Accessibility

Accessibility statement for Sustainable Advanced Manufacturing (SAM) project

This website is run by the Sustainable Advanced Manufacturing (SAM) project. It contains about us information, photographs of the team, information videos, news, events and workshop information, technical expertise information, images of equipment and machinery, research and development information, factories and kit information, grant funding information, impact case studies, infographics and maps. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to: 

  • change colours, contrast levels and fonts 
  • zoom in up to 300% without the text spilling off the screen 
  • navigate most of the website using just a keyboard 
  • navigate most of the website using speech recognition software
  • listen to most of the website using a screen reader (including the most recent versions of JAWS, NVDA and VoiceOver) 

You can find useful advice on making your device more easy to use by visiting AbilityNet, which provides step-by-step guides to making individual adjustments to your laptop, tablet or smart phone.  

How accessible this website is 

We know some parts of this website are not fully accessible: 

  • some parts may not be fully compatible with screen readers.

Feedback and contact information 

If you need information on this website in a different format like accessible PDF, large print, easy read, audio recording or braille: 

Email: sam.project@sunderland.ac.uk 

Call: 0191 515 3111 

We’ll consider your request and get back to you in 10 days. 

Reporting accessibility problems with this website 

We’re always looking to improve the accessibility of this website. If you find any problems not listed on this page or think we’re not meeting accessibility requirements, contact: sam.project@sunderland.ac.uk. 

Enforcement procedure 

The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) is responsible for enforcing the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 (the ‘accessibility regulations’). If you’re not happy with how we respond to your complaint, contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS). 

Contacting us by phone or visiting us in person  

0191 515 3111 

sam.project@sunderland.ac.uk 

SAM Project University of Sunderland, The Industry Centre 
1 Colima Avenue 
Sunderland Business Park West 
Hylton Riverside 
Sunderland, SR5 3XB 

 Technical information about this website’s accessibility 

 The University of Sunderland is committed to making its website accessible, in accordance with the Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018. 

Compliance status 

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.1 AA standard, due to the non-compliances and exemptions listed below. 

Non-accessible content 

The content listed below is non-accessible for the following reasons. 

Non-compliance with the accessibility regulations 

Navigation and accessing information 

Some headings on webpages are not organised to appear in order. We will correct heading order as we review each page. 

Not all page headings contain content and some headings skip a level. 

It is not possible to use a keyboard to access all the content. We will ensure content can be navigated by keyboard as we review each page. 

Some information is conveyed as an image of text rather than as text itself so that it’s not compatible with screen readers and other assistive technology. We will ensure content conveyed as an image is replaced by HTML when we review each pages 

Most tooltips disappear as soon as the cursor moves. Also, tooltips are not always present for all icons and images. We will reconsider tooltip usage when we review each page. 

Some links are not labelled clearly, for example, they do not make sense when taken out of context. We will correct link text over time as we review each page. 

Adjacent links on certain pages go to the same URL. 

Tables may be used for layout only and their content is not at all tabular in nature. 

Interactive elements of the website (such as search) do not utilise status messages to update screen readers of a change in state.  

We aim to improve our websites accessibility on a regular and continuous basis. See the section below (‘What we’re doing to improve accessibility’) on how we are improving our site accessibility. 

Disproportionate burden 

We are not currently claiming that any accessibility problems would be a disproportionate burden to fix.  

Content that’s not within the scope of the accessibility regulations 

Third-party content 

Our website contains third-party content. We do not have control over and are not responsible for the accessibility of this content, but we make best endeavours to work with the third party to improve its accessibility. The problems that may occur include: 

  • Colour contrast issues. 
  • Keyboard navigation not functional. 
  • Videos closed captions missing. 
  • Links to non-University of Sunderland websites 

For any of the third party products that you may issues with accessing, you may be also be able to find accessibility statements in searchBOX.  This is a free, comprehensive directory created by textbox to support accessible content.  The University is not affiliated with searchBOX and is not responsible for its content. 

If you find any of our resources hard to access, then please contact us at sam.project@sunderland.ac.uk directly for help. 

What we’re doing to improve accessibility 

  • We have a rolling programme of updating the content and design of this website in accordance with the guidelines set out by the WCAG and will continue to assess and improve our accessibility based on these guidelines, user testing and user feedback. 
  • We have completed  colour contrast fixes, font size fixes and added video captions. 

Preparation of this accessibility statement 

This statement was prepared on 21/06/2021. It was last reviewed on 21/06/2021. 

This website was last tested on 21 June 2021. The test was carried out by the University of Sunderland webteam and the SAM Project Team.   

This website is tested using a quality assurance tool to identify accessibility issues.  

We tested: 

  • our main website platform, available at samprojectuos.co.uk.
  • Our website is tested on a regular basis, with a new scan scheduled every seven days using an automated accessibility tool provided by LittleForest. This tool tests all web pages and provides a report on accessibility issues. Manual checks are also performed on a sample of pages on the SAM Project website. 

Issues are prioritised according to the severity of the impact it may cause, the number of people that may be impacted and the time involved in resolving the issue.