Accessibility Statement
Last updated: 17 December 2021
The University of Oxford is committed to providing an accessible web presence that gives members of the public and members of the University community full access to University information, courses and activities offered publicly through the web. The University of Oxford's Equality Policy outlines our commitment to a culture which ‘maintains a working, learning and social environment in which the rights and dignity of all its staff and students are respected’.
The following accessibility statement applies to University of Oxford, Department of Politics and International Relations website – www.politics.ox.ac.uk.
Our aims
We want our website to offer the best experience possible for all of our users. In order to ensure that all of our visitors can use our website, we aim to meet Level-AA standard of WCAG 2.1.
Our current website uses the Drupal CMS. We are committed to making sure that this website delivers Level-AA standard of WCAG 2.1, which includes elements such as:
- Alt text for all informative images and icons, providing non-visual alternatives where appropriate
- Decorative images and icons hidden from assistive technology
- Content can be navigated with just a keyboard or speech recognition tools
- The website can be used with a screen reader
- Content is structured, ordered and labelled appropriately, with correct headings
- Sufficient font contrast and size styling, for readability
Other accessibility information
AbilityNet has advice on making your devices easier to use if you have a disability. In addition, major operating systems produce the following guidance:
If you’d like more information about accessibility and resources for students, staff and visitors in Oxford more generally, please visit our Equality and Diversity pages.
If you’re looking for information on building accessibility, please try the Access Guide for Manor Road Building (where the Department is based) or the University’s interactive map.
How accessible this website is
Accessibility work completed:
100 essential pages of our old website were externally audited in July 2020 with broad recommendations applied to the website content, as far as possible, over the ensuing months.
A total review of content, for accessibility and readability, was completed in the run-up to the launch of our current website, in December 2021. These edits have striven to ensure:
- Alt text is available for all informative images and icons, and non-visual alternatives are provided where appropriate
- Content is structured, ordered and labelled appropriately, with correct hierarchical use of heading styles
- Web links are descriptive and specific
- Text is improved for readability
During the development of our current website we commissioned AbilityNet to review a number of our key webpages. We worked with our website developers, Olamalu, to implement these changes to ensure:
- Decorative images and icons hidden from assistive technology
- Content can be navigated with just a keyboard or speech recognition tools
- The website can be used with a screen reader
- Good readability, using sufficient font contrast and size styling
What we doing to ensure accessibility is maintained and improved
In early 2022, after all web development has been completed for our website, we will audit our site again, to make sure that we meet our Accessibility Objectives listed above.
We continue to review the site's content for accessibility and repeat our website accessibility training for website editors, on an annual basis.
Accessibility Known Issues
We are aware that some elements of our website are not fully accessible. These include:
- Some older videos do not have subtitles
- When older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software, web accessible versions of the text may not always be available (however documents that are essential to the service we provide will be either be converted to HTML pages or made accessible).
- Some web links could be improved to be more descriptive or specific
- Text could be improved for readability
We are working to address areas where our accessibility needs improvement. Some items, detailed below, may be fall outside of accessibility regulations.
Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations
Third-party content
Our site includes third party content and functionality. This may direct you to a related service, link to another site or supporting documentation. We are not responsible for the accessibility of third-party content or to other sites we link to. This includes:
- News and journal articles
- Vimeo and YouTube videos
- Sound Cloud audio files
- Google maps
- Mailchimp forms
Third party platforms
We often create content which is hosted on third party platforms. This includes:
- content we create for social media
- audio/video content which we host on YouTube, SoundCloud or Vimeo
- data we supply to national databases
We are responsible for ensuring the content we supply meets accessibility requirements; however, we are not responsible for the accessibility of the platform itself.
Documents (Word & PDF)
This site has a number of Word and PDF documents which were published before September 2018. These aren’t essential to the service we provide and won’t be replaced. If you experience any difficulties accessing these documents, please email comms@politics.ox.ac.uk.
Video and audio content
This site has pre-recorded audio and video content that was published before 23 September 2020, which is exempt from the accessibility regulations.
Archived content
This site contains archived content, which is exempt from the accessibility regulations. The archived content is all internal announcements and external news stories published prior to 23 September 2018, but which have not since been updated.
Feedback and Contact Information
If you need information on this website in a different format, please contact comms@politics.ox.ac.uk. We will consider your request and get back to you within 14 days.
Reporting accessibility problems with this website
We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of our current website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, please contact comms@politics.ox.ac.uk.
Enforcement procedure
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).