Access vs. Accessibility: Building Inclusive Online Learning Experiences

When creating content for an online learning experience, an essential part of the process is to consider how a variety of learners will engage with the material. Understanding the terms “access” and “accessibility,” which are often used interchangeably, is critical to developing inclusive and equitable online learning environments. Because you may not know the full extent of the barriers that potential learners face, it’s important to intentionally design your course so that all learners can meaningfully engage with your content.

There is a connection between access and accessibility, although they are not, in fact, the same thing. Both center on the idea of ensuring learners can participate in learning, but there are key distinctions.

Access is like providing a ticket to a concert. It allows people the opportunity to be present and take part in the experience. Intentional choices that expand access, such as by leveraging digital technologies, invite more people to the venue.

Accessibility, by contrast, enables people to fully experience the concert once they’ve arrived. It’s focused on removing barriers, such as physical, auditory, visual, or cognitive ones, so that people can engage with the performance. A ticket alone isn’t enough to ensure adequate engagement if the person cannot fully hear, see, or understand the performance. Intentional choices that expand accessibility, such as providing variations to sound volume and seating, ensure more people can experience the performance.

Integrating both access and accessibility practices into pedagogical decision-making breaks down barriers to reaching courses and engaging with their content, thereby ensuring that learners can fully benefit from the learning experience.

Understanding Access

Access refers to a learner’s ability to acquire and utilize instructional content. Barriers to access come in several forms.

Cost

It has become increasingly more expensive to attend higher educational institutions each year. From 2010 to 2023, the cost of tuition at a four-year public institution increased 36.7%. High-quality massive open online courses, such as those hosted on Michigan Online, are just one way to support access to lifelong learning at a lower cost, as are online and hybrid degree programs.

Devices and Applications

Learners access their online courses from a variety of devices, such as phones, tablets, laptops, and desktop computers. In fact, a recent survey by EDUCASE QuickPoll found that 3% of students are smartphone-dependent for their academic needs. Allowing learners to use their own device for coursework provides better opportunities for access, but that means that device compatibility (e.g., Windows vs. Mac) must also be considered before requiring any educational tools. Additionally, applications and software are not universally available in all countries. A prominent example is the suite of Google applications that, while web-based and free, are restricted in several countries.

Open Educational Resources

Access to educational materials, such as articles behind paywalls or required textbooks, can come at an additional unexpected cost for learners. Selecting high-quality, open educational resources (OERs) can reduce financial barriers and encourage full participation in your courses.

Internet Connectivity

In Michigan, 6% of households do not have access to high-speed internet due to infrastructure limitations. The connectivity gap between households, otherwise known as the digital divide, is shrinking nationwide; however, it has not been eliminated. Nearly 7.9 million households in 2024 did not have access to the internet. Internet access disparities mean that learners in your online courses may need to travel to access the internet in public locations, such as libraries or coffee shops, limiting their ability to upload or download large file types, like videos and images. 

For our global learners in particular, this gap remains a significant challenge. MOOCs draw learners from around the world. Online degree programs allow students who may be traveling or working abroad to continue in their academic career. When designing your course, keep this potential barrier in mind. For example, instead of requiring a learner to upload a video response, offer an alternative to upload a photo and a short essay.

Understanding Accessibility

Accessibility, which ensures technology and instructional content can be effectively used by people with disabilities or diverse needs, is a mandatory consideration when building your online course. 

In April 2024, the U.S. Department of Justice updated ADA Title II regulations to require all government entities to ensure their digital content meets WCAG 2.1 Level AA standards with limited exceptions. This requirement also applies to public universities, including the University of Michigan, with a deadline for digital accessibility compliance of April 24, 2026, for larger entities such as U-M and April 26, 2027, for smaller institutions. 
It is important to make progress toward equitable and inclusive online learning, given that, worldwide, around 1 in 6 people live with a disability, totaling approximately 1  billion people. In the United States, that ratio shrinks to 1 in 4. Given this reality, the university embraced the Department of Justice’s mandate with its own Digital Accessibility Strategic Initiative.

Learners can have temporary, situational, and permanent disabilities that impact them in a variety of ways, even requiring assistive technologies such as text-to-speech software, screen readers, closed captioning, and voice recognition to participate in online courses. Building accessible course materials ensures learners have access to the learning no matter the circumstance.

Recommendations for Instructors

Improving access to courses and the accessibility of that content can become an instructional habit for instructors, reducing the need to make fixes on a semester-to-semester cadence.

Design Intentionally from the Start

While the immediate future may require revisiting and revising content you’ve already created, a good long-term habit is to always approach designing new content with access and accessibility in mind. Ensuring course content is easy to access with little to no barriers to engagement will provide you with content that you can feel confident students will be able to use now and in the future.

Improving Access

• Integrate OERs: Leveraging open-source textbooks and other open articles is a great way to improve access to course content. While residential students can access a wealth of materials with their university email through the library system, this access ends  after graduation and does not extend to global learners in open online courses.
• Offer Software Alternatives: It is common to rely on different software to facilitate our courses, perhaps none more than the Microsoft Office collection. Microsoft Office is available to current students, but access is tied to enrollment, and even less safe to assume for global learners. Offering software alternatives when possible, such as LibreOffice as an alternative to Microsoft Office, serves to expand access while not greatly changing one’s approach to teaching.

• Utilize Universal Design for Learning: Beyond accessing resources, providing multiple ways for learners to demonstrate what they have learned is a way to improve access. Flexible approaches to assignment completion, such as encouraging a variety of response methods rather than instructors pre-determining one, allow learners the autonomy to engage in ways that are feasible to them, given their resources and capabilities.

Improving Accessibility

• Enhance Visual Content:Addressing visual accessibility concerns in course content is a great place to start, as it presents a low lift while offering a big impact. Some simple improvements center on:
  • Color Contrast – Ensure a high degree of color contrast between text and backgrounds on lecture slides or infographics – essentially, light text should appear on a dark background and vice versa. Try WebAIM’s Color Contrast checker.
  • Built-in Formatting – Formatting text using built-in heading levels, such as H1 and H2, greatly improves a learner’s ability to skim and remember content.
  • Text Size – In general, the larger the text, the easier it is to read. Current recommendations are that 18-point text is the smallest size that should be used in slides, and within documents the limit is 12-point text.
  • Alternative Text and Narrative Descriptions – Diagrams, charts, and graphs are staples of instruction, but they often pose visual barriers to learners. When recording lectures, make a conscious effort to verbally describe the importance or value of these content items. In documents, add alternative text, an accessible document element that screen readers can interpret.

• Improve Files and Resources: Revising files or PDFs can be overwhelming, as can designing new accessible content from scratch. Fortunately, the university has secured tools to support this work. Utilizing extensions such as Panorama and Grackle can lighten the burden on instructors by reducing some of the technical how-to barriers that have prevented them from making improvements sooner.

Trainings and Other Resources

Staff and faculty can learn more by exploring available resources that detail accessibility and accommodation requirements, and can even participate in trainings on how to create accessible online content. Check out the many resources and community events available at U-M.

As you embark on (or perhaps continue) the journey to develop a more accessible course, always keep in mind: improving access and accessibility is not just about supporting learners with disabilities; it is about improving the learning experience for all of your learners.