How Universities Assess Accessibility During Procurement
Most universities have an accessibility procurement policy. Few have a reliable process for enforcing it. Here is how leading institutions are getting it right.
Why Accessibility Review Is Part of Procurement
Under Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act and Title II of the ADA, public universities are legally required to ensure that the technology they procure is accessible to students, faculty, and staff with disabilities. That obligation extends to third-party software.
Accessibility review during procurement is the mechanism that prevents liability from arising. It is not a box-checking exercise. It is the process by which institutions confirm, before signing a contract, that a vendor has taken accessibility seriously.
The Standard Approach: VPAT Review
The most widely used tool for vendor accessibility assessment is the Voluntary Product Accessibility Template, or VPAT. Vendors complete a VPAT to document how their product conforms to WCAG 2.1 criteria. Procurement teams then review those VPATs before making purchasing decisions.
In practice, the quality of VPATs varies enormously. Learning to tell the difference between a thorough VPAT and a generic one is a skill most procurement teams have to develop on the job, and the inconsistency that results creates real liability exposure.
What Leading Institutions Do Differently
They require VPATs before the demo, not after. Requesting a VPAT early filters out vendors who have not done the work and sets clear expectations from the start.
They use a scoring rubric. A structured rubric evaluates completeness, specificity of remarks, recency, and correct template version. A rubric creates consistency across reviewers and across vendors.
They document their findings. If an accessibility complaint arises after procurement, documentation of your VPAT review is what demonstrates due diligence.
They include accessibility in contract language. The strongest programs require vendors to provide an updated VPAT at each renewal and include remediation timelines as a contract condition when gaps are identified.
The Scaling Problem
Even with the right processes in place, accessibility procurement review is difficult to scale. A large university may evaluate dozens of new software tools each year. If each VPAT review takes two to four hours, the math becomes unsustainable quickly.
Inclusive Digital VPAT Evaluator automates the scoring of vendor VPATs, flags incomplete or vague responses, and produces an audit-ready report in seconds. Institutions can review more vendors, more consistently, with a fraction of the staff time manual review requires.
Automate your accessibility procurement review.
Inclusive Digital scores vendor VPATs in seconds so your team can make faster, more defensible procurement decisions.
Try VPAT Evaluator