There is no explanatory text or "alt" text (I know it's not an image as such). The accessibility recommendations for Font Awesome seem to recommend containing  such text within a <span> and then using css to hide it (http://fontawesome.io/accessibility). This doesn't seem to have been done. 

We have had complaints from users using screen readers who are having serious problems because of this. 

I haven't checked, but I imagine this also applies to the "gear menus" in other places.