Blackboard Ally is BU’s digital accessibility tool offered through Blackboard to help make course materials more inclusive.
Ally automatically generates alternative formats, such as audio, HTML, and electronic braille, allowing students to choose the format that best meets their needs while instructors improve accessibility. Ally also provides instructors with a private accessibility dashboard that identifies issues and recommends improvements.
Who Can Use Ally?
Blackboard Ally is available to all current Boston University students, faculty, staff and those with a sponsored Guest account.
Educational Benefits
Your classroom includes students with varied abilities and learning preferences. Ally automatically scans your original content and applies processes to enhance accessibility, as well as:
- Ensures compliance with accessibility standards (e.g., WCAG 2.1, ADA)
- Promotes inclusivity and equity in education
- Improves usability for all learners not just those with disabilities
- Reduces risk of legal challenges related to accessibility
By making course materials more accessible, you empower students to choose the format that best supports their learning.
Benefits for Faculty
Benefits for Students
Key Features
- Accessibility Scoring: Evaluates course content and assigns an accessibility score based on compliance with standards
- Instructor Feedback: Offers clear, actionable guidance to improve content accessibility
- Alternative Formats: Automatically generates multiple formats, including tagged PDFs and ePubs, among others
- Institutional Reporting: Provides analytics and insights into accessibility trends across courses
Best Practices
- Get started with accessibility using Ally’s course accessibility report:
In Practice
“I had a student that was commuting to campus daily from Rhode Island (50-minute commute) and she was thrilled to hear she could download course materials and listen while commuting.”
-Maureen McCarthy
Adjunct Lecturer, BU College of Communications
Ally gives students a greater sense of belonging, because when we introduce it, we are telling students that we recognize that not all readers are alike, that we know some of them commute to campus, that we know some of them prefer to annotate texts. We are saying we care about how you learn, and we want to help.
Megan Sullivan
Faculty Director of BU Inclusive Pedagogy Initiative, Associate Professor of Rhetoric, College of General Studies
Additional Resources
- Visit TechWeb for additional technology support
- Visit the Blackboard Ally Support page for app-specific support
- Look for upcoming Institute workshops
For more information, to set up a consultation, or to explore more resources to enhance your teaching and learning: