Accessibility statement for Short Courses
Website accessibility statement in line with Public Sector Body (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018
This accessibility statement applies to shortcourses.ed.ac.uk
This website is run by Digital Learning Applications and Media at the University of Edinburgh. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:
- Change most of the colours and contrast levels
- Navigate the site without experiencing time limits
- Magnify content with reflow to 400%
- Navigate the site without encountering flashing, moving or scrolling text
- Listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver)
We've also made the website text as simple as possible to understand. However, some of our content is technical, and we use technical terms where there is no easier wording we could use without changing what the text means.
Customising the website
AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability. This is an external site with suggestions to make your computer more accessible:
AbilityNet - My Computer My Way
With a few simple steps you can customise the appearance of our website using your browser settings to make it easier to read and navigate:
Additional information on how to customise our website appearance
If you are a member of University staff or a student, you can use the free SensusAccess accessible document conversion service:
How accessible this website is
We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:
- There are some site objects where colour contrast could be improved
- Some links open new tabs or browser windows without warning
- Not all content can be reached by keyboard
- Colour is used as a sole means of conveying information
- Not all videos have human corrected captions and transcripts
- Not all video content has audio descriptions
- Not all non-text content has appropriate alt text
- The site is not fully compatible with assistive software such as screen reading and voice recognition software
Feedback and contact information
If you need information on this website in a different format, including accessible PDF, large print, audio recording or braille:
- Email: AccessibilitySCP@ed.ac.uk
- Telephone: 0131 651 5151
- British Sign Language (BSL) users can contact us via Contact Scotland BSL, the on-line BSL interpreting service.
We'll consider your request and get back to you in 5 working days.
Reporting accessibility problems with this website
We are always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page, or think we're not meeting accessibility requirements, please contact:
- Email: AccessibilitySCP@ed.ac.uk
- Telephone: 0131 651 5151
- British Sign Language (BSL) users can contact us via Contact Scotland BSL, the on-line BSL interpreting service.
We'll consider your request and get back to you in 5 working days.
Enforcement procedure
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the 'accessibility regulations'). If you're not happy with how we respond to your complaint please contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS) directly:
Contact details for the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS)
The government has produced information on how to report accessibility issues:
Reporting an accessibility problem on a public sector website
Contacting us by phone using British Sign Language
British Sign Language service
Contact Scotland BSL runs a service for British Sign Language users and all of Scotland's public bodies using video relay. This enables sign language users to contact public bodies and vice versa. The service operates from 8.00am to 12.00am, 7 days a week.
Technical information about this website's accessibility
The University of Edinburgh is committed to making its websites and applications accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.
Compliance Status
This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.
The full guidelines are available at:
Non accessible content
The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.
Noncompliance with the accessibility regulations
The following items to not comply with the WCAG 2.2 AA success criteria:
- Not all non-text items have appropriate alternative text
- Not all non-text items have appropriate alternative text
- Videos presented on the site may lack human corrected captions
- Videos presented on the website may lack audio description
- Information, structure, and relationships conveyed through presentation cannot always be programmatically determined or are available in text
- Some links on the site are missing a permanent underline and therefore indicated through colour only
- There may not be sufficient colour contrast between font and background colours, especially where the text size is small
- Visual information to identify user interface components, such as keyboard focus, do not always have a sufficient contrast ratio
- Some elements cannot be operated via keyboard
- Some linked content leading to external web pages are only marked visually by an icon without offering an audio alert for keyboard users
- There are missing Form Labels on the site relating to filter operations.
- The website is not fully compatible with assistive software, such as screen readers and voice recognition software (e.g. there are broken ARIA labels and not all ARIA attributes conform to valid values)
We aim to improve our websites accessibility on a regular and continuous basis. See the section below ('What we're doing to improve accessibility') on how we are improving our site accessibility.
We are working towards solving these problems and expect several improvements by January 2027. The site is fully within our control.
Disproportionate burden
We are not currently claiming that any accessibility problems would be a disproportionate burden to fix.
Content that's not within the scope of the accessibility regulations
At this time we believe no content is outwith the scope of the accessibility regulations.
What we're doing to improve accessibility
We will continue to address and make adequate improvements to the accessibility issues highlighted. Unless specified otherwise, a complete solution or significant improvement will be in place by January 2027, as part of ongoing review and release cycles are scheduled for maintaining and building out the site for content under our control. Where items are outwith our control we will work with our supplier to seek resolution
- Course information pages offer course images with the ALT text “Course image” as a way to clarify the user journey on the site where images show prominently in the user navigation. We are working with our vendor to find a way to improve the ability to set ALT text or to revert back to declaring images as decorative. The issues we have highlighted to fix in the next few releases are:
- Videos presented on the site may lack human corrected captions. We continue to support and educate course teams in checking their resources before publication
- Videos presented on the site may lack human corrected captions; there is no dedicated audio description. This is available to users on request through the Contact Us support channel.
- Automated testing revealed a broken ARIA attribute as well as a number of errors for ARIA attributes.
- Some links on the site are indicated through colour only and are missing a persistent underline with the underline only appearing when in focus.
While we are in the process of resolving these accessibility issues we will ensure reasonable adjustments are in place to make sure no user is disadvantaged. As changes are made, we will continue to review accessibility and retest the accessibility of this website.
Preparation of this accessibility statement
This statement was prepared on 10th December 2024. It was last reviewed on 13th February 2026.
The website was last tested on 20th November 2025. The testing was carried out by the Digital Learning Applications and Media Team at the University of Edinburgh using both automated and manual methods. The site was tested on a PC, primarily using Microsoft Edge alongside Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome.
Recent world-wide usage levels survey for different screen readers and browsers shows that Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Edge are increasing in popularity and Google Chrome is now the favoured browser for screen readers:
WebAIM: Screen Reader User Survey
The aforementioned three browsers have been used in certain questions for reasons of breadth and variety.
We ran automated testing using WAVE WebAIM and AXE and then manual testing that included:
- Spell check functionality;
- Scaling using different resolutions and reflow;
- Options to customise the interface (magnification, font, background colour, etc);
- Keyboard navigation and keyboard traps;
- Data validation;
- Warning of links opening in new tab or window;
- Information conveyed in the colour or sound only;
- Flashing, moving or scrolling text;
- Operability if JavaScript is disabled;
- Use with screen reading software (for example JAWS);
- Assistive software (TextHelp Read and Write, Windows Magnifier, ZoomText, Dragon Naturally Speaking, TalkBack and VoiceOver);
- Tooltips and text alternatives for any non-text content;
- Time limits;
- Compatibility with mobile accessibility functionality (Android and iOS).
Change Log
All issues highlighted in this statement have been raised and work is underway to resolve each item. This log reflects any items that have since been closed off as resolved following successful re-testing.
- A coding element was picked up as alternative text object which was not an object on the site. This issue was resolved March 2025.
- Automated testing revealed a misplaced form label relating to the general search bar. This was fixed May 2025.
- Minimum Non-Text Colour Contrast not met in the styling for keyboard focus (2.04:1) in some areas. This was fixed March 2025.
- 1.4.11 Non-text Contrast – Level AA (partially resolved)
- Skip to Main Content was made available in January 2025.
- Automated testing revealed a missing Form Label on the site. This issue was fixed March 2025.
- Keyboard navigation focus is not persistently visible in some areas of the site navigation. This issue was resolved January 2025.
- Some linked content diverts the user to an external site without offering a notification. This issue received a workaround through adding visuals to identify links that divert to another browser page since February 2025.
- 3.2.2 On Input – Level A (partially resolved)
- Some improvements to customisation options (colour, font and browser responsivity) have been brought to the site in March 2025.
- 1.4.8 Visual Presentation – Level AAA (partially resolved)
- Reflow posed a problem in some advertised courses hosted by the University of Edinburgh. A redesign undertaken and implemented in October 2025 resolved this issue.
- Minimum Non-Text Colour Contrast not met in the styling for keyboard focus (2.04:1) in some areas. This issue received a fix January 2025.