National Instructional Materials Accessibility

Standard
For Australian National Indigenous Music Awards (NIMAs), see National Indigenous
Music Awards.
The National Instructional Materials Accessibility Standard (NIMAS) helps facilitate
timely access to alternate formats of instructional materials for students with visual
impairments or other print disabilities. NIMAS (pronounced NYE-mas) outlines a set of
consistent and valid XML-based source files created by K-12 curriculum publishers or
other content producers. These well-structured source files can be used to
create accessible specialized formats (i.e., braille, audio, e-text, large print, etc.) of print
instructional materials. The full set of files includes XML content files, a package
file, images, and a PDF file of the title page (or whichever page
contains ISBN and copyright information).
In a significant step forward for students with disabilities, the U.S. Congress adopted
NIMAS as part of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004, a
reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

References
 NIMAS Topic Brief (OSEP)
 IDEA 2004 Archived 2015-07-11 at the Wayback Machine
 NIMAS Development & Technical Assistance Centers
 National Instructional Materials Access Center (NIMAC)