Pile of PDF documents

Accessible online documents e-learning course

Concerned about meeting the Government’s accessibility legislation? Want to improve the accessibility culture in your organisation? Still trying to make all your online documents accessible? SDS are here to help.

We have recently developed an e-learning course on how to create accessible Word and PDF documents for online publication.

Local authorities in Kent, Sussex and Surrey have found the course informative, engaging and practical. Many are already rolling it out to staff across their organisations.

‘Just wanted to say thank you for a really excellent course! So much useful information that’s really going to change the way I work’.

Course content

The course starts with an overview of the government legislation on accessibility and outlines the challenges for customers accessing online documents. It then moves on to practical demonstrations of how to:

  • Use heading styles correctly
  • Make hyperlinks accessible
  • Avoid the use of blank spaces or lines to create formatting of space
  • Format tables
  • Create accessible images and charts
  • Avoid floating images and charts
  • Use the Word Accessibility checker
  • Add meta data
  • Publish as an accessible PDF

Here is a quick preview of the course so you can see what it covers and how the videos work: accessible online documents preview

The course is aimed at anyone who writes documents for online publication. By the end of the course you should feel confident in how to create accessible word documents that can then be converted into accessible PDFs.

‘I now feel 100% more confident to review/update our website taking what I have learnt into account – though it won’t happen quite overnight!’

Course benefits

The benefits of our video courses are:

  • You can access the courses remotely and at a time that is convenient for you.
  • Simple registration to create a personal account so you can review your progress through a course.
  • You can navigate through the course at your own pace, dipping in and out if you need to, it doesn’t need to be completed in one sitting.
  • It is easy to revisit any elements of the course at any time, particularly useful when you are working on documents.
  • The course can be quickly and easily rolled out to staff across your whole organisation.

‘I wasn’t sure the format would be as engaging or as effective as learning in a live environment but actually, I think it is better in a way, especially as you can repeat modules that aren’t as familiar to you’.

Please get in touch if you would like us to make this e-learning course available to you and others in your organisation.