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Part 3: Tagging your Application

Part 3: Tagging your Application

Owned by Daniel LaGrow, created
Last updated: Mar 13, 2025

 Instructions

Step 7: Tagging Content

When your PDF Tab Order is finished, it is time to tag your PDF. Tagging your form is a very long and repetitive process, but it does get easier and faster with time and practice. We have to tag our objects in this order.

  1. The Form Fields - When tagged they should have OBJR tags inside of Form Tags. Then include a Paragraph Tag with the name of your content for the form field inside it.

    A paragraph tag has the text full name inside. There is also a link tag with an OBJR tag called Full Name - OBJR in the tag.

  2. The Title (Heading Tag), then the Employment/Job Application Text (Heading 1 Tag), and the All Fields are Required (Paragraph Tag) text.

    The Heading tags with their content inside.

  3. The sections text like Personal Information, and Education (All Heading 2 Tags).

    The Heading 2 Tags for each of the sections.

  4. Tag the Page Numbers with Paragraph Tags.

    The Tag Hierarchy for Page Numbers

  5. Tag the regular text with Paragraph Tags.

    A paragraph tag with text inside it.

  6. The Unmarked Content, this includes lines and blank spaces between rows of content. Place it all in a single paragraph tag, then set the content to Artifact. Then delete the paragraph tag.

  7. Rearrange the tags by placing the completed form field tags and paragraph tags into the tags of the sections they are a part of. Make sure those tags are all in the correct order too.

Chapter 4 and Chapter 7 in this series have examples of how to tag most objects found in PDF documents and forms. To see the tagging process and final results, watch our Sample Project Series.

Step 8: Accessibility Checker

You have now reached the last step of our process before testing with a screen reader. We need to use Adobe’s Accessibility Checker. The accessibility checker will scan our entire document, from the tags, to the font used, to the color contrast, and many other accessibility attributes. After it is done checking, the accessibility checker will give us a notification on what issues need to be fixed and what fulfills accessibility requirements.

Keep in mind though, that while accessibility checkers are very good, they should not be completely depended on. Think of them as a first step for testing accessibility. If you want to see if your document is completely accessible, it is recommended to test it with a screen reader. When you have all of the issues fixed in Acrobat’s Accessibility Checker, feel free to double check it using PAC 2021 and compare the results.

Afterwards, use NVDA or another screen reader to test your PDF. Everything in your PDF should be read by the screen reader in order. If anything is skipped, be sure to fix the reading order or tab order or any additional issues you may run into. Once you are done, the PDF should be fully accessible, and you can share it with your student, or other faculty that need it.

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