Canvas Accessibility FAQs

Accessibility of Canvas Course Content

On April 24, 2024, the Department of Justice published a final rule updating the regulations for Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). This rule emphasizes the need for web content to meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1. The rule applies to online course content (including Canvas and all posted materials) created or managed by university staff, faculty, and students working at Western. See more about the Final Rule on Web Accessibility on the Civil Rights and Title IX Compliance site.

When will this rule take effect?

This rule goes into effect two years from the start of the ruling (April 24, 2026). The task of ensuring that online courses meet the current accessibility standards will take time, and we advise early attention to this work.

Why is this important?

Making educational content accessible to all students is the right thing to do and is in alignment with the University mission.  Additionally, inaccessible course content leaves the instructor (and the University) open to official complaints being filed.

Who is responsible?

The final rule applies to Western staff, faculty, or students working in an official university capacity who create or manage online course content. All instructors are responsible for seeing that their course content meets the standards of this ruling.

What is affected?

All course content presented electronically, which includes Canvas:

• Content pages, discussion prompts, assessments, and assignments
• Course reading material (including PDFs, Word documents, or Google documents, or similar)
• Spreadsheet-based content (such as Microsoft Excel documents, Google Sheets, or similar)
• Slide presentations (including Microsoft PowerPoint, Google Slides, or similar)
• Videos (captioning)

What can instructors do to prepare?

A good starting place for instructors is to learn more about some of the issues that lead to inaccessibility. Some of the greatest challenges to accessibility in online courses are improperly created documents (such as PDFs, word-processed documents, slide presentations, and spreadsheets). Additionally, videos without captions or transcripts provide a barrier to accessibility.

For our complete set of instructional support and videos, see: Unlocking Accessibility: Pope Tech Canvas Dashboard (Fall 2025) as well as the Pope Tech Canvas Accessibility Tools page.

For a useful overview for what you can do to ensure your digital content is accessible, watch this recorded session from winter term of 2025:

Here, AJ Barse, WWU Instructional Designer, and Justina Brown, Senior Instructional Designer, share what is entailed in the new federal digital content accessibility mandate prior to the early 2026 effective date. They also cover accessibility basics to help you ensure your digital content is ready.

Recording Link: Countdown to Meeting New Federal Digital Accessibility Rules (33 min)

Slides Link: The Final Countdown...

Once an understanding of the accessibility challenges that may arise in online courses has been obtained, instructors can begin the task of making improvements.

A useful resource from WWU Web Communication Technologies (WebTech) can be found at Preparing sites for the Title II rule on Web Accessibility.

What are some best practices for creating accessible content?

ATUS provides resources and support for ensuring Canvas course accessibility, helping to fulfill the University’s obligation to create accessible online course content for all students. Here are some basic steps to consider:

• Use the built-in accessibility checker in Canvas to identify any issues that need to be fixed.  Additionally, Western licenses the Pope Tech Accessibility Guide in Canvas to assist in identifying and fixing accessibility issues.
• Add course content within Canvas whenever possible, rather than uploading files in PDF, Word, PowerPoint, or other formats.
• Assure that files (such as Word, PowerPoint and PDFs) are properly formatted for accessibility.  For additional information, please refer to this online guide to creating accessible documents.
• Confirm that all videos you are using are close captioned. WWU provides automatic machine captioning for videos through Panopto, but automatic captioning isn't perfect.  Please review your captions and correct any inaccuracies.
• Verify that any external class materials (such as publisher-supplied content) or software add-ons meet accessibility standards.
• When using the rich text editor within Canvas:
  • Headings should be used for structure, not for visual formatting.  By default, the title of the page in Canvas will be tagged as Heading 1.  Therefore, the highest level of headings used within a page should be Heading 2. Deeper levels of sub-headings, if needed, should be Heading 3, Heading  4, etc.  Heading levels should form an outline of the page content.
  • If you add images to a page, be sure to add a brief description of the image in the Alt Text field. The purpose of this is to provide equivalent access to the image content for people who are unable to see the image, e.g. students who are blind or using screen reader software.  For more information, please see the WWU Web Communication Technologies' (WebTech) alt text guidelines.  The WWU Descriptive Alt Text Generator is also a very good resource.
  • After creating any new content using the rich text editor, check it for accessibility using the Check Accessibility feature built into Canvas.
• Make sure that accommodations for extra time on Canvas quizzes has been properly set.  If students require extra time on exams, e.g. a disability accommodation, please refer to:  Once I publish a timed quiz, how can I give my students extra time?

Support 

For additional support with accessibility in Canvas, please contact: CanvasHelp@wwu.edu