ADA Updates for Faculty 

Starting April 24, 2026, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) will include specific guidelines about what makes digital content, including course materials, accessible.  

These changes to the ADA apply to:

• CSUN websites and web applications, including Canvas and course websites 
• PDFs 
• Word documents 
• Presentation slides (PowerPoint) 
• Spreadsheets (Excel) 
• Videos 
• And more 

In January, we highlighted some campus resources and tips in We Need to Talk About the ADA, and those are a good start. But the University and the Chancellor’s Office understand the need to do more to support our faculty in this effort. 

A11y+ Student Employee Training 

This summer, a grant-funded collaboration between CSUN’s own a11y+ and Academic Technology will train student employees to evaluate and remediate instructional content and provide support for faculty with accessibility. 

This program seeks to provide our student cohort with awareness of the need for this work plus marketable skills to take with them into the workforce. The program is actively recruiting CSUN students with disabilities, bringing balance and perspective from the cohort itself. 

Canvas Ally Upgrade 

Canvas Ally is getting an upgrade! This summer, the CSUs will transition to a powerful new tool from Cidi Labs, offering enhanced features and usability. This new tool will provide the same features we love from Canvas Ally, along with some new features like the ability to convert a file to an accessible Canvas Page with a single click. 

New Equidox License for CSUs 

The Chancellor’s Office has licensed Equidox for all of the CSUs. With Equidox, making text-based PDFs accessible has never been easier or faster! If you want experience using Equidox, please attend our PDF Accessibility workshop on April 23 at 10am and let us know that you are interested. If you are unable to attend the workshop, you can make an appointment with the Universal Design Center (UDC) instead. 

The UDC has a different tool for PDFs that contain mathematical or scientific notation, hand-written notes, and more. 

Captioning and Audio Description 

CSUN has an established program to caption instructional videos at no cost to academic departments. The Chancellor’s Office is working to expand our program to provide unlimited captions for all CSUs, with future iterations potentially including audio descriptions. 

Digital Accessibility 

CSUN has a network of staff who are knowledgeable about digital accessibility. We are seeking to expand this network so that in the next academic year, faculty will have ready access to people on campus who can provide guidance and support.