Creating Accessible Documents

Microsoft Word Tips

Upgrade Your Software

Upgrade to the most recent version of Microsoft Word. If you have MS Word 2016 or later, you should have a "Check Accessibility" option under the "Review" tab. Use this tool to identify and correct common accessibility issues identified by MS Word. You'll still have a couple of things to check and possibly correct once you've saved your Word document as a PDF, but this can significantly reduce the amount of work you'll need to do once you get there. 

Use Headings Correctly

Use document headings for structure, not style. One of the most common accessibility mistakes is to use Headings for style purposes (e.g., to make text look bigger and bolder or a particular color). If you would like your text to look a certain way, use the text formatting tools such as font size, bold, italic, etc. directly. Or you can create custom styles using the Styles pane. Just don't use Headings such as Heading 1, 2, 3, etc. for cosmetic purposes.

Why You Shouldn't Use Headings for Styling Purposes

Screen reader technology uses Headings to convey the structure and organization of a document to its users. Headings, such as Heading 1, Heading 2, etc., create document structure in the same way that a table of contents is organized. Word (as well as Google Docs) can auto-generate a table of contents for your document based on its headings. It will assume Heading 1 blocks are like "chapters" and will nest Heading 2 blocks as sub-sections of any Heading 1 preceding it (and so on for Heading 3, etc.). The bottom line is that Headings need to be nested properly to be accessible.

Properly Nesting Headings

Think of Headings the Same Way You Think of an Outline:

• Heading 1 is the first tier of bullets in an outline such as this.
  • Heading 2 is like any second-level bullet. In an outline, you can't skip to a third-level bullet without a second-level before it. Likewise, you should never skip a heading level in your documents. Doing so will create an accessibility issue.
    • Heading 3 can only exist after level 2 and so on.
  • Heading 2: You can come back from level 3 to level 2…
  • Heading 2: ...and have as many same-level headings next to each other as the content necessitates. Note that you could also return to a Heading 1 from a Heading 3, just not the other way around, just like this outline.
• Returning to a Heading 1 signifies a whole new "chapter" or section of your content. 

Just as an unordered (bulleted) list won't allow you to skip from a Heading 1 to a Heading 3, never skip a heading level when formatting headings on a page. 

Use Tables for Data, Not Layout

Use tables for data only, not for layout. Another common mistake that makes accessibility a challenge in PDFs is when a table has been used to visually lay out content in a particular way. Tables should only be used for their intended purpose – to display content within a grid of columns and rows identified by column headers. Avoid row and column spans and keep your table heading outside of the table if you require one. 

Every table should have at least one header row, and often the first column will also be marked as a header when it relates to the subsequent columns in its row. This should be addressed in your source document. Word's default table settings should already default to these properties being set. But you should always verify this, or you'll see table errors after an accessibility check. 

Images Require Alternate Text or should be marked as Decorative

Create a PDF from Word

Select the Acrobat tab in Microsoft Word and click the "Create PDF" button to preserve document structure and any accessibility fixes. If you do not see the Acrobat tab in Microsoft Word, ensure you have Acrobat Pro DC installed on your computer, as this will automatically add this tab to Word.

Adobe Acrobat Pro Tips

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Note: If you jumped straight here but skipped the Microsoft Word Tips section above, please go back and review that section. Unless you have very few minor edits to an existing 508-compliant PDF, you always want to start from scratch in a new Word document and use the Acrobat "Create PDF" button – you'll be thankful that you did. 

Upgrade Your Software

Make sure that you have Adobe Acrobat Pro installed on your system. Acrobat Reader and Acrobat Standard lack the features required for this tutorial.

Fixing Your PDF Accessibility Issues

The number and difficulty level of issues you may encounter can vary greatly. However, if we're simply talking about text-only documents and you've followed all of the tips in this primer thus far, you're probably going to have minimal work to do. This guide will not attempt to address the numerous, and at times highly technical, fixes for most PDF issues. Instead, we will cover a couple of common and simple quick fixes for a typical basic document.

Adobe Acrobat Pro has extensive documentation covering each of the issues you may encounter, and this information can be easily found by right-clicking on any issue and selecting "Explain" from the context menu. This will open a new tab in a browser and should scroll to the specific issue in the Acrobat User Guide. At the time of writing, that user guide can be found at https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/user-guide.html, and the relevant information is located in the section titled Accessibility, Tags, and Reflow.

Fix the Title

Not only does the title tell your users what this document is about, but it also becomes the text for the link that a Google search finds. Often, a converted Microsoft Word document inserts the title with the .docx extension and whatever other random file-naming conventions we have come up with. So even if this one passes, it's a good idea to go in there and clean it up.

To check and update your PDF title, open up the main application's File Menu, and select Properties. In the Properties dialog, the default view is Description, and right there at the top is the Title. Check that it reads just as a title should, removing any dates, file extensions, underscores, or any other unnecessary characters.

Tip: Even though you're posting this document to your PCC web page, Google and other search engines will still find it outside of this context, so it's good to include "PCC" or "PACCD" in the title somewhere, in addition to the title of your document. 

Once you've updated the Title (and optionally Author, Subject, and Keywords) click OK. Now go back to the Accessibility Checker results and right-click the "Title - Failed" error and select Fix. The check mark should turn green. Now don't forget to save the PDF (Control+S on Windows, Command+S on Mac) so that fix gets saved if someone else checks your PDF for accessibility issues later. 

Fix Alternate Text

If you didn't add alternate text via Microsoft Word from the tips in Part 1 of this primer, you'll still have an opportunity to do it here. Expand the Alternate Text category and right-click on the "Figures alternate text - Failed" issue. Select Fix from the context menu, and you will be presented with a dialog that allows you to add alternate text for every figure (image) that is missing it. Just add brief descriptive text in the text box provided and then either advance to the next image using the arrow button or click "Save and Exit." If you used the Decorative Image checkbox during the previous step, you may have a new set of errors after exiting this dialog. We recommend always including alternate text for each issue to avoid this quirk. Again, once you've corrected all issues here and you've got the green checkmark, save the PDF (Control+S on Windows, Command+S on Mac)

Other Issues

As stated previously, for all other issues you may encounter, please select the issue context menu item Explain by right-clicking an issue. If you get stuck on something, feel free to reach out to us! Just submit a request via our Web Help form at https://pasadena.edu/webhelp.