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Media captioning

Per CSU policy, including Executive Order 1111, and the ADA Title II web and mobile accessibility rule, ÍÑ¿ã°É Bay must make its programs, services, and activities accessible to students, employees, and members of the public with disabilities. This includes multimedia used in courses, events, and on public-facing websites.

“Multimedia” includes any combination of text, audio, still images, animation, or video regardless of delivery system (for example, YouTube or other streaming platforms, Canvas course sites, PowerPoint recordings, and campus websites). Video presentations with audio must be captioned. Captions (or subtitles) must be visible for any time-based multimedia presentation (for example, a movie, video, or animation) in order to meet WCAG 2.1 Level AA.

Quick checklist for content owners

• All required instructional and public-facing videos have accurate, synchronized captions.
• Audio-only content (such as podcasts or audio lectures) has a full-text transcript.
• Live streamed events with required accommodations include real-time captioning.
• Auto-generated captions are reviewed and corrected before being relied on for accessibility.
• Vendors or publishers confirm that purchased media includes high-quality captions and/or transcripts.

Prioritization guidance

High priority captioning

• An accommodation is requested by a student, employee, or member of the public who requires captioning and the request is verified by the appropriate campus office (for example, Accessibility Services, Human Resources, or an equal opportunity office).
• Multimedia will be presented multiple times and/or over an extended period of time (for example, used in a course for more than one term, reused in new courses, or used in revised segments of existing courses).
• Multimedia appears on a public-facing web page (for example, commencement or other streamed or recorded events, news and marketing videos, or informational videos). This includes social media and other non-university-hosted sites that are officially associated with ÍÑ¿ã°É Bay departments, units, or services.

Other prioritization considerations

• Purchased multimedia should be delivered in a captioned state. If not, captioning will be done once appropriate rights have been acquired. This applies to uncaptioned purchased media and online videos belonging to other owners (for example, YouTube) that may be used in a class or on a website. The employee or department is responsible for securing permission from the copyright holder/content owner or acquiring updated or alternate material with captions.
• Archived materials should be captioned upon request. Frequently requested materials should be proactively captioned.
• Captioning is a lower priority if lecture capture is used to post a lecture that is a review of a face-to-face class, will only be available for one term, and you have verified that there is no accommodation request.
• If captioning is required for one term only, the quality must still be clear enough to allow equivalent access (for example, the ability to infer the meaning of whole sentences). Auto-generated captions (such as YouTube’s automatic captions) are not acceptable on their own due to the tendency for errors, unless they are reviewed and corrected by the content owner.

How to request captioning support

• Courses and academic content: contact Accessibility Services or Online Campus with your course ID and links to the media that need captions.
• Events or marketing videos: work with University Communications or the hosting department to plan for captioning when you schedule the event or produce the video.
• Purchased media or vendor platforms: coordinate with Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Purchases and the ATI team to confirm that captions and transcripts are available as part of the accessibility review.

CSU captioning guidance

Additional systemwide guidance is available from the , including policies and tools for captioning and media accessibility.

Accessibility of this page

We aim for this page and the resources it links to to meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 Level AA and the requirements of the ADA Title II web and mobile accessibility rule.

If you encounter video or audio content at ÍÑ¿ã°É Bay that is not properly captioned, please contact Accessibility Services or complete the .

Last updated: December 2025