[Irl-dean] Draft CEN CWA on Web Accessibility Certification

[Barry McMullin]

Dear Colleagues -

As many of you already know, CEN (the European Standardisation
body) has been overseeing the drafting of a so-called "CEN
Workshop Agreement (CWA)" on the subject of Web Accessibility
Certification. A draft of this CWA has now been issued for public
comment.  This draft is available (MS-Word format only - and I am
aware of the irony!) at the following URL:

  <ftp://ftp.cenorm.be/PUBLIC/CWAs/draft/WSWAC%20N%20027.doc>

The full title is "Specifications for a complete European Web
Accessibility Certification Scheme and a Quality Mark".

As you will recognise, if such a scheme does, in fact, come into
existence, it would potentially have significant impact right
across Europe.  Accordingly, despite the fact that this is a
rather technical document, I would encourage you to consider
commenting upon it (even - or perhaps especially - if you are not
in favour of the idea of web accessibility quality marks at all).

Comments should be sent to Tony Hittema, Workshop Secretariat, by
email to <tony.hittema at afnor.org>, using the
(MS-Word) template from the following (long) URL:

<http://www.cenorm.be/cenorm/businessdomains/businessdomains/isss/about_isss/commentstemplate.doc>

The comment deadline is 20 February 2006.

If you encounter any difficulties in accessing either of the
documents above (especially if these are related to
accessibility/assistive technology) please let me know.

If there is interest in doing so, it may be possible to arrange
a face-to-face seminar session to provide a briefing on this
process and to present and discuss the draft CWA.  Again, please
let me know if you would be interested in attending such a seminar.

And of course, please feel free to copy this announcement and
message to any other individuals, list, or forums where you think
it may be of interest.

Best regards,

- Barry.

---

Barry McMullin
Dublin City University
http://www.eeng.dcu.ie/~mcmullin/