"Every district now faces a simple test. Will the district's digital choices expand learning or create barriers for millions of students who depend on accessible content? Public school systems serve roughly 7.5 million students with disabilities, about 15% of total public school enrollment in 2022-23, and many of those students rely on digital materials to access instruction and services. Recent analyses show that roughly 94.8% of public-facing home pages contain detectable accessibility failures."
"These gaps matter because the new regulatory landscape no longer leaves accessibility to interpretation. The Department of Justice's 2024 rule sets WCAG 2.1 Level AA compliance for schools as the technical standard and gives districts clear compliance timelines. Larger districts must meet the standard by April 24, 2026, and smaller districts by April 26, 2027. For district leaders, this is not a narrow compliance task. K-12 digital accessibility compliance intersects with equity policy, curriculum delivery, family communication, and legal risk."
Approximately 7.5 million public school students have disabilities, and many depend on digital materials for instruction and services. Most public-facing home pages show detectable accessibility failures, revealing significant gaps in K-12 digital access. The Department of Justice requires WCAG 2.1 Level AA compliance, with deadlines of April 24, 2026 for larger districts and April 26, 2027 for smaller districts. Compliance affects equity policy, curriculum delivery, family communication, and legal risk. Districts need strategic plans that include audits, training, remediation, ongoing monitoring, and fixes for commonly inaccessible formats like PDFs.
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