Accessibility
Accessibility statement for the University of Edinburgh, School of Biological Sciences websites
This accessibility statement applies to websites in the domain "bio.ed.ac.uk"
This website is run by the University of Edinburgh, School of Biological Sciences. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:
- change colours, contrast levels and fonts
- zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen
- navigate most of the website using just a keyboard
- navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
- 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.
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
AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.
How accessible this website is
We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible:
- some parts may not be fully compatible with screen readers
- you may not be able to access all content by using the keyboard alone
- not all media will have a transcript or be subtitled
- not all images will have alternative text
- some text may not reflow in a single column when you change the size of the browser window and at certain levels of magnification
- some older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software
Feedback and contact information
If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille:
- email Biology.Web@ed.ac.uk
We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 10 working days.
Reporting accessibility problems with this website
We’re 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, contact:
We’ll respond as soon as possible, but this will be no more than 10 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:
contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).
Contacting us by phone or visiting us in person
British Sign Language service
contactSCOTLAND-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 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
contactSCOTLAND-BSL service details
Technical information about this website’s accessibility
The University of Edinburgh, School of Biological Sciences is committed to making its website 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 version 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1
Non-accessible content
The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.
Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations
- Not all images have appropriate alternative text
- Not all link text makes sense when read on its own (for example, ‘click here’).
- Not all our PDFs and Word documents meet accessibility standards.
- Not all prerecorded audio-only or video-only media will have alternative media that presents equivalent information e.g. audio track with description of the action in a video with no sound
- Not all video will have subtitles or subtitles that identify all speakers as well as noting other significant sounds e.g. laughter
- Most tooltips disappear as soon as the cursor moves. Also tooltips are not always present for all icons and images.
- There may not be sufficient colour contrast between font and background colours especially where the text size is very small.
- Visual information to identify user interface components, such as keyboard focus, do not always have a sufficient contrast ratio
- It is not possible to use a keyboard to access all the content
- Information is conveyed as an image of text rather than as text itself so that it's not compatible with screen readers and other assistive technology
- There are some occurrences of badly formatted links either with text that is not descriptive enough e.g., click here or have the full web address e.g., https://www. rather than formatted link text. There are also some examples of inline links which are not distinguishable enough from surrounding text. We are currently working to eliminate these link issues as part of our content migration.
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.
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
PDFs and other documents
Some of our PDFs and Word documents are essential to providing our services. For example, we have PDFs with information on how users can access our services, and forms published as Word documents. By September 2020, we plan to either fix these or replace them with accessible HTML pages.
The accessibility regulations do not require us to fix PDFs or other documents published before September 2018 if they’re not essential to providing our services. For example, we do not plan to fix PDFs of Research papers published before 23rd September 2018.
Any new PDFs or Word documents we publish will meet accessibility standards.
Archived websites
Our archived websites are not needed for services our organisation provides, and they are not updated.
What we’re doing to improve Accessibility
Measures from the University of Edinburgh which support the improvement of Accessibility within the School of Biological Sciences:
- A project is underway to move all content into a new Content Management System. All content will be moved to the new platform by March 2023. During this time we plan to fix many of our current accessibility issues.
- A project is underway to replace the Degree Finder. All content will be moved to a new platform. During this move we plan to fix many of the current accessibility issues.
- A project is underway to replace our design framework with a more comprehensive design framework. During this work we plan to fix many of the current accessibility issues.
- A regular monthly central website audit using an automated service, followed by manual prioritisation of issues with key user journeys
- A full University web estate audit to assess issues with site accessibility, security and data protection. This has led to over 200 sites being decommissioned since December 2018.
- Publishing a University web strategy and governance approach
- A project is currently in place to upgrade the software that runs the University website. During this process accessibility will be one of overarching principles and priorities. Some existing accessibility issues were resolved during this development work.
- Support, guidance and training process in place for all University staff to increase awareness of accessibility and what our responsibilities are.
- From May 2020 onwards we are running a series of workshops and campaigns to highlight the importance of Word and PDF accessibility and train users in how to audit and then improve the accessibility of these documents.
- Project in 2019 - 2020 to create a website design and development framework for the University where accessibility will be a priority.
In addition to the above measure, The School of Biological Sciences:
- Is migrating all content to a new, more accessible Content Management System. All content will be moved to the new platform by November 2023. During this time we will endeavour to fix current accessibility issues.
- Uses a quality assurance application to identify non-accessible content and inform content editors of the requirement to change these. There will be occasions, however, when these changes have not yet been made.
- Will create a web governance committee to provide guidance and training for content editors to ensure further compliance with accessibility standards.
Preparation of this accessibility statement
This statement was prepared on 19th August 2021. It was last reviewed on 3rd June 2022.
This website was last tested in May 2022. The test was carried out by the School of Biological Sciences website review team.
We used this approach to deciding on a sample of pages to test:
