RISE - accessibility features

I agree with Jeanne. A simple list or chart would be incredibly useful (in addition to the more detailed information that's already available).

Hello. I just want to echo everyone else's comments. Accessibility is really important to us and we'd be really keen to see a clear roadmap from Articulate, with timelines included, that demonstrates a commitment to improving accessibility. We were disappointed by the December release. We were expecting much more significant changes. We've just had another round of testing done and despite using only accessible block types (which severely limits the interactivity of our courses), basic issues such as insufficient colour contrast and no page titles in code are still showing up as issues.

Hi Colette, 

We've been releasing Rise features and fixes throughout the past year, and you can see a full listing of those here in the Rise Version history.

Some things we've already implemented:

• can improve accessibility for learners with screen readers by adding alternate text to images 
• we changed the text contrast which darkened/lightened some colors in the UI to create stronger contrast (this is not author controlled) 
• we’ve verified that Rise text can safely zoom to 200% without breaking the design, a key accessibility need

We've got a few other accessibility features in the pipeline, and my colleague Mike offered a great overview of what's coming up next with keyboard navigation here. 

Please keep the feedback, ideas and accessibility needs coming! It's all valuable for our team as they continue to plan out the next features and updates. 

Hi Nathan, 

We’ve been working hard on the accessibility features in Rise. And our ultimate goal is to be Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) compliant.

We’ve built Rise to follow Accessible Rich Internet Applications (ARIA) standards for common navigation features, such as buttons, links, and forms. For custom features that aren’t covered by ARIA, such as interactive markers and sorting activities, we’ve focused on making the custom keyboard navigation feel natural and intuitive.

We do not yet provide full keyboard navigation support for learners who require a screen reader, but we are actively working on this.

As part of our plan to get to be WCAG compliant, we’re also hiring a 3rd party consultant to do a full audit. We’ll then produce a WCAG compliance document.

We appreciate your patience as we continue to work to meet the needs of all your learners and will continue to update you as we make progress in this area.

I would be happy to share my insights.  I am a long time customer with Articualte products and I enjoy working with them.

There are several nice online tools that will assess accessibility issues.  It would be nice if there was an option or a mode for Rise that would pass those tests.  Our primary considerations in this agency are good contrasting colors, voice assisted navigation, screen reader compatibility, and keyboard navigation.

The state (my employer) is enacting new policies that require all new training to meet these accessibility standards.  Since Rise does not meet the standards, I am violating policy when I use it.  I find Rise a much better option for rapid development on small projects, but it I will have to go back to using Storyline until accessibility standards can be met with Rise.

It would be nice if Rise provided the developer with some control over the color pallet, rather than just letting us choose one accent color.  Even if we just had a few canned templates to pick from.  It would also be nice if the end user had an option for selecting high contrast mode so that they could adapt the screen for their vision.

We have adopted accessibility compliance as part of our production best-practices. Just making this comment so I may see updates on this thread. 

Hi there. Is there any update or timeline for accessibility features in Rise? 🙏

I agree - a consolidated document of the features mentioned above would be very useful. We have a number of clients who are public sector and this is part of the contract. I believe there is new legislation coming in to the UK soon, too, that will increase the accessibility requirements for public sector bodies.

I really appreciate Sharon's list (above) of what worked well with a screen reader and what didn't, but it's concerning to think that many of the exciting interactive features of Rise 360 may not be WCAG compliant. I'm working on a staff training course that contains flash cards, sorting activities and scenario blocks; I'm hoping to include labelled graphics, too, and arrived here while searching for info on alt text. Can anyone direct me to Rise-specific WCAG guidance, please? Thank you!

I'm glad to see that Articulate has been working on accessibility for Rise. Thank you!

However, what I really want is a simple list of block types with a yes/no for full accessibility with keyboard and screen readers and any known accessibility issues listed. 

Does this exist somewhere?