WCAG2.0aa

Introduction to the WCAG2.0aa

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 are commonly regarded as the best technical guidelines for website authors to ensure accessibility in web content.

The WCAG2.0 (pronounced "Web CAG Two Point Oh") guidelines are NOT legally required for Montana K-12 websites. They are a technical guideline provided by the W3C to help website authors ensure accessibility.

For schools that are under review by the Office of Civil Rights, the WCAG2.0aa specifications are used as measurement to guarantee that the district's website is accessible. This is not a legal requirement for districts, but is used as the standard of measure by the OCR in the absence of any specific legal guideline.

Levels of the WCAG2.0

There are three different recommended levels of conformance provided by the WCAG2.0. Each of the different levels provides an increased accessibility standard.

The three levels are:

• WCAG2.0a (the lowest level of conformance)
• WCAG2.0aa
• WCAG2.0aaa (the highest level of conformance)

The WCAG2.0aa standard is the generally-accepted base standard that districts should shoot for and is also the standard that the OCR will use to measure schools that are under review.

Understanding WCAG2.0aa

The WCAG2.0 standard provide a list of 12 guidance standards. The 12 guidance standards are categorized into the four principles of accessibility.

Each of the 12 guidelines has at least the WCAG2.0a level of guidance suggestion. Some of the guidelines have additional guidance levels for WCAG2.0aa and some include additional guidelines for WCAG2.0aaa.

To meet WCAG2.0aa compliance, a website must meet all 12 guidelines at the WCAG2.0aa level. This means meeting at minimum the WCAG2.0a guidance levels if that level of compliance is the only one that exists for a particular guideline. For any guideline that has a WCAG2.0aa compliance level, the website must also meet the WCAG2.0aa guidance levels.

For example:

• The Guidance Standard 1.1 is called "Text Alternatives". This standard has only one substandard (1.1.1) which is designated level WCAG2.0a. For a website to meet all of the guidance standards for WCAG2.0aa, the website must adhere to the substandard 1.1.1 (the only applicable level).
• The Guidance Standard 1.2 is called "Time-based Media". This guidance standard has nine substandards (1.2.1 - 1.2.9). The first three standards are WCAG2.0a levels of compliance (1.2.1 - 1.2.3). The next two are WCAG2.0aa levels of compliance (1.2.4 - 1.2.5). The last four substandards (1.2.6 - 1.2.9) are WCAG2.0aaa levels of compliance. In order to maintain WCAG2.0aa compliance, a website must meet substandards 1.2.1 - 1.2.5, but they would not have to meet substandards 1.2.6 - 1.2.9.