How to Remediate Inaccessible Materials (15 mins)

Check the Accessibility of your PDFs

There are two main ways to check the accessibility:

• Use Adobe Acrobat Pro and run the PDF accessibility checker Links to an external site.. Faculty, staff and students have free access to all software in the Adobe Creative Cloud. Links to an external site. 
• If you have access to Canvas, use Ally select the Ally Course Accessibility Report in the left hand navigation menu or select the gauge icon  next to the document's title to follow Ally's guidance for remediation.

Remediate your PDFs

Publisher created PDFs

• Locate the original file online or work with your subject librarian Links to an external site. to locate an accessible version.  

Instructor created PDFs

• If you have access to the original document (either in Word or PowerPoint), open that file and run the accessibility checker Links to an external site.. Follow the instructions to fix the issues and then use the "Save as PDF" option to convert it to PDF. It is much easier to remediate a Word or PowerPoint file compared to a PDF. 
• If you don't have access to the original file, open the document in Adobe Acrobat Pro and follow the steps for remediating it. Links to an external site. Using Acrobat Pro takes more time and knowledge of tagging structure, so it's best left for the experts. To view a simple walkthrough showing how to fix reading order, ALT text and heading structure in Adobe Acrobat Pro please see Accessibility Check of a PDF Links to an external site. (12 min video with chapters).

Scanned PDFs

• Locate the original file online or work with your subject librarian Links to an external site. to locate an accessible version.
• Alternatively, you can also try using Adobe Acrobat Pro to “Scan/OCR” and “Enhance” your document. OCR = Optical Character Recognition which means each character is readable and selectable. It's not perfect! This option usually requires some remediation.

Steps for Using Acrobat's Scan & OCR

1. 1. Open Adobe Acrobat Pro. Select "Scan & OCR" from the right hand menu. If it’s not there, select the more tools tab, locate "Scan & OCR" and select open.
   2. Select "Enhance" at the top middle of the screen.
   3. Select "Scanned Document".
   4. Select "Enhance".

Use Ally to OCR 

Please note, this method is not perfect, but is worth a try. If you have access to Canvas, you can use Ally’s alternative formats Links to an external site. to OCR the document.  Please see Fixing Scanned PDFs Links to an external site. (8 min video) for guidance.

Optional Resources

For future exploration of Adobe Acrobat Pro, Canvas and Ally.

• Adobe Acrobat User Guide: Take a look at this guide for an overview of Adobe Acrobat's features.
• Adobe Acrobat Pro Workspace Basics: Get to know the features with this clear walkthrough of the menus, toolbars, etc.
• PDF Accessibility eCampus webpage Links to an external site.: See this page for general guidance on PDF accessibility and troubleshooting accessibility issues.
• Creating Accessible PDFs Links to an external site.: This is an advanced and very comprehensive course from LinkedIn Learning (SJSU login required).
• Canvas course evaluation accessibility checklist Links to an external site.: Use this checklist to review all aspects of your course.
• Accessibility with Ally Self-Directed Course Links to an external site.: Enroll in the self-directed course for comprehensive resources and guidance on all things accessibility! Complete the modules for a badge or just use the course as a resource!

Next

Now that you have learned how to remediate a PDF for accessibility, select Next to reflect on the process.