Through a settlement agreement between Ohio State and the federal Office of Civil Rights, Ohio State has pledged to make all of its digital content accessible to individuals with visual impairments who use screen readers to access digital content. Because the university has a sitewide license, the university must comply with Title II; therefore, certain question formats that are not compatible must be disabled. Please visit the links below for more information.
- List of Accessible and Non-accessible Question Types
- Qualtrics’ Check Survey Accessibility Tool (use this built-in tool to see if your survey meets accessibility requirements)
- Matrix – Likert can meet WCAG2.1 (click on the link to find out how).
- Find your area’s Digital Accessibility Coordinator
Exceptions for Researchers:
We have created an exception process for researchers who must have access to these question formats. Exceptions can be requested by filling out the Exception Request Survey.
Exceptions will be considered based on the following scenarios:
- Current research in which data collection is ongoing.
- Research that uses Qualtrics to present visual stimuli (pictures, figures, graphics) to participants;
- Research in which an approved IRB states that individuals with visual impairments are explicitly excluded;
- Research that is attempting exact replication of existing work, where modifying question formats would invalidate the replication.
For other scenarios, exception requests will be reviewed by an ad-hoc committee of faculty researchers. Note that, for researchers with multiple active studies, only a single exception needs to be requested.
If you are in the process of designing new studies using Qualtrics, please consider carefully if excluding individuals with visual impairments may affect the generalizability of your findings and could raise compliance concerns. Furthermore, such exclusions could challenge the validity of your study. Wherever possible, you should include a sample size, which would provide a good representation of the population that you wish to study.
If you have questions, contact Qualtrics Brand Admin at OTDI-SurveySupport@osu.edu.
Exceptions for Teaching or Administrative Purposes:
Requests for exceptions for teaching or administrative purposes are reviewed by the ADA Coordinator’s Office. To initiate a review, complete this form at https://dac.osu.edu/tracking/