EdX Commits to Accessibility for Individuals with Disabilities

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., April 2, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- On April 2, the United States Department of Justice ("DOJ") announced an agreement with edX related to Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA"). EdX has agreed to conform its website, platform and mobile applications to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 AA ("WCAG 2.0 AA"), published by the World Wide Web Consortium ("W3C")'s Web Accessibility Initiative.

"At edX, we seek to understand and respect the unique needs and perspectives of our global community of learners," stated Anant Agarwal, CEO of edX. "Our vision—quality education for everyone, everywhere—can only be achieved when our site is accessible to all users, including people with disabilities."

EdX has been committed to providing educational access to learners with disabilities since its inception, incorporating synchronized transcripts, keyboard accessible controls and support for screen reader users. In addition edX has retained an outside website accessibility consultant to further improve the accessibility of the edX website and platform. Our commitments under the agreement with the DOJ will build upon edX's existing best practices and procedures.

In the coming weeks, edX will release the first accessible text annotation tool, Student Notes. This feature includes custom keyboard controls developed to improve the learning experience for visually impaired and other keyboard-only users.

While edX's agreement with the DOJ does not address course content, edX will continue to offer tools and support to its university and institutional members to enable the creation of accessible content across their courses.

About edX

EdX is a nonprofit, open-source enterprise offering online courses from more than 60 member institutions, composed of both leading global universities and colleges and a diverse group of prominent organizations from around the world. Founded by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, edX is focused on transforming online and on-campus learning through groundbreaking methodologies, game-like experiences and cutting-edge research on an open-source platform. Based in Cambridge, MA, USA, edX is focused on people, not profit.

SOURCE edX