Kaltura Accessibility

Kaltura Help

Platform Accessibility

The Kaltura Platform meets Section 508 and WGAG 2.0 Level AA standards.  For more information on platform accessibility, please Download Kaltura VPAT2.4 Dec 2021 in PDF format

Additional references: 

Player Keyboard Shortcuts

Kaltura Capture - Keyboard Shortcuts

Media Accessibility

Color Contrast

Making content distinguishable is essential for low-vision and color blind users.  This is best achieved by providing sufficient color contrast between foreground (text) and background. Guidelines state the visual presentation of text must have a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 (normal text) and 3:1 for large and linked text. Large text is described as 18pt or 14pt bold.  Use the following tools to measure contrast ratios:

The use of Color to Convey Meaning

Color should NOT be used as the only way to convey meaning, prompt a response, or distinguish a visual element because it can make content inaccessible to blind and visually impaired learners.  If color is used to convey content meaning, instructors are encouraged to describe how color is used in his/her audio description of the presentation.  In this way, the audio and transcript of the video provides another means to distinguish a visual element and users who have problems distinguishing between colors can listen or watch for text cues.

Avoid using red and green to convey meaning or as the only means to differentiate content.  Users who have color-blindness benefit when information conveyed by color is available in other visual ways.  

Integrated Described Video

To reach students with visual disabilities, read aloud important content written in your slides and describe figures and visual aids.  This allows the audio track, transcript or caption to offer another way to distinguish visual elements. 

If using voice over PowerPoint/Google Slides/Keynote (as content for your videos)

  • Use 20 pt or larger font size for the slide titles
  • Use at least 18 pt size font or larger for the slide content
  • Use sans-serif fonts (Arial, Helvetica, or Verdana)

Captioning

Disabled Students Program (DSP) Captioned Media for Students

At the beginning of each term, the Disabled Students Program (DSP) Captioning Department will notify instructors that they have a student with a Letter of Accommodation (LOA) requiring realtime captioning and/or captioned media. In these cases, refer to Captioned Media Instructions. 

For questions regarding DSP captioning services, please email dsp-captioning@berkeley.edu.

Automated Captions

The Kaltura Media platform provides automated-captioning which supports broad usability of the media, providing a clickable, searchable  transcript for each media file uploaded to Kaltura. However, automated captions are insufficient for students with a Letter of Accommodation (LOA) requiring captioned media. For this scenario, please see DSP Captioned Media Policies (below). 

DSP Captioned Media Policies

  • Any media presented in your course needs to be captioned according to DSP policy prior to being shown. Media must be captioned appropriately before presenting it in lecture/discussion, posting on a website/bCourses, or linking to it in your syllabus.  Visit our Captioned Media FAQs for detailed information.

  • To have your media captioned, visit Captioned Media Instructions.

  •  UNCAPTIONED VIDEOS may NOT be shown in a class with a student who has a captioning accommodation.  This includes any videos which are shown by professors, lecturers, guest speakers, and in student presentations. This requirement comes from both ADA law and UC Policy PACAOS-140: Guidelines Nondiscrimination on the Basis of Disability. Students with a captioning accommodation must have communication access that is effective and provides the same access to information as their peers.  

  • Automated captions are NOT an acceptable form of captioning.  Please review this article on automated captions for clarification on automated captions. A quick way to determine if the captions are acceptable is to check to see if there is punctuation and speaker identifiers. 

Public Sharing

At UC Berkeley, we have not yet enabled public sharing of video content from Kaltura. All public sharing of campus media must adhere to copyright law (“fair use “ typically no longer applies) and must be accurately captioned in accordance with WCAG 2.0 Standard 1.2.2.  

DIY Captioning

Kaltura provides a means for you to manually improve (“Do It Yourself”)  the machine-generated captions that are provided automatically for all Kaltura videos. 

If you have a student with a Letter of Accommodation (LOA) requiring captions, you must utilize the DSP services to generate professional, human-edited captions for your course. DIY captions are not acceptable. Email  dsp-captioning@berkeley.edu for additional information.

If you do not have a student with an LOA, you can produce DIY captions following the instructions in the YouTube video, Revising Kaltura Auto Captions.

If you produce DIY captions for publicly available media, you are responsible for ensuring captions:

  • are accurate (proper punctuation, capitalization, and grammar)

  • are synchronized

  • include meaningful sound effects such as "Music Playing" or "Applause" 

  • include speaker identification if more than one person is speaking.  Speaker names or Speaker 1, Speaker 2, etc. can be used.

Revising Kaltura Auto Captions covers how to ensure the above criteria.