Cedar Crest College Campus Map

Cressman Library | Cedar Crest College

Facts & Figures | Cedar Crest College

Admissions & Aid | Cedar Crest College

PARKING AND TRAFFIC REGULATIONS

Faculty | Cedar Crest College

Office of Global Initiatives and International Programs

Human Resources | Cedar Crest College

Office of the Registrar | Cedar Crest College

Student Success and Engagement

All controls on the page - including links, buttons, and fields - should show when 
they have been selected by the keyboard.

You can confirm this yourself by loading a webpage and using the Tab key to navigate 
through it. Anything you can select should alter its appearance when selected. 
For example, a text field might change color, or have a distinctive border applied. 

This is default behavior for all standard web controls, and so if this issue is appearing
it is because this default behavior has been disabled. Or alternatively, if you have written
your own custom controls, these will need styling to support focus states.

## How to fix

Links and form controls typically define an `outline` CSS style, which ensures
they are highlighted automatically, for example:

```css
input:focus (outline: 2px solid red);
``` 

If you choose to override or disable the default `outline`, you should specify an accessible 
alternative, such as a border or background color.

### Elements appear to change in the browser

Focus states should be defined in CSS alone, and not require JavaScript to work.

Try disabling JavaScript on the page, and see if focus is still visible. If it not,
then the focus state won't work with assistive technologies that don't have a physical
keyboard, e.g. mobile phones.

Some more unusual means of implementing a focus state cannot be detected or measured
automatically. These include:

* Focus implemented via pseudo-elements - such as `::after` or `::before`.
* Focus using `:focus-within` (JavaScript current provides no way to access these).
* Focus cascaded to child elements, e.g. a `<span>` inside an `<a>` tag. We detect
  some of these cases, but there are variations that we cannot detect.

Currently, there is no practical way to assess these focus states automatically.

### Unexpected elements are focusable

You may be surprised to see tags like `<div>` or `<span>` being shown as focusable.
If an element has a `tabindex` of 0 or higher, it becomes focusable. Any HTML tag can be made 
focusable in this way, this is so that custom controls (e.g. your own drop-down menus, or 
sliders) can support keyboard navigation. [Learn more about tabindex on MDN](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Global_attributes/tabindex).

## Further reading

* [WCAG 2.4.7](https://www.w3.org/WAI/WCAG22/Understanding/focus-visible.html)

ensure-focus-is-visible

June 2024

May 2024

Cedar Crest College

Title / URL	Issues
Cedar Crest College Campus Mapwww3.cedarcrest.edu/campusmap.shtm	29
Cressman Library \| Cedar Crest Collegewww.cedarcrest.edu/academics/cressman-library/	16
Facts & Figures \| Cedar Crest Collegewww.cedarcrest.edu/about/facts-figures/	14
Admissions & Aid \| Cedar Crest Collegewww.cedarcrest.edu/admissions-and-aid/	14
PARKING AND TRAFFIC REGULATIONSwww3.cedarcrest.edu/security/parking.shtm	14
Faculty \| Cedar Crest Collegewww.cedarcrest.edu/academics/faculty/	14
Office of Global Initiatives and International Programswww3.cedarcrest.edu/global/index.shtm	14
Human Resources \| Cedar Crest Collegewww.cedarcrest.edu/human-resources/	14
Office of the Registrar \| Cedar Crest Collegewww.cedarcrest.edu/registrar/	14
Student Success and Engagementwww3.cedarcrest.edu/studentaffairs/index.shtm	14

Ensure controls change appearance when they are selected

Cedar Crest College

Where this issue has occurred