Contents

Accessibility statement for North Kent College (www.northkent.ac.uk)
Contacting us by phone or visiting us in person
Technical information about this website’s accessibility
Non-accessible content
How do we test this website?
What we’re doing to improve accessibility

1. Accessibility statement for North Kent College

We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website and to be able to find, read and understand the content.

Using this website you should be able to:

  • change colours, contrast levels and fonts
  • zoom in up to 500% 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 aim to make the website text as simple as possible to understand.
Please note, AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.

How accessible is this website?

We are aware some parts of this website aren’t fully accessible:

  • you cannot easily skip to the main content when using a screen reader
  • some web pages may have colour or contrast issues
  • some images and are missing alt text but we are currently working on this
  • the main menu items do not highlight on focus when navigating by keyboard
  • links within the main content are only identified by colour and do not have ARIA labels to identify the purpose
  • some links do not have a discernible name

What should you do if you can't access or are having difficulty using this website?

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. So, if you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, please get in touch. It will really help us if you can be specific and detailed in your comments when you do.
Tel: 01322 629400
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

We’ll consider your request and get back to you within 48 hours (working days only).
Please let us know if you need information on this website in a different format, for example: accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille

2. Contacting us by phone or visiting us in person

If you are visiting North Kent College website and can’t view the map on our contact us page, please call or email us for directions.
Tel: 01322 629400
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Complaints

If you are unhappy with the response you receive having contacted us using the details above, you can make a formal complaint to us using North Kent College’s procedure for Feedback and Complaints.

Enforcement procedure

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the accessibility regulations. If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

3. Technical information about this website's accessibility

North Kent College is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018.
This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances listed below.

4. Non-accessible content

We have contracted the support of Blackboard Ally to fix non-accessible elements and pages wherever possible. The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons.

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations

Some images do not have a text alternative, so people using a screen reader cannot access the information. This fails WCAG 2.1 success criterion 1.1.1 (non-text content).
We plan to add text alternatives for all images by July 2021 as this is a work in progress. When we publish new content we’ll make sure our use of images meets accessibility standards.

Issues with technology

The vast majority of our website works correctly on any web technology – see the list of the web browsers we support below:
Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Edge, Opera, Safari
The latest versions of these browsers are supported on Mac OS, Windows 7 – 10, Linux, Android and iOS. We test our website infrastructure in these browsers as a minimum along with tablets and mobile devices too.

Issues with text

You might find:

  • page structure issues such as poor use of headings or missing heading levels WCAG criterion 2.4.6 Headings and Labels
  • link text which doesn’t make sense when it is read on its own or is poorly labelled for example ‘click here’ WCAG criterion 3.3.2 Labels or Instruction

Disproportionate burden

There may be some elements deemed to be a disproportionate burden once Blackboard Ally has reviewed the technical audit and website code.

5. How do we test this website?

This website was last tested on 20th September 2020. The test was carried out by Blackboard Ally. 

6. What are we doing to improve accessibility?

We will be taking steps to mitigate some of the issues over the next 6 months such as skipping to the main content when using a screen reader, some colour or contrast issues and the appearance of links within the main content.
We are working with Blackboard Ally to allow auditing of content and provide an alternative format for existing content where this is achievable.