Cultural accessibility in e-learning management systems : cultural artefacts of WebCT course design

Although it is a legal requirement of all institutions/organisations to permit sensorially, cognitively, and physically disabled persons equitable access to public website information, cultural accessibility is seldom considered important in the design of online information content. Many tertiary institutions have a highly diverse, multicultural student body whose learning needs require special attention. Usually instructors transform existing lectures and exercises, then adds links, and discussions to create Web supported units, but without any real understanding of possible cultural artefacts or inherent limitations of their interface. A popular e-learning management system, WebCT is used to both deliver and support courses using material commonly developed for students whose cultural and linguistic backgrounds are invisible for the teacher. This paper reports on the results of a survey and logfile analysis whereby students were asked to comment on their preferences for three uniquely different purpose-built WebCT pages which comprised identical content. Results showed a definite preference for a sparse, menu-driven website as opposed to a colourful, congested, all-in-one interface, or the bare-bones WebCT interface.