Hi Charline,
Something that popped into my head while reading your message is that the
paper might have done something that one of our retail electronic stores
does with their flyers or circulars every week.
They don't actually print out the items on their circular, they simply scan
the page and post it up on the page as an image.
This might be what the newspaper publisher is doing with their newspaper.
While I realize that a large number of newspaper publishers do not do this,
some do, and so you may want to try some things before you take the course
of action I'm going to suggest at the bottom of this message.
First, you have to find out if other sections of the newspaper are
accessible. I know you said that you entered on the comics, and/or pga 1,
but you have to do a full audit of the newspaper's pages to determine if
this is a problem with the newspaper, or the way your screen reader is
presenting the webpage layout.
Secondly, have you tried to access any other newspaper from your area, and
if so, have you gotten them to read with your screen reader?
You may want to try the stories or pages on another newspaper's website, if
only to see if you get the same results. If you do, then it's safe to
assume that it's something on your end, and not the paper's.
Another thing you might want to try, as someone has already suggested, is to
use the Jaws cursor and see what is on the page itself, to see if there is,
in fact, any text on the pages you're bringing up. If there is, then it is
most definitely something on your computer's end, and you need to change the
layout of how your screen reader displays the webpage, in other words, make
sure you are using simple view, as opposed to screen view, and go from
there.
So, if you've found out that the problem isn't on your end, your computer is
fine, and your view settings for the browser are perfectly ok, then you have
to approach the newspaper's customer service department, or public relations
department.
Find out of they have an alternative format for the paper, possibly a PDF
version, you can obtain, or get sent to you, which you can then, either get
printed, scanned and use OCR on it, or you can send the document to a
virtual printer, such as Kurzweill's virtual printer, or Microsoft's virtual
printer, which you can then OCR and have it read to you.
Another option is to approach the IT department of the newspaper and get
them to author the web page properly, and in accordance with W3C standards,
which they will know what they are, but for your own information, it is the
World Wide Web Consortium, which develops guidelines for creating web pages
that are completely accessible and properly formatted.
Let them know that you require access to the newspaper for school, and
whether they can help you in a timely manner or not.
If they can, great, but if they can't, you'll have to move onto my next
suggestion, that of approaching your teacher/school dean or principal.
Since the newspaper is unable to help you read the paper, and your current
available technology is ill equipped to handle it, you need to approach the
school and get them to change what is required for the class, or equalize
everyone in the class, so each person, you included has an equal opportunity
to use the class material needed to complete the course. All schools and
school boards have guidelines and services available to those students who
require special aids or assistance with dealing with inaccessible school
material. It is unfair that you should foot the extra cost for school, just
to pass a course.
Either way, I hope you get this figured out, and please let us know what
you're going to do, and it's result.
Victor
Co-moderator
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