The Equall Oppor
rtunit
ty Unit
t
The University o
of Hon
ng Kon
ng
Spring 2
2014
For all our differences, w
we
make a com
mplete world!
Rolles of an Eq
qual Oppor
O
rtunit
ty Adv
viser ((EOA)
1. First ccontact point in a dep
partment to
o give advicce on equa
al opportunity issues.
2. May be
b invited to serve as a mem
mber of th
he Discrim
mination Co
omplaints Committee
e to
condu
uct formal investigatio
ons.
3. Can h
help to prom
mote equall opportunity in the de
epartment by:

Atttending events of Equ
ual Opporttunities Fesstival held annually.

in the evvents of Equal
En
ncouraging staff mem
mbers of tthe departtment to participate
p
Op
pportunitiess Festival.

Ch
hecking wh
hether the w
website of the department is in line with th
he standing
g guidelines on
we
eb accessibility and if not, th
he EOA ca
an help to
o amend the website or ask the
de
epartmental staff mem
mber to am
mend. Web
bsites that are inacce
essible to p
persons wiith a
dissability co
ould be a kind off disabilityy discrimin
nation and under the Disab
bility
Disscriminatio
on Ordinance, this cou
uld be a kin
nd of unlaw
wful act.
Ass an EO
OA is the first con
ntact perrson in a departm
ment to ggive advicce on eqqual
oppportunitty issues,, what arre the Doos &Don’ts in handling coomplaintts?
 Refer the case to
t the Equa
al Opportu
unity Unit o
or seek help from the
e Equal Op
pportunity Unit
whene
ever you co
onsider app
propriate
 Do nott act as a ju
udge
 Write d
down the a
alleged eve
ents chrono
ologically
Lo
orem Ipsum
 Analyyze the factts objective
ely
 Be im
mpartial
 Exam
mine whethe
er the alleg
gations cou
uld constitu
ute to prohiibited discrrimination/h
harassmen
nt
 Expla
ain the posssible chann
nels and le
et the Comp
plainant ch
hoose the next
n
step
 Re
eport to the
e Equal Op
pportunity U
Unit
 Acct in accord
dance with the Procedures in ha
andling disscrimination
n/harassme
ent compla
aints
of HKU
 Co
omplain to the Equal Opportunitties Comm
mission
 Re
eport to the
e police

sta
art civil pro
oceedings a
at the Distrrict Court
W
What arre the pprocedu
ures forr handliing disccriminaation/ h
harassment
coomplain
nts at HK
KU?
W
Write
to th
he VC
Equal Opportun
O
nity Offic
cer
Concilia
ation/med
diation
Dis
scrimina
ation Com
mplaints
N
No case
Case se
ettled by concilia
ation
Co
ommittee
Impo
ose penalty for
Case unsubstantiated
subs
stantiated
d case
F
For more details, please refer
r
to paragraph 18 to 58 of P
Proceduress for han
ndling
d
discriminatiion/harassment co
omplaints, which can be
e found at http://www.hkku.hk/
e
eounit/eng//procedures.htm.
3
W
What aree the guideliness on webb accesssibility?
RE
EADING U
USING TH
HE PC
1. For perssons with vvisual impa
airment (P
PWVI) using a PC, a
software
e known as a "screen reader" is used. The
e output iss
in the fo
orm of syntthesised sp
peech and
d/or Braille through a
refreshab
ble Braille
e device. The mo
ost commo
on screen
reading software is "JAWS"" which iss available
e in manyy
language
es including English a
and Chinesse.
RE
EADABLE
E FORMAT
T
2. Essentia
ally, JAWS will read a
anything on
n the scree
en that hass
a text ba
ase. It w
will not read
d images-based material, e.g.
graphicss and ph
hotos.
F
File
forma
ats contaiining textt
compone
ents (hencce readable
e by PWVI) include, MS Word
(doc), sim
mple text ((txt), email (eml), Exccel (xls), Po
ower Pointt
(htm/html)
(ppt), webpages
w
and text-base
ed (called
searchab
ble) PDF (PDF). Of these, the most read
dable oness
are the d
doc and txxt, the doc being prefferred for iits ease off
navigatio
on with the cursor keyys.
3. If there is
i a choice
e, it is infin
nitely prefe
erable to provide
p
the
e
doc form
mat to stude
ents with viisual impairment.
FIIGURE CA
APTION (O
OR ALT TEXT)
T
4. A brief te
ext descrip
ptive captio
on by an im
mage or fig
gure would
be imme
ensely helpful to readers with
h visual im
mpairment.
This wou
uld inform them of th
he existencce of an u
unreadable
e
image.
PDF FO
ORMAT (ccont’d)
6. Any PDF file containin
ng a
e image ha
as no text base
b
pure
and hence u
unreadable
e by
PWV
VI. This is said to
o be
unse
earchable.
A sighted
persson just lo
ooking at the
scre
een cann
not tell the
as
diffe
erence
an
unse
earchable PDF im
mage
mayy appear to contain text
altho
ough, in actual
a
fact, the
appa
arent text is part off an
imag
ge. The screen rea
ader
JAW
WS would say "em
mpty
docu
ument, ass it sees no
emb
bedded rreadable text
base
e.
PD
DF FORM
MAT
5. Files in such
s
forma
ats as Micrrosoft Officce, plain te
ext and sea
archable P
PDF are re
eadable byy the
Braille de
evices used by people with visual impairm
ment. PDF
F files prod
duced by m
most scann
ners
are not re
eadable byy Braille sca
anners.
We can p
produce a searchable
e PDF file simply
s
by cclicking "sa
ave as" in Microsoft
M
O
Office.
Alternativvely, the following pro
ocedure will produce a searchab
ble PDF file
e from Miccrosoft Officce:
-
Click "F
File Print" just like printing a h
hard copy.
Select "Adobe PD
DF" as the printer.
Click "O
OK" just likke printing a hard cop
py.
Enter a name forr the PDF ffile when assked to do so.
Click "S
Save".
Lo
orem Ipsum
SPRING 2014
OCUMEN
NTS FROM
M SCANNIING
DO
7. Most olde
er scannerrs will scan
n a document and ge
enerate an
n image
(unsearchable) PDF
F file. Thiss is definite
ely uselesss to studen
nts with
visual impairment. In fact, th
his is the m
major sourcce of unde
esirable
eadable) PD
DF files.
(unsearchable/unre
SE
EARCHAB
BLE PDF FFROM SCA
ANNING
8. With new
wer modelss of scanne
ers, the use
er has a ch
hoice of either an
ordinary (unsearcha
able) or a good searcchable outtput. The latter
l
is
u
the option called "scan document"" rather
normally obtained under
an picture"". Basically the lattter (search
hable optio
on) has
than "sca
built in a
an addition
nal text-reccognition procedure
p
known as optical
characterr recognitio
on (OCR) which em
mbeds the text base
e in the
PDF file making
m
the
e latter sea
archable forr PWVI.
CO
ONVERTIING FROM
M BAD TO
O GOOD P
PDF
9. For the te
echnically minded, it is possible
e to convert an image (bad)
PDF into
o searchab
ble (good P
PDF forma
at using an OCR so
oftware.
The softw
ware calle
ed Omnipa
age or Om
mnipage prrofessional would
perform tthis task. T
This procedure is onlly used as last resortt (e.g. if
the original doc file has be
een lost) as,
a apart from bein
ng time
consumin
ng, the acccuracy of (O
OCR) is alw
ways limite
ed.
GO
OOD PRA
ACTICE RE
E PDF
10
0. To avoid
d the troub
ble mentio
oned in 6 and
a
9 abo
ove, it is in
nfinitely
preferab
ble and more efficientt to have a good PDF
F (searchab
ble) file
generate
ed using th
he direct te
echnique m
mentioned in 5. Thiss would
do awayy with the e
extra proce
edures of p
printing, sccanning and OCR
with an inferior output.
ON
NLINE EL
LECTRONIIC MATER
RIALS
11
1. Most on
nline electrronic mate
erials, e.g. electronicc journals, online
newspap
pers and library resources are text-based
d, hence re
eadable
for PWV
VI.
NO
ON ASCIII (NON-TE
EXT) CHA
ARACTERS
12
2. In MS W
Word, aparrt from standard ASC
CII text characters, m
most of
the symb
bols entere
ed under th
he "insert/ssymbol" menu are re
eadable
with a sp
pecial keysstroke.
Further informattion/
enquiriess
To learn m
more aboutt the
Equal Op
pportunity U
Unit,
please
visit
http://www
w.hku.hk/eou
nit/eng/in
ndex.htm.
e
For enquirries, please
contact the Equal
Opportunity Unit at
3917 5171
1 or
eounit@h
hku.hk.