Development of a Scoring System for Evaluating the Accessibility of eTextbooks

The Internet enables educators to provide free educational resources to many users, including those with disabilities. Existing regulations outline minimum accessibility requirements. However, we are not aware of any standard metric that would allow users to judge the relative degree of accessibility provided by e-learning materials, such as eTextbooks. The goal of the present study was to develop an accessibility scoring method that can be used to guide users’ decision making when selecting eTextbooks. Using both non-assistive and assistive technologies, we analyzed a sample of 37 free access eTextbooks using 15 SkillsCommons accessibility checkpoints. We then worked with accessibility SMEs to determine severity weightings for each checkpoint in terms of its overall accessibility impact on users. Although, the scoring technique we developed needs further validation, it provides a starting point for accessibility researchers and post-secondary education stakeholders to quantify the level of accessibility provided by different eTextbooks.