Accessibility
This page says what we aim at, what this site actually does today, and what it still gets wrong. If something here blocks you, tell us and we will get you the information another way while we fix it.
Last updated August 11, 2026.
The standard we aim at
We build this site against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1, Level AA. That is the standard most people mean when they say a site should be accessible, and it covers things like keyboard use, contrast, text alternatives, and content that does not depend on animation.
We are not claiming we conform to it everywhere. Nobody has audited this site independently, so a claim like that would be a guess dressed up as a fact. What follows is what we have checked ourselves, and what we already know is wrong.
What is true of this site today
Structure
Every page has one main heading, real landmarks (a banner, a navigation region, a main region, and a footer), and headings that step down in order without skipping levels. Each section is labelled by its own heading, so a screen reader user can move through a page by heading or by region and know where they are. A "skip to main content" link is the first thing in the tab order on every page.
Keyboard
Everything you can do with a mouse you can do with a keyboard. Buttons are buttons and links are links, not clickable boxes. The mobile menu opens from a button, reports whether it is open, closes with Escape, and hands focus back where it came from. The four pillar columns on the home page respond to arrow keys, Home, End, and Escape. The quiz runs entirely on buttons. The frequently asked questions use the browser's own expandable sections. The one prompt that appears over the page takes focus when it opens, keeps the Tab key inside itself while it is open, closes with Escape, and returns focus to where you were.
Focus
Focus is always visible. The ring is drawn in two colours, one of which stands out on bone and the other on the dark and crimson sections, so it never disappears against the surface it is sitting on. We have not removed focus outlines anywhere without putting a stronger one back.
Motion
If your device is set to reduce motion, this site listens. The opening sequence on the home page does not run at all, the scroll reveals never engage, the pointer effect on the placements grid is switched off, smooth scrolling is turned off, and transitions and animations are reduced to nothing.
More important than any of that: no content is hidden behind an animation. The scroll reveal is applied by script after the page loads, so if the script fails, if you have JavaScript off, or if you have reduced motion on, everything is simply visible from the start. The opening sequence on the home page can also be dismissed with a click, Escape, Enter, or the space bar, and it clears itself after a few seconds regardless.
Contrast
Body text measures about 16:1 against the bone background and secondary text about 8:1, where the standard asks for 4.5:1. The gold buttons carry dark text at about 10:1. Text on the crimson sections measures about 8:1. Those all pass with room to spare. The smallest labels are a known exception and are listed below.
Colour and hover
Nothing on this site is explained by colour alone. Links in running text are underlined, the current page in the menu is marked in the page code as well as underlined, and form fields have visible text labels rather than placeholder hints standing in for them.
Nothing is revealed by hovering either. The placements grid reacts to a mouse pointer, but that is decoration: every company and field on it is readable without moving the pointer at all, and the effect is switched off on touch screens and under reduced motion. The pillar cards open on hover on a mouse, and they also open on click, open from the keyboard, and are all open at once if the script never runs.
Targets and text
Buttons, quiz answers, the menu toggle, and the pillar controls are at least 48 pixels tall, which is above the recommended minimum for a finger. All text is real text, not pictures of text, so it survives zooming and your own font settings. The layout reflows down to a 390 pixel phone without sideways scrolling.
Images
Photographs that carry meaning have text alternatives, and photographs that are purely decorative are marked as decorative so a screen reader skips them rather than reading a filename. Photographs sit under short captions where a caption adds something. The crest and the wordmark are drawn as background shapes and are hidden from assistive technology, because the organization's name is already there in text.
There is no audio or video anywhere on this site, so nothing here needs subtitles yet. If we add a video, it ships with captions and a transcript or it does not ship.
What is not there yet
Written down plainly, because a page that only lists good news is not worth reading.
The smallest text does not quite meet contrast
Captions, form field labels, event meta lines, and the small grey lines under headings measure about 4.3:1 against the bone background where the standard asks for 4.5:1, and about 3.9:1 on the cream sections. It is close, but close is still short. Nothing essential is only in that grey, and the fix is a single change to one colour value.
The members area is a demonstration, not a product
The log in and members pages are a preview built to show the board what the finished thing will look like. There is no real sign in behind them and the roster is made-up sample people. That area has not been through the same checks as the public pages, and it will be rebuilt before it holds anything real.
Some photography is a placeholder
Several images are licensed stand-ins waiting for real SUM photography. Their text alternatives describe the placeholder honestly, which means they will be rewritten when the real pictures land.
Nobody outside has audited this
What we have done is walk the site with a keyboard, measure the palette, and run automated checks in the browser. What we have not done is a formal third-party audit or testing with people who use screen readers, magnifiers, or voice control every day. Automated checks catch a minority of real problems, so treat this page as our own honest assessment rather than a certificate.
Places we link to are not ours
Instagram, LinkedIn, and the merch store run their own sites. We cannot fix accessibility problems there. If one of them stops you doing something SUM related, email us and we will handle it directly instead.
Why there is no accessibility button on this site
You may have seen sites with a small floating icon offering to fix contrast, font size, or screen reader support. We do not use one and we are not going to add one. Those tools sit on top of a page instead of fixing it, they often get in the way of the screen readers and browser settings people already have set up, and the claims made for them have not held up. The work belongs in the page itself.
Your own browser and operating system settings for text size, zoom, contrast, and reduced motion all work on this site. That is the right place for them to live.
Found a barrier? Tell us
Email csufsigmaupsilonmu@gmail.com with "accessibility" in the subject line. It helps if you can include the address of the page, what you were trying to do, and what you are using to browse, such as a screen reader, voice control, or keyboard only. Do not worry about getting the technical detail right; a sentence describing what went wrong is enough.
We aim to reply within five business days during the semester. Replies over the summer and between terms can be slower, because the board is made up of students. If the fix is going to take a while, we will tell you that and give you what you were after another way: by email, over the phone, or in person on campus.
Asking about an event, RSVPing, or applying for rush can all be done by email instead of through the forms on this site. Nobody has to use this website to reach us.
Keeping this honest
Every claim on this page describes the site as it is on the date at the top, not what we hope it becomes. When we change the site we re-check this page, and when we fix something on the list above we take it off the list and move the date.
SUM and the university
Sigma Upsilon Mu is a registered student organization at California State University, Fullerton. This site is run by the organization, not by the university. Its content is ours and does not represent the views of CSUF, and this statement covers this site only, not any university system or page.