"Dreams unlocked" by glancs is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. 

Accessibility in Digital Environments

Halah Mohammed

Before and throughout the  Covid-19 pandemic (ongoing), I have been wondering about accessibility in terms of food deserts, wifi and tech access, cost and financial barriers to  necessities and leisure activities, and how they relate to or are in discussion with the trend to digitize these facets of livelihood.  Learning about WCAG 2.1 , actionable and evaluative guidelines and standards for how to make content online more accessible to a wider range of people with disabilities and the  comformances  associated with it,  further amplified my motivation to look into that potential relatedness. Additionally, learning about POUR, an acronym for the four principles of WCAG which are perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust,  made me think more deeply about how to evaluate and construct online versions of life’s necessities and other experiences. 

Below I use the principles of  WCAG 2.1, POUR, and the accessibility evaluation tool WAVE–powered by WebAim–to evaluate the accessibility of the websites for a grocery store and museum in Colorado. 

Sprouts Farmers Market 

Sprouts, as it is colloquially known, is a grocery store chain in Colorado that serves local and organic produce, food, and  home and body supplies. It typically runs weekly discounts and happens to be one of the nearest grocery stores to my home in Colorado. Note, there are three grocery stores near that home and each of them are on average a 15 minute drive from it, making my neighborhood essentially a food desert. Throughout the pandemic I used Sprout’s website to review their inventory before submitting a grocery order through Instacart. I was curious about how accessible their website is according to WCAG, POUR, and WAVE, so I evaluated Sprout’s website for accessibility using those guidelines, principles and tools. Below is an image of the summary findings from WAVE. 

As the picture depicts, WAVE identified a slew of errors. I will highlight two. 

1. One of the four errors with the red box with white “x” symbol. One of those errors is an empty heading associated with a button,  which means the button does not have any content associated with it. The lack of a header for this button is an issue because people who use assistive technology to read screens may not perceive  a button is there or understand what the button  is for without a heading. 

2. One of the twelve contrast errors--two circles with one outlined in red and the other filled in with red-- refers to a low contrast between text and background colors for a label on the screen. This causes an issue for people with low vision or sight acuity. My takeaway from this shallow review is that the Sprouts website could improve its accessibility in a  myriad of areas especially with regard to perception, operability, and understandability. In general, readability and transparency increase accessibility for all so it is important that they are present, capitalized on, and utilized in the construction of online content. 

MCA Denver 

The MCA Denver (MCAD) is one of my favorite museums to visit in Denver because I value art, especially contemporary pieces because they tend to synthesize, bring attention to, and illustratively showcase current threads of ideas and happenings across the world. I tend to review their website for news about the latest installations, concert series updates, and much more. I know that structurally it is built to accommodate a few modes of traveling and navigating the space such as large elevators and wide staircases with railings. But, I was curious about how accessible their online website is too, so I again used WCAG2.1, POUR, and WAVE to evaluate the accessibility of MCAD’s website. Below is a picture of the summary of my findings from WAVE. 

As the picture shows, WAVE noticed a number of errors especially with contrast and alerts. The former is most surprising because the MCAD deals with art so I assumed the contrast presented in the MCAD online site would be prioritized. 

1. One of the contrast errors refers to part of a header  “Upcoming Events.” This particular contrast error is problematic because again people with low sight or acuity would have difficulty understanding this part of the header, which is attempting to educate and invite people to come to or access the MCAD. 

2. One of the alerts, indicated by a mustard yellow triangle with an exclamation point in white text color, refers to an issue with alternative text. It appears to be insufficient and full of extraneous details. I reviewed the four lined text and I agree. Alternative text should be programmatic in that assistive technologies can read them and should be concise, relaying the most important information for the reader. My takeaway is that the MCAD’s website could improve its accessibility in a number of ways, including editing the contrast for many parts of the page and the text for alternative text for images and other graphics to increase perception and understanding.