Tech Tip: Adobe Accessibility

Why make Accessible PDFs?

We all know that making documents accessible to persons with disabilities is not only the moral thing to do, but it’s also the law. It may seem like a hassle to make your PDFs accessible, but there are benefits for the general user as well.

Making a PDF accessible means that it can read the contents to you. This is useful for listening to a long document while you’re on the treadmill or doing the dishes. You can do your work without having to sit and just read. This function is also useful for auditory learners (people who learn best when they hear the information rather than reading it).

How do you make an Accessible PDF?

To make a PDF accessible in Acrobat Pro DC, start by selecting Tools then Action Wizard. A list of available actions will display in a toolbar. Select Action List then Make Accessible. The pane will change to display new functions. Select the file you would like to make accessible. You can add multiple files to make them all  accessible at once. When you have added all of your files, click Start. The accessibility check will display any issues found.  Many can be corrected right in the accessibility results pane using the hints and ideas in the Wizard.  When finished, save the new accessible document.

For more help, visit the Adobe Help page.  Now that you have an accessible document, use the Accessibility features in Adobe Reader to read the text out load.  More information on how to use this feature is available in this additional Adobe help guide.

These features are useful for everyone so that we can access content in the way we prefer to do so.  However, if you have a documented disability and require accessible documents, contact Lynn Davies (daviesl@etown.edu) in Disability Services.