Spartan Ally Quick Start Guide

Improve The Accessibility and Usability of your Content

Spartan Ally is a D2L/Brightspace integration that automatically scans course content for common accessibility issues and provides feedback to help faculty gauge the overall accessibility of their course, along with step-by-step guidance for fixing issues.

Alternative Formats

Ally automatically scans your content (PDF, DOCX, PPTX, ODF, HTML, D2L files and pages) , determines what accessible formats can be created from that content (tagged PDF, OCRed PDF, HTML, MP3, ePub, Electronic Braille, BeeLine Reader), and will then generate new accessible file types. You or your students can download this alternative format by clicking the icon to the right of each original file.

The ally icon for downloading a document in an accessible format

Accessibility Scores

Ally will automatically check for accessibility issues in your new, existing, and updated content, then assigns a numeric score from 0% to 100% based on the number and severity of issues. A colored gauge will accompany the score and can be found to the right of your content, on a content page’s menu area, and in the course’s overall accessibility report. Click the icon for instructions on fixing your content’s accessibility. 

4 gauges with corresponding color and dial position are shown to measure the accessibility of different documents

Course Accessibility Report

Your Course Accessibility Report, accessed through the Ally Report menu item, provides a summary and overview of your content’s accessibility at the course level. The report includes graphs and actionable steps to help you understand and remediate accessibility issues. 

Instructor Feedback Panel

The Instructor Feedback Panel offers a preview of your document with highlighted accessibility issues, and provides an Ally score, links to detailed explanations, and instructions for fixing each issue. 

Detailed Spartan Ally Resources

In-depth Spartan Ally Guide expands on the features in this document

Spartan Ally D2L Course offers a hands on approach to learning Spartan Ally

Sarah Wellman

Sarah is a Learning Design Specialist working with both the Eli Broad College of Business and the College of Arts & Letters. She has been working in higher education with a focus in online learning since 2010, holding positions previously at Macomb Community College and Bay Mills Community College where she currently teaches various computer, art history and native studies courses. Sarah brings a breadth of learning design experience to the EDLI team and specializes in course quality assurance, and development.