Criterion Section 508 Solutions
The Criterion Difference
“Criterion was great to work with! They addressed all of our Section 508 issues in a quick and economical manner. I would refer Criterion to anyone needing Section 508 compliance solutions and we look forward to working with them again on future projects.”
Criterion 508 Notes!
Vol. 4, Issue 3, June 2004
Successful Award Protest Shows Section 508 Has Teeth
Too often in life, companies make decisions to be penny wise. As the saying goes, those decisions may end up being "penny wise, but pound foolish". A prime example can be found in the recent decision CourtSmart Digital Systems, Inc., 2004 WL 816361, *1+, B-292995.2, 292995.2+ (Comp.Gen. Feb. 13, 2004).
In response to a Request for Quotations (RFQ) from the Social Security Administration, CourtSmart Digital Systems Inc. and York Telecom Corporation were among a number of vendors which responded. The SSA had issued its RFQ for the nationwide purchase of a portable digital recording system through competitive quotations. The RFQ contained a detailed statement of what was needed, and pointed prospective vendors to a website for obtaining a Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) to complete and submit with their quotations. The evaluation standards included a clear statement that consideration would be based at least in part upon Section 508 compliance.
A number of vendors submitted applications and the SSA held demonstrations of the proposed systems and conducted pre-award testing of the systems. York's quotation indicated that its system was not Section 508 compliant at the time of application. CourtSmart's quotation indicated that its system was Section 508 compliant. No vendor other than York had its system tested against Section 508's requirements, and York's testing reflected that there were remaining Section 508 issues at the time of the test.
On September 30th, SSA placed its order with York for 1,470 systems to be used on a nationwide basis to record hearings and appeals regarding applications for SSA disability benefits. Soon thereafter, CourtSmart protested the award.
The result of the protest was that York's order was canceled, the costs and attorney fees of CourtSmart's protest were reimbursed, the RFQ was amended or reissued and a new source selection was made. A primary reason for this ruling is that Section 508 compliance is mandatory and the successful vendor (York) was neither Section 508 compliant by the time it made its application nor by the time of the award, whereas CourtSmart was already Section 508 compliant. The test under the Access Board's regulations and guidance is not perfection, but rather which vendor would best meet the standards. 36 C.F.R,. § 1194.2(b). Since CourtSmart was acceptable based on its application's statement that it met Section 508 standards, and York admitted it was not compliant, York could not be awarded the contract.
The lesson to be learned from this ruling is that where government purchasing requirements specify Section 508 compliance as necessary, the successful vendor will be that which is either entirely or significantly compliant. The company with the most meaningful and persuasive evidence of its compliance will succeed in obtaining government contracts.
Why Structural Markup is Important to Accessibility
A fundamental principle of accessible electronic document design is the separation of content structure from its presentation. This applies to documents created using publishing tools (such as, Word, Quark, InDesign, and the like), which may be distributed as Acrobat PDFs, and to web pages.
Structure refers to the way information is organized logically and describes the structural role of content elements. For example, headings, sections, paragraphs, and lists can be identified using structural markup.
Presentation refers to the appearance of an electronic document to a user. For example, font sizes and colors, paragraph indentation, and the type of bullets used in a list are all elements that are identified using presentational markup.
Distinguishing the structure of a document from how the content is presented allows the person or assistive technology accessing the document to control its presentation in a way that is meaningful to them.
People accessing a page with assistive technology rely heavily on structural markup. For example, their software will inform them if a piece of text is a level 2 heading or an element in a list. This enables them to build a mental outline of the page. Headings that have been coded with structural markup (such as, H1 and H2) enable these users to skim through a page by navigating the headings using keyboard shortcuts provided by their software.
When presentational markup is used to make text look like a heading, but the text is not marked-up using a structural heading element, assistive technologies will not be able to interpret the information as a heading. Conversely, structural markup should not be used to achieve presentation effects (for instance, using a header tag to change font size).
Structural markup is a key component in improving the accessibility of electronic documents .By separating a document's presentation from its content and structure, a document can be rendered intelligibly regardless of the device used to display it.
Example of Structure Separated from Presentation
| Structural Markup | Structural Markup with Stylesheet Attached |
|---|---|
 |
 |
Stylesheet presentation.css
