Academic accessibility is important for the inclusion of all learners. Necessary for some but beneficial for all, accessibility provides an ease of use and ensures that learners of all types and abilities are able to access the tools they need for quality education.
ASU offers many resources for accessibility through the Canvas LMS, including the Canvas Accessibility Checker and Ally.
Be sure to view our Accesibility Quick Tips
What is it?
Ally is a tool for improving the accessibility of course documents. It has two main functions:
Ally improves the student experience by providing alternative and accessible formats of uploaded course documents. The accessible versions available will depend on the original document. Students may select the format that best meets their needs. Providing access to course documents in alternative formats is beneficial to all students, regardless of ability.
The goal of Ally is to assist instructors with learning techniques for enhancing the accessibility of course documents. There are no required actions however, the integrated Ally tutorials will provide information and simple steps to take to improve the accessibility of uploaded course materials. Instructors can use these techniques when creating future course content and ensure that these materials are accessible from the start. As subject matter experts, faculty members’ main goal is to communicate concepts and help students achieve learning outcomes. Ally is another available tool to help instructors meet that goal.
Once an instructor uploads a document into a course, Ally performs an automated accessibility evaluation and a small accessibility gauge will appear next to each uploaded document. The gauge indicates the overall accessibility of the document as a percentage.
The indicator is color-coded and uses a gauge to indicate the accessibility score:
Ally then guides faculty and designers through a series of steps designed to remediate the document and improve the overall accessibility.