Author pictureI’m Luke McGrath, an accessibility consultant and writer. You can tell I’m a writer because I wrote How to Meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0. You can also tell I didn’t have any help with the title.

Web Accessibility Bio

I first got involved in web accessibility and the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 in 2011. Since then, I have learned everything I can about web accessibility – and I don’t expect to ever stop learning. I’m now putting my skills to the test and helping businesses make their websites accessible.

When I first read about web accessibility, I wanted to know everything and update all of my websites to AAA compliance immediately. A day later, I had scaled back my ambitions. I couldn’t make head nor tail of the guidelines themselves, their sufficient criteria, endless definitions of terms I’d never heard of before, and general incomprehensibility left me bewildered. So I set out to make things better. I scoured through the techniques for every guideline and distilled all the advice down according to two simple criteria:

  1. Was it useful advice?
  2. Was it future-proof?

From this benchmark I distilled over 700 hundred pages down to a little over 100. I used my own notes to write a book to help other people in the same situation.

How to Meet the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 is everything you need, and nothing you don’t: the simplest web accessibility tactics that produce the most benefit for your users. On the back of the book’s success, I began to expand this website as a place for me to talk about web accessibility in terms real people can understand.

Here’s some lovely feedback I got from a client:

We had the pleasure of working with Luke on a very large project. We found him to be responsive, knowledgeable and extremely pragmatic in helping us steer the path between best practice and client operational requirements. Would happily recommend him.

Chris Ryan

In May 2014 I was honoured to talk about web accessibility and the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines on Jen Simmons’ The Web Ahead Podcast, Episode 69.

Personal Bio

Born: 10th January 1986
Hometown: Newark-on-Trent
Current
: Newcastle upon Tyne
Occupation
: Digital Content Specialist
Education: LLb Law (Hons) 2:1, MA Creative Writing (Distinction) – both Newcastle University

I’m a writer, marketer and web accessibility consultant living in Newcastle upon Tyne. I have two beautiful daughters, Vani (3) and Anvi (1). I started writing when I realised how unfulfilling my law degree was.  I took a Masters in Creative Writing and graduated from Newcastle University with a distinction and a quarter of a novel.

I’m fairly active on social media, but you’ll most likely find me on Twitter and LinkedIn.

I like Korean and old Universal horror films, as well as classic television like Quincy, The A-Team and Quantum Leap. If you’d like to work with me on anything, contact me.

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