The main objective of this project was raising awareness and empower and train people with disabilities to actively participate in the implementation of the Web Accessibility Directive (WAD) through the feedback mechanism and complaint system. This permits also to leverage the knowledge of people with disabilities on accessibility issues and to engage them to be an active and essential part of the digital community. Within the project, a methodological toolkit for collecting and categorising user feedback and an interactive repository of best practices for structuring and reporting on web accessibility issues were developed. Based on this, a model curriculum for the design of vocational training courses for training people with disabilities on digital accessibility and feedback was created in English, translated to German, French and Swedish, and validated with the target group in Germany, Sweden, and France. As a further result, practical guidelines for transferring the curriculum to different contexts and member states across Europe were prepared to facilitate the development of specialised vocational training courses in this field.
Public sector bodies (PSB) across Europe need to be aware of accessibility issues on their websites and mobile applications, to be able to prioritise and remediate web accessibility barriers. End users often encounter problems, but do not know how and where to express them so that PSBs can effectively act on them. The project bridges that gap, by emphasising the need of engaging, empowering, and training end users with disabilities on how to provide actionable feedback regarding accessibility issues of public sector websites across Europe. The present situation is not sufficient: end-user feedback, if any, is very generic or very specific, and the missing background knowledge of the end users make it difficult for them to explain the accessibility problem. In the project a model curriculum and other resources were developed to empower end users with different levels of background knowledge on ICT, covering all relevant aspects related to feedback on accessibility problems. The project results help end users with disabilities to provide structured and valid feedback, using the feedback mechanism, the instrument installed by Directive (EU) 2016/2102, known as WAD.