Open Journal System accessibility statement

There are a number of customisation options for your browser and device that could help you use the website and other websites more effectively.

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

Explore some of our recommendations for tools that can make your online experience better.

We provide a facility whereby resources can be converted in range of alternative formats via Sensus Access.

Please contact us if you have an accessibility query including:

• If you are experiencing issues with accessing information or using the website
• If you find an accessibility problem not listed on this statement
• If you have positive feedback on the accessibility considerations made. 

When you contact us there is a process in place that will acknowledge your contact, tell you who is dealing with it and give you a timescale by which you can expect a reply.

We are designing our content to be as accessible as possible. If you experience barriers, you can request alternative formats. For more information please contact the alternative formats team. 

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 the University of Kent’s webmaster to register your difficulty. This helps us improve our systems. 

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).

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

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

We formally test the accessibility of key user journeys that represent the breadth of content across our website on a regular basis against WCAG 2.1 AA standards. 

Some parts of the website may not work for everyone. Below are known issues that we either need to fix, cannot fix, or do not need to fix right now.

If you find something that does not work that we missed, remember to contact us.

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

This section covers issues that we need to fix and are working to do so. The issues listed in this section refer to both the platform (OJS) and the content hosted on OJS. Where issues are part of the platform we may not be able to fix these in house. 

Tool tips are missing or do not stay visible

Some elements are missing tooltips. Others have tooltips that disappear as soon as the cursor moves focus away from the element. This means that users who need to hover the mouse over the content in the tooltip, for magnification etc cannot do this (WCAG: 1.4.13).

Contrast Issues

Some pages contain elements with low contrast between the elements and its background particularly when under focus. This can cause the text to be difficult to read, especially for those with low vision, poor eyesight, or colour blindness. 

OJS is developed by a third party, Public Knowledge Project (PKP), with customisation applied locally by the university. Thus some of the issues with the colour contrast may be fixed by Kent, however, some issues may be part of the platform that we cannot control (WCAG: 1.4.3).

Issues with focus indicator 

Some elements may not always display effective focus indication. (WCAG 2.4.7).

Journal editors are responsible for the content uploaded to the OJS platform (journal articles, reviews, images, videos, etc.).  We can make changes to the front-end appearance of journal webpages, but this is subject to what has been made available by PKP for the platform. 

The following is a list of the issues we have identified with content uploaded to OJS from a large sample of representative documents:

Document untagged 

Portable Document Format (PDF) tags are hidden labels that clarify the structure of the document and define what’s a heading, paragraph, table, list, etc.

Documents language is not specified.

Documents do not have a language specified. The document does not specify the language in which it's been created. Certain technologies, such as screen readers, rely on the specified language to determine how to pronounce the document text.

Page titles

Some of the page titles do not accurately describe the content of the page. Some of the page titles are not unique which can cause confusion.

The document does not have any headings 

Do not only use visual appearance such as text size, bold or underline to mimic a heading. Always use the program's native heading styles to ensure headings are properly marked as headings.

Contrast issues 

Some documents contain text with low contrast between the text and its background. This can cause the text to be difficult to read, especially for those with low vision, poor eyesight, or colour blindness.

Images without a description 

Some documents contain images that don’t have a description or alternative text. People with screen readers or other assistive devices rely on these descriptions to understand the image content and purpose.

The document is scanned but not Optical Character Recognised (OCRed)

A scanned document is created when a paper-based document, often already printed, is digitised using a scanner. The scanning process takes a photograph of every page and bundles it together into a PDF or other format. While the content will look like text, it's just an image of the text. This means that the content cannot be accessed by screen reader or edited to meet learner’s requirements such as increasing font size or changing colours. 

To convert non-OCRed documents to an accessible format please use SensusAccess or contact us for assistance.

Tables without header row

Some documents contain tables which do not have their header row set with mark-up. This means that screen readers cannot identify the header row, and where tables overlap across pages, the header is not maintained on the following pages

The document's heading structure does not begin at one

The headings in this document don't begin with heading 1 and therefore don't follow a logical order. Having the main heading at the beginning of the document will provide a more logical structure and will make the document much easier to understand and navigate for all users.For standard documents, the title of the document should be Heading 1.

Headings are not sequential

Some pages may not contain consistent marked-up headings. The page is missing a top level heading.

This section covers issues that we cannot fix right now. We’ve assessed the cost of fixing these issues but believe that doing so would be a disproportionate burden within the meaning of the law.

We have not identified any issues that we believe to be disproportionate burden.

This section covers issues that we do not need to fix right now. The law calls these exemptions.

PDFs and documents

Some of our PDFs that are not essential to providing our services were published before 23rd September 2018. Any new PDFs or documents we publish will meet accessibility standards wherever possible.

If you experience difficulty accessing these documents please refer to our list of tools that can help with access or you can request alternative formats. 

We provide a facility whereby resources can be converted in a range of alternative formats via SensusAccess. 

For more information please contact the University's IT support service.

The issues listed in this statement refer to both the platform (OJS) and the content hosted on OJS. Where issues are part of the platform we may not be able to fix these in house.

OJS is an open source software application for managing and publishing scholarly journals that was originally developed and released by Public Knowledge Project (PKP).PKP publishing services provide technical support for Kent’s OJS software installation (e.g. upgrades, data exports, technical support).

The Office for Scholarly Communication (OSC) manages Kent’s installation of the OJS software (e.g. installing plugins, making edits to our own platform,  working with the journal editors, liaising with PKP for upgrades, date exports, etc).

PKP produces some useful guidance on creating accessible documents.

To help accessibility compliance across the sector, the University of Kent supports searchBOX, a centralised, independent directory of third-party accessibility information. 

SearchBOX catalogues the contact information and accessibility statements of third-party suppliers, enables the sharing of community-generated accessibility statements, and allows users to map their supplier ecosystem. 

Users can access third-party accessibility statements using the free searchBOX Finder service. 

The University of Kent encourages all our partners and suppliers to support this effort by ensuring that their accessibility information is included in the searchBOX directory.

This statement was prepared on 1 June 2020. It was last reviewed on 12 April 2022. 

This website was last tested on 1 June 2020. The test was carried out by University of Kent.