Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Document Accessibility Checklist

To pass the electronic thesis/dissertation accessibility check, your final PDF document must include the elements below. This list describes Texas Tech Electronic Thesis and Dissertation (ETD) accessibility requirements, part of the ETD formatting requirements. Please see the official ETD page for more details, including the formatting manual and complete ETD checklist. 

Document Properties

For more information, see our guide on document properties

• Document title must be present
• Document language must be set

Document Structure

For more information, see our guides on document structure, table of contents and table and figure lists and captions

• Document structure should be created using Word Styles pane
• Table of Contents should be built with Word’s built in features

Figures

For more information, see our guide on alternative text

• All figures must include descriptive alternative text (alt-text) offering a full explanation of the figure

Lists

For more information, see our guide on lists

• Lists must be created with Word’s built in list features

Columns 

For more information, see our guide on columns

• Columns must be created with Word’s built-in features

Tables 

For more information, see our guides on tables and table lists and captions

• Tables should have a simple structure, clear title or description and specified header rows, tables should only be used to present data

Color 

For more information, see our guide on color

• All text and informative figures (charts and graphs) must pass a color contrast check of at least 4.5:1 for text and 3:1 or higher for figures.
• For figures avoid the use of color alone to convey meaning, i.e. a line graph will need to use different styles (dotted, dashed, solid lines) as well as colors to differentiate
• If complex figures cannot achieve the required ratio a long description must be added before or after the figure or in an appendix to clarify the figure

Audio and Video

• Audio has accurate, synced closed captions (Note: Automated captions are not sufficient for WCAG compliance and must be manually corrected)
• Audio descriptions of any visuals occurring in the video

Other

• Document reading order should be logical (i.e. the sequence in which content is presented by screen readers must ensure that meaning is preserved)
• Hyperlinks need to have a clearly defined label of the destination of the link so that a screen reader can read that out loud when scanning the document (i.e. Do not use “click here” this gives no useful information)