessible digital campus experience is central to our mission of serving the public through excellence in research, teaching and medical care,” said Ravi Pendse, vice president for information technology and chief information officer, and Tami Strickman, executive director of the Equity, Civil Rights and Title IX Office, in a message to faculty and staff on the Ann Arbor campus and Michigan Medicine.
“Over the next several months, we will continue to expand and share resources, offer training, and provide support to help the university fulfill its digital accessibility responsibilities and create inclusive experiences for everyone.”
In January, the university announced the Digital Accessibility Strategic Initiative, a partnership between Information and Technology Services and the Disability Equity Office, a team within ECRT, to support digital accessibility at the university.
The Digital Accessibility website has since been a hub for information, tools and resources to assist campus with creating and maintaining accessible materials.
In addition, a network of approximately 100 digital accessibility liaisons representing schools and colleges across the Ann Arbor, Dearborn and Flint campuses was established to advance and coordinate work at the unit level.
In their campus message, Pendse and Strickman encouraged faculty and staff to make content accessible, explore available guidance and resources, attend training sessions and reach out for assistance.
Make content accessible
Following the guiding framework of “create, fix, remove,” individuals are encouraged to use available accessibility best practices, checklists and tools to create accessible content from the start, fix inaccessible content or remove inaccessible content that is no longer needed. They are also encouraged to use core accessibility concepts in materials, such as heading structures, lists for ordering points, alt text for images, captions on videos and proper color contrast.
Course accessibility expectations
Guidance for instructors outlines steps for making course content accessible in accordance with digital accessibility obligations in university policy and federal regulations. Instructors should also prioritize materials with the greatest impact and reach, such as syllabi, slide decks and Canvas page content.
Roadmap
The Digital Accessibility Compliance Roadmap is an in-depth tool to assist individuals and departments with meeting ADA compliance requirements. Organized into nine digital content areas — including websites, course content and documents — the roadmap provides guidance across four key action areas:
- Learn about best practices via training modules and articles.
- Review assets for use and accessibility with help from inventory templates, scanning tools and checklists.
- Remediate inaccessible assets with a prioritized approach and workflow options to match your needs.
- Monitor and improve progress to establish a sustainable workflow that integrates your accessibility practices.
Tools and training
In addition to built-in accessibility tools and checkers, several U-M tools are available to assist the community, including:
- Grackle, an accessibility checker for Google Docs, Sheets and Slides.
- Panorama, a tool in Canvas to find, fix and improve digital accessibility of course content.
- Siteimprove, a platform for scanning and managing the accessibility of U-M websites.
The teams will also host a variety of training sessions and open office hours to assist units with adhering to digital accessibility requirements.
“We are committed to supporting our community in meeting the federal accessibility requirements,” Pendse said. “We look forward to working together to create digital experiences that welcome and include everyone.”
Silke-Maria Weineck
92% of the faculty senate (which represents tenure track, LEO, and clinical faculty along with librarians, curators, and others) just voted for a motion requesting that “the University rapidly deploy sufficient resources toward implementing and making available tools and processes that would relieve the faculty of this additional workload and achieve the goals that we all support.” It is disheartening to see a response that does not shift the workload to trained experts. One IT expert estimated that it takes about 150 hours to make a canvas site compliant. Many of our lecturers teach three different classes a term.
I wonder who will be liable for non-compliance — individual faculty or the university?
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xR1U_C6Vb6XqN_WEMKFm7FpfHYrKd9tx/edit