This website is run by Bury College. We want as many people as possible to be able to use this website. For example, that means you should be able to:

  • zoom in up to 400% without the text spilling off the screen,
  • navigate most of the website using a keyboard or speech recognition software,
  • listen to most of the website using a screen reader (such as NVDA).

We’ve also made the website text as simple as possible to understand.

AbilityNet has advice on making your device easier to use if you have a disability.

How accessible this website is

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

  • some videos do not have audio description, so information shown only on screen may not be available to people who are blind or have low vision,
  • some older PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen reader software,
  • the embedded YouTube video player contains some code that screen readers may not interpret correctly.

Technical information about this website’s accessibility

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

This accessibility statement applies to the Bury College website at burycollege.ac.uk. It does not cover separately hosted systems linked from the website.

Compliance status

This website is partially compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines version 2.2 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

Video

Some of our prerecorded videos do not have audio description or a full text alternative, so visual information that is not described in the soundtrack is not available to people who cannot see the video. This fails WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.2.3 (Audio Description or Media Alternative (Prerecorded)) and success criterion 1.2.5 (Audio Description (Prerecorded)).

We plan to review each affected video by October 2027. Where important information is shown only on screen, we will add audio description or a text alternative. New videos will be checked for this before they are published.

PDF documents

Some of our PDF documents are not fully accessible to screen readers, and so people using a screen reader may not be able to access the information. These documents may fail:

  • WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.1.1 (Non-text Content): images, graphics and logos may not have text alternatives,
  • WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.3.1 (Info and Relationships): headings, tables and form fields may not be marked up so that a screen reader can interpret them,
  • WCAG 2.2 success criterion 1.4.3 (Contrast (Minimum)): some text may not have enough colour contrast,
  • WCAG 2.2 success criterion 2.4.2 (Page Titled): some documents may not have a title,
  • WCAG 2.2 success criterion 3.1.1 (Language of Page): some documents may not have their language set.

We now have processes in place to make replacements in an accessible format. Any new PDFs we publish will meet accessibility standards, unless we determine that they represent a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the accessibility regulations.

We are working towards addressing this by removing older PDF documents and replacing them with accessible documents, or accessible web page content where this does not represent a disproportionate burden.

Please contact the Marketing Team (marketing@burycollege.ac.uk) if you have difficulty with any of the PDFs or videos on the site and we will work to provide you with the content in an alternative, more accessible format.

Disproportionate burden

The Public Sector Bodies (Websites and Mobile Applications) (No. 2) Accessibility Regulations 2018 require public sector bodies, subject to various exemptions and conditions, to:

  1. Make public sector websites and mobile applications accessible.
  2. Provide an accessibility statement.

The accessibility regulations state that a public sector body does not need to meet the accessibility requirement if this would put a disproportionate burden on them, provided that a disproportionate burden assessment is undertaken. The following disproportionate burden assessment relates to inaccessible PDFs on our site.

Inaccessible PDFs

Some of our PDFs are documents that are essential to be made public for governance reasons (for example, Corporation meeting minutes). Our assessment of the burden of making all of the PDFs on our site into accessible versions is that:

  • these are historical documents created by the organisation,
  • each document would require a number of hours of work to be recreated in a fully accessible version (estimated based on extensive experience of converting the active documents at between 2 and 30 hours per document, depending on length and complexity, plus any required sign-off),
  • many of the documents are officially published, and publishing a new version requires detailed checking and a formal sign-off process,
  • many of the documents contain complex elements which are difficult to retrospectively convert, such as detailed tables, graphs and diagrams.

Also relevant to this decision are that:

  • interest in these documents is low – few people access them,
  • the documents do meet accessibility requirements for a large number of users, although some groups will find them disproportionately difficult,
  • requests for more accessible versions of the documents we consider a disproportionate burden are rare,
  • we have always assisted, and will always assist, with accessible versions on request.

Assessment

Where documents are no longer in active use, or no longer being updated, there is a high cost in terms of employee hours to convert. Some documents are part of the public record but no longer represent the current position, and interest is limited. We will always respond to requests for different formats on a case-by-case basis, so accessible versions are available on demand.

We consider that the costs of converting older documents where there is little evidence of demand would be a poor use of limited staff time and would represent a disproportionate burden on the organisation in terms of cost.

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

Third-party content

Our site contains third-party content that we do not develop or control, so we are not responsible for its accessibility. We work with third parties to improve accessibility where we can. This includes:

  • the embedded YouTube video player, which contains some ARIA code that is not valid. This may affect how screen readers announce some player controls (WCAG 2.2 success criterion 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value),
  • other content and functionality provided by third parties on our website,
  • content hosted on other websites, such as social media sites.

What we’re doing to improve accessibility

In October 2026 we carried out a full manual and automated audit of the 30 most visited pages on this website against WCAG 2.2 AA. We fixed the issues it found, apart from the video audio description issue described above, and checked each fix.

We regularly monitor the accessibility of this website using automated Quality Assurance software, which we use to identify and fix issues as they arise. We also use tools such as Deque Axe, Google Lighthouse and WAVE to assess our websites and find and fix issues. We repeat the full audit at least once a year.

We work with our suppliers and third parties to ensure compliance with standards and plan for improvements and fixes where possible.

Feedback and contact information

We are always looking to improve the accessibility of our site. If you find anything on the site difficult to use, or wish to give us feedback on what could be improved, we would welcome it.

Please contact the Marketing Team by:

To help us understand the problem as quickly as we can, please provide:

  • the web address or title of the page where you found the issue,
  • the exact nature of the issue,
  • what computer and software you use.

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, please contact the Equality Advisory and Support Service (EASS).

Preparation of this accessibility statement

This statement was first prepared on 23 September 2024, following an evaluation of the website by the Government Digital Service. It was last reviewed on 7 October 2026.

This website was last tested between 5 and 7 October 2026 against the WCAG 2.2 AA standard. The test was carried out by Bury College’s web development team.

We tested the 30 most visited pages on the website, based on Google Analytics data. Each page was tested manually, including keyboard navigation, screen reader testing with NVDA, zoom and reflow, and text spacing, and with automated tools (axe DevTools, WAVE and Lighthouse).

The statement will be reviewed annually, and following any substantial revision of the website.

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