Skip to main content.
  • Faculty + Staff
  • Alumni/ae
  • Families
  • Students
Bard
  • Bard
  • Academics sub-menuAcademics
    • Academics
      • Programs and Divisions
      • Structure of the Curriculum
      • Courses
      • Requirements
      • Academic Calendar
      • Faculty
      • College Catalogue
      • Bard Abroad
      • Libraries
      • Dual-Degree Programs
      • Bard Conservatory of Music
      • Other Study Opportunities
      • Graduate Programs
      • Early Colleges
  • Admission sub-menuAdmission
    • Applying
      • Apply Now
      • Financial Aid
      • Tuition + Payment
      • Campus Tours
      • Meet Our Students + Alumni/ae
      • For Families / Para Familias
      • Join Our Mailing List
      • Contact Us
  • Campus Life sub-menuCampus Life
    • Living on Campus
      • Housing + Dining
      • Campus Resources
      • Get Involved on Campus
      • Visiting + Transportation
      • Athletics + Recreation
      • Montgomery Place Campus
      • Current Students
      • New Students
  • Civic Engagement sub-menuCivic Engagement
    • Bard CCE The Center for Civic Engagement (CCE) at Bard College embodies the fundamental belief that education and civil society are inextricably linked.

      Take action.
      Make an impact.

      • Campus + Community
      • In the Classroom
      • U.S. Network
      • International Network
      • About CCE
      • Support
      • Get Involved
  • Newsroom sub-menuNews + Events
    • News + Events
      • Newsroom
      • Events Calendar
      • Press Releases
      • Office of Communications
    • Special Events
      • Family and Alumni/ae Weekend
      • Commencement + Reunion
      • Fisher Center + SummerScape
      • Athletic Events
    • Join the Conversation
      •         

  • About Bard sub-menuAbout Bard
    • About Bard College
      • Bard History
      • Campus Tours
      • Employment
      • Visiting Bard
      • Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
      • Sustainability
      • Title IX and Nondiscrimination
      • Board of Trustees
      • Bard Abroad
      • Open Society University Network
      • The Bard Network
  • Give
  • Search

Supporting Universal Design

BardIT Menu
  • Services sub-menuServices
    • Academic Technology Services (ATS)
    • Helpdesk
    • Management Information Systems (MIS)
    • Networks and Systems (NetSys)
    • Telecom Services
    • Purchasing
    • Training and Documentation
    • User Services
    • Web Services
  • Helpdesk sub-menuHelpdesk + Support
    • Helpdesk Tickets
    • Desktop Support
    • Email
    • Student Employees
  • Labs sub-menuFacilities + Printing
    • Labs and Hours
    • Classrooms
    • Bard Print
  • Teach sub-menuTeaching + Learning
    • Academic Technology Services (ATS)
    • Universal Design
    • Teaching Technology
    • Video Conferencing
    • Training and Documentation
    • Media Support
    • Course Continuity
  • Security sub-menuSecurity + Policies
    • Email Lists and Usage
    • Security Best-Practices
  • About sub-menuAbout
    • Mission
    • Our Staff
  • Home
Through Campus Technology Accessibility

Accessible Media Files

A File Conversion tool to make your digital course materials more accessible.

Bard SensusAccess is an on-demand file conversion service that helps Bard students, staff, and faculty convert digital materials into alternate formats, such as audio books, e-books, digital large-print and Braille.
This service improves the accessibility and readability of your digital documents.

Bard SensusAccess

Accessible PDF Documents

Review Your Current PDF Documents

  • Audit your digital course materials. Do some PDF files display sideways? Are any of them somewhat illegible even under ideal conditions? If so, check to see if it is available from a vendor (via our library’s subscriptions) and replace that older, skewed scan. Or, re-scan it from a cleaner copy using one of the OCR-enabled copier/scanners on campus.
  • Have you added the document properties for Title, Author, and Language to your PDFs (course reading) and/or Office files (like your syllabus)?
  • Have you used a legible document file name that does not contain spaces and/or special characters? Is the document file name clear and concise, limited to 20–30 characters? (eg. Jackson_Rethinking_Repair.pdf )
  • Was the document scanned using OCR (Optical Character Recognition)? If you don’t know, open the PDF, find a unique word in your document and search the text (using command-F or control-F) for that word. If you are able to search and find keywords in the text, characters are recognized in that document - this is one crucial step toward creating a more accessible document.
  • Have you tried using a screen reader or another assistive technology? Open a document in Adobe Acrobat Pro or Reader, from the file menu, select View, then Read Out Loud. Select Activate Read Out Loud. From the same file menu (View - Read Out Loud) chose: Read this Page Only. How (machine) readable was your document?
     
Tips for Creating Accessible PDFs
  • Scan at a resolution of 300dpi or higher (up to 600dpi for text that is smaller than 10 points).
  • Use software like Adobe Acrobat Pro DC to convert the PDF file into recognized text. Acrobat Pro’s OCR currently produces better results than the OCR software on some copier/scanners.
  • Add the document properties for Title, Author, and Language to your PDF.
  • Scanning two document pages to fit onto one page almost always results in a document with high text recognition errors. Consider scanning one full-size page of the original text at a time.
  • If you start with a clean source document (free of underlining, annotations, or black photocopying marks), you will usually be able to create a highly accessible document in only a few steps. When in doubt, re-scan your document or find a cleaner copy from a publisher, vendor or free online source (like archive.org or gutenberg.org).

Network Issues, Technical Assistance, and Logins:

  • Helpdesk@Bard
  • Call 758-7500
  • Email Login
  • Brightspace Login
  • Password Change
Bard College
30 Campus Road
PO Box 5000
Annandale-on-Hudson, New York 12504-5000
Phone: 845-758-6822
Admission E-mail: [email protected]
©2023 Bard College
Follow Us on Twitter
Like us on Facebook
Follow Us on Instagram
You Tube
Information For:
Prospective Students
Current Employees
Alumni/ae 
Families
Quick Links
Employment
Travel to Bard
Site Search
Support Bard
COVID-19 Info