Hello! I’m Tessa, and for the last four weeks I’ve been the Web Accessibility and Resource List Intern here at LHSA – well not exactly ‘here’, as like all of us I’ve been working remotely, which for me is from my flat in Glasgow. Despite this I’ve had a wonderful experience, and keen to share what I’ve been working on…
My internship was formed of two main parts;
firstly, I tested the LHSA’s website against the UK
Government’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.1). It was surprising to find out this is a mandatory list of criteria
that a website must meet in order to enable access to users with disabilities
such as visual, hearing, cognitive and mobility.
WCAG 2.1 is based on the following 4 design principles:
·
Perceivable
·
Operable
·
Understandable
· Robust
Essentially these principles encompass
everything that makes a website accessible for all users, from ease of
navigation to appropriate colour contrast. With the daunting
thought of over 500 pages making up the LHSA website, I started by testing the
main index pages (of which there are 16) as these are likely to receive the
highest user traffic. I then further tested internal pages, which contain
elements like tables, video and audio sections which I thought would be
beneficial to assess. I ended up exceeding my expectations, testing just shy of
80 pages, which I hope will provide a good representation on the types of future
improvements to be made. As there could often be many elements to test within one
page, the application WAVE (Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool) proved
invaluable by cleverly highlighting areas that needed attention and also translating
web code into human language!
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| WAVE in action, testing the LHSA Home page |
After about a week of running tests, the second part of my internship was a complete contrast! As the reading room is currently closed, my task was to compile a list of digital resources from the University of Edinburgh and beyond on the history of psychiatry in the UK, to aid research and teaching. Records relating to this subject are often highly requested at the LHSA, and fortunately for me, there was so much to be found online! Among the range of resources I’ve included on the list are three podcast series from the University of St Andrews, and an entire playlist of talks on mental health, recorded at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. Also, it was interesting to see the different and innovative ways institutions are enabling and facilitating remote access to their collections while access is currently limited, and I definitely found myself falling down a few rabbit-holes during my research…
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| The feeling when you stumble across a page of online exhibitions |
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| The Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh's online exhibition 'Moonstruck: 500 Years of Mental Health' - |
As well as these two tasks, I was able to learn about the history and daily operations of the LHSA – talking to Ruth Honeybone about her conservation work, finding out more about Louise Neilson’s role as Access Officer and Louise Williams' work as archivist. These chats have been great for keeping myself and fellow Intern Farhana connected, along with attending the CRC Staff meeting – not least the weekly virtual coffee breaks!
It is clear to me that I have learnt a tremendous amount
in the last four weeks, which I somewhat feel is a result of remote working,
rather than in spite of the current restrictions. With this, I’ve had to learn
to adapt to new challenges, but I’ve felt incredibly supported throughout (a testament
to Louise N and the rest of the wonderful LHSA team!) and would certainly
recommend any new professionals like myself pursuing a remote internship in the
future. I look forward to when I’m able to visit the LHSA in person in the
not-so-distant future!
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