Carl Brown
1946 - 2008

The AT professional family has lost one of its most esteemed members. Carl Brown, Director of the High Tech Center Training Unit (HTCTU), died November 21, 2008 in Northern California. One simply cannot overstate Carl’s importance to the field of assistive technology, especially in higher education. He steadfastly championed this cause for over 30 years.

I had the very good fortune of participating in his training program in the early 90s. Carl and his staff at the time, Wayne Chenoweth and Marcia Norris, produced trainings that remain the standard by which others are judged to this day.

Carl Brown had the greatest vision and the most resolute determination of anyone I have ever known in the AT field. For many it will be hard to understand this loss because Carl promoted ideas, programs and philosophies rather than himself. But make no mistake; absolutely no one has had greater influence on shaping and defining AT in higher education than Carl Brown.

One trick I quickly learned during those training days was that if you brought your lunch back to the HTCTU, the chances were good that you would end up having lunch with Carl and whoever else was around in the conference room. I have fond memories of those lunches. My very first in-depth class about the internet was done by Carl in 93 or 94. Not only was he enthusiastic about the internet in its then rather primitive state, but it was clear he could see the future and the great possibilities the internet held. Also in those days I “toured” the De Anza College campus in a virtual reality that Carl built. It was a completely text and command line environment, but you could enter rooms, explore objects and even travel across the campus. As I said, he was man of vision.

It has been years since I have spoken with Carl, but his influence remains in much of my daily work. This is truly a very sad loss. My thoughts and prayers go out to his family.

Emerging and Diverging Competencies in College AT Support

I recently attended the International Dyslexia Association (IDA) national conference and it has me thinking about how supporting Assistive Technology in colleges and universities is diverging into two separate and distinct competencies. On the one hand, is the technical support aspect to AT, and on the other there is an emerging end-user support competency. The reason the IDA conference got me thinking about this is the way they discussed students utilizing AT. There was very little “technical” talk of keystrokes, networking problems, roaming profiles etc at the presentations. There was talk about assessing students, selecting appropriate tools and strategies, evaluating outcomes etc. While technology is an important tool to these professionals, the focus remained on the student.

The technical support competency essentially makes sure that the computers work and the AT is functioning as it should. The newer emerging end-user competency ensures that the user is getting the maximum benefit of the technology and in the world of AT this is a critical piece of support. These competencies are not unique to AT, but it is the AT aspect that is the subject of this brief article.

The Technical Support Competency

The AT tech-support competencies includes basic skill sets such as: understanding computer security, networking protocols, configuring and maintaining of desktop computers and basic web interactions. Additionally, the AT tech-support provider needs to understand resolving software conflicts, innovative uses of system level devices and their special application to AT. They also need a basic understanding of the alternative methods students with disabilities use when computing.

But in the end, the AT technical support competency is about providing a smooth-running, efficient and trouble-free computer. It has little to do with the end-user.

The End-user Support Competency

The end-user support competencies are skills related to the successful use of the recommended applications. Training computer users has grown into its own area of expertise. It is an even more critical task when the computer users have disabilities. While training students with physical disabilities requires special skills, it is students with learning disabilities that I want to focus on here.

Students with learning disabilities, obviously, may require alternative learning methods and learning to use the computer is no exception. An AT provider expected to get students with learning disabilities fluent with computers, must have some expertise in this specialized training area. And remember, we are not (necessarily) talking about using word processors or spreadsheets, but specialized programs to help the student compensate for a reading or other cognitive deficit.
Most AT support staff will probably tell you that their job is a blend of these two skill sets. I have been doing this for over fifteen years and that is what I would say. The depth of knowledge in each skill set is increasing to the point that it is becoming difficult for one person to do both well. In my own case, a few years back I began shifting basic tech-support to a systems group and I received formal and informal training in teaching technology integration to students.

How This May Affect Your Staffing

If you have an AT specialist on staff, then establish whether their strengths are technical support or end-user support. If your employee has good technical skills, then you might consider enhancing your end-user support. Most colleges have a department supporting academically struggling students and they can make a great partner in this endeavor. Their specialty is the student. They may even find some of your technology of interest for the students that they are serving.

If your AT specialist leans toward end-user support (this can be the case when a college hires a former student with a disability to work in the AT lab), then you might want to strengthen basic technical support. You usually find such support from your college IT department. Support can also be available from a smaller group, sometimes referred to as “systems support.” For example, such a group might manage computers in the library.

If you have no AT specialist, but are contemplating hiring one, then decide which competency set you need most and let that direct your job description. The important thing is that, in the very near future, blending these skill sets into one job may not be in the best interest of your students.

The Take Away

Know that there are two emerging and separate skill sets necessary to deliver high quality AT support in colleges and universities. By virtue of history, the technical side is more established, but now many experts recognize the importance of specialized support for maximizing the end-user’s benefit of the technology.

The technical set-up and maintenance of academic computing facilities is increasingly being taken over by various systems groups on college campuses. This frees DS to hire a technologist who’s expertise and training focuses on end-user success. And this is extremely important in promoting the academic success of students with learning disabilities.

Stay Focused!

This short article reminds us all to keep our eyes on the ball.

This term my e-text production service started converting a lot of PDF files into various forms of alternative-text. Things were going well and then we hit a few files that “choked” our ocr software OmniPage Pro. Opening the PDF in it’s native environment, Adobe Acrobat Pro, and stripping out some “document information” initially solved the problem. (Don’t ask me why…)

Finally a file came for which this solution did not work. It became a real technical challenge to “fix” this PDF. My staff and I searched the internet for similar problems and (hopefully) a solution. We tore apart the file in Acrobat Pro searching for its “fatal flaw.” I wouldn’t say we were obsessed, but we were pretty dedicated to solving this problem.

Then it hit me.

Actually a student worker provided the clarity with these words, “Why don’t we print it and scan it?” In that moment I realized that we (I) had lost site of getting usable text to the student and had jumped down some technological rabbit hole. Printing and scanning solved the problem in just a few minutes. Granted, you don’t want to do this with all your PDF files, but if you get one that defies cooperating with your other technology, just print it. I know that there are PDFs that will not print by design, but that is a topic for some future article.

The moral of this story is to stay focused on your original goal. In this case, getting clean usable text to a student with a print related disability. Technology has a seductive way of taking your attention from your task and redirecting it onto the process itself. You’ve been warned!

Utilizing Student Workers for AT Services

If you already utilize student workers in you AT delivery, then you can skip this article. But if you feel perpetually understaffed and shorthanded in the AT department this article may be able to help.

Many of the DS coordinators I work with have nothing but good things to say about student workers. Most say that they could not adequately deliver services if it were not for the student labor pool. Here are some of the ways my AT program makes use of student workers.

Computerized Based Notetaking (CBN)

Students with certain types of LD issues benefit from seeing notes in real time with the lecture. It is a text supplement delivered as the lecture is delivered. The notes are transmitted between two wirelessly linked laptops. The notetakers are students who are paid an hourly wage for their services. Obviously a college is a great place to find good notetakers.

Alt-Text

Providing alt-text on many campuses has grown into a small industry. And it is an industry that could not survive without student workers. In my program students handle book cutting and scanning. They manage the automated processes used for students with LD related reading issues. The do the precision editing and conversion required by our blind students. Student workers are the “face” of our alt-text program. Once students using these services get appropriate assessment and any necessary training they work directly with the student workers to obtain their alt-texts.

Basic AT Lab Management

I have worked with many DS coordinators who use technically savvy student workers to provide routine computer maintenance in their AT lab and to offer students basic technical support.

Take Advantage of Some Basic Characteristics of Student Workers

I have hired and managed dozens of student workers for my AT program over the last ten years. Most students want to work 8 to 12 hours per week during the academic term. I take advantage of this by giving the students only two to three related tasks to do. (I.E. cutting, scanning and automatic file creation.) This simplifies training and make it easy to isolate production breakdowns if or when they occur. Students, like most people, are drawn to meaningful and satisfying work. Supporting students with disabilities really qualifies for this. I always point out that no matter what career path they may ultimately take, serving students with disabilities will be a plus on their résumé.

Create a Congenial Work Environment

Over 95% of the students I have lost, I lost to graduation. Rather than adhering to an absolutely strict schedule, make objectives within the job the priority. If your students are getting good and usable alt-text files reliably, does it matter if the student workers adhered to a strict work schedule? Allow for down time. Some weeks no one needs books or journal articles converted. Pay your workers “to be available” it is a wise investment.

A Little Upfront Effort on Your Part Will Pay Handsome Dividends

Do a small departmental self-study and determine where you need help. Separate out the work the requires professional skills and then check what of the left over jobs could be handled by students.

Break the work up into jobs involving two or three tasks. Not only does this make training easier, it also makes for a very productive work flow.

Write clear job descriptions. These are not long or super detailed. List attributes you think the successful worker in this job will possess.

Either create or use your school’s existing job application. Post the job via your school’s “job board” and then review applications and interview applicants.

I realize this sounds like considerable work, but you can mange it by reserving a certain time each week for the process. Once your student workers are in place you will be surprised at how they lighten your schedule.

Flier for My Managing AT Book

Managing the Assistive Technology Process

Remembering Dick Banks

The AT community has lost a treasure. Dick Banks passed away on July 8, 2008.

I wish I could write that I was Dick’s close personal friend, because I felt that way. But I have a suspicion that anyone who interacted with Dick more than a few times felt like his close personal friend. That is just how Dick treated people.

Dick was a highly regarded leader in the AT field when I started over fifteen years ago. And he remained so right through to the end. I am convinced that there are thousands and thousands of students who are much better served today because of his work. And he approached his work with passion and dedication.

Dick was a sweet and gentle man. He had a huge influence on the development of assistive technology. I am afraid we will never replace him and I know we will never forget him. As I write these closing words, I can hear Dick’s distinctive laugh. It is a memory I will always cherish.

God bless Dick and his family in this time of loss.

Faculty Development and Document Accessibility

I recently presented at a faculty development workshop at DePauw University. It was dynamic and full of positive energy. I want to thank Diane Hightower, Dean of Student Academic Support, and Allison Cath, Director of Academic Support Programs for presenting such an energetic workshop. The other presenters were Heather Stout and Sally Coffman from Purdue University.

Reconsidering Our Approach to Faculty

I believe the nature of AT in higher education is rapidly evolving and this invitation made me reflect on how we communicate this to faculty. In the past, such presentations focused on an isolated student with a disability and how an instructor might have to make adjustments or accommodations in the class for the student. However accurate this perspective may have once been, it does not reflect the new classroom landscape.

Our advantage now is that much of what helps a student with a disability also very favorably impacts all students. That is how to frame these presentations; focus beyond what is accessible and emphasize how these techniques benefit all students. For example, a text based PDF is the bare minimum for a student with a disability, but it is also much richer and more useful educational material for all students by being a searchable document. I will get back to PDF in a bit.

Demonstrating Kurzweil 3000

You can make a pretty entertaining workshop around Kurzweil 3000 (K 3000) or similar products. Remind the audience what word processors did for writing and then explain that this technology is a “reading processor.”

First and foremost let the instructors know that this is a “play” session and they are not expected to learn how to use K 3000. They should just relax and play with voices, create notes, try to “break” the dictionary and highlight text. Along the way the participants can try reading by highlight and saving highlights out to an outline.

These features have been on K 3000 and similar products for several years and I do not mean to imply that they are new and innovative. My goal was to get the faculty intrigued and engaged in the possibilities and for them to understand what a useful tool this is for students.

By the end of the workshop they were making mp3 files, creating voice notes and easily interacting with various aspects of the program.

Creating Accessible PDF Files

Once the faculty saw how alternative documents could really help a struggling student, it was time to discuss what they can do to help.

I started off with PDF files “copies”, that is, PDFs of journal articles etc. I showed two truly hideous examples from an actual course packet. One had a shadow across about a third of one of the pages. The other had a similar shadow, but also had underlining and margin notes in handwriting. I pointed out that these were not readable by machines or people! I think they got the idea that “clean’ originals were an essential starting place. I did not stop there. We talked about the effectiveness of educational materials. Here the point was made about a searchable text-based PDF being far more useful to all students over a picture-only version. It is important to leverage the fact that these instructors use PDF files in their own work and they know that a searchable version is a much more useful and more versatile document. I pointed out that if they were using Acrobat Pro to create PDF files it could convert them to text-based files quite easily.

We moved from PDF “copies” to PDF “originals.” These are files created in a word processor and then made into PDF. By making small changes in how you create these documents you can make them more structured and navigable. MS Word is the word processor that integrates well with PDF production. The participants learned that by using Headers Style rather than simply bolding a word (that is a header) makes the document more readable for students using computer reading aids. They found it was easier to use the column formatter in Word rather than fuss with multiple tab and enter keys to create columns. And this preserves the correct reading order in the PDF. The participants got tips on how to make tables more readable and how to create brief text descriptions of images. It is interesting how many faculty are inserting the image of their textbook cover (no doubt thanks to amazon.com) into the syllabus.

The participants were surprised to learn that creating a structured and readable PDF took only slightly longer than their old, and far less accessible, methods.

Creating Accessible PowerPoints

This gets a little tougher. Accessibility has never been a strength of PowerPoint presentations. It is usually presented in real time as a backdrop to a lecture. The handouts are also notoriously either inaccessible or incomplete. Nevertheless, steps can be taken to not only make PowerPoint more accessible, but also a freestanding and accessible study aid or review tool.

Before I get any further, I want to thank Greg Kraus from LecShare, Inc. He worked very hard to support this presentation and contributed to its success. LecShare Pro is a great tool for making PowerPoint presentations more accessible and packaging them for future use. LecShare is a great product and I predict it is going to be an indispensable tool for most colleges. By the way, I own no stock in the company nor do I benefit in anyway from the program’s success.

We spent time on the basics of accessible and solid presentation creation. Choosing a good (san serif) font and a reading-enhancing color combination was the start. We discussed animations and slide transitions and that they should only be used to clarify or advance the presentation. The group learned to add text descriptions to images and graphics.

LecShare include tools to clean-up alt-texts and change slide titles. While LecShare exports to four different file types, the html export is probably the most accessible. Each slide is its own web page with “next” or “previous” links for easy navigation. Another link makes the slide text only.

LecShare also creates a very nice replay package in the form of a movie file. The instructor can read text from the notes page of the presentation onto an audio track. The text of the notes page then becomes captions that appear with the slide. Such a “package” could be posted to Blackboard or Moodle as excellent content review material and again, this works for all students.

I don’t want this to get too technical, suffice it to say that the faculty participating in this workshop learned some fairly easy ways to make accessible PDF and PowerPoint files. A final point that was made was if this work seemed burdensome, the faculty should strongly encourage their department to hire a student worker who could make these changes on the files before they are made available to the students.

The big point here is that accessible electronic documents or presentations are more useful for all students than their inaccessible counterparts.

When putting together a faculty development workshop on accessible materials, seize the momentum that already exists. Faculty already know from personal experience that some files are more useful to their work than others and you should play to this awareness.

Faculty will continue to make increasing amounts of instructional materials and the more they embrace universally accessible materials, the easier your job will be.

Flier for My New Book!

Managing the Assistive Technology Process

Conference Calendar

AHEAD - “Multiple Intersections” the 31st Annual Conference
July 14 - 19, 2008 ~ Reno, NV, USA

http://ahead.org/training/conference/2008/index.php

Alt-text and Its Disparate Consumers

Frequently, and I am guilty of this too, alt-text is referred to as a single thing. We are learning to be a little more careful about this with the proliferation of commercial E-books. E-books, we are finding out, are not all that accessible for people with print disabilities.

Even in the world of providing alt-text to college students with print disabilities there are very different needs. Ignoring these differences can lead to wasted time, money and effort. Even worse, it may be short changing the student. When contemplating your alt-text services, define it in student terms.

At my school there a generally two types of students getting alt-text services and both have valid print access disabilities. One group has learning disabilities and the other group has vision issues. The fact is, these two groups get very different alt-text “products.” I’d like to share our system with you and I invite your comments.

Alt-text for Students with Learning Disabilities
The basic reading issue for college students with learning disabilities is comprehension of long chunks of text and not basic reading remediation where the student struggles with identifying single words.
These students typically have full visual access to their books. While some follow highlighted text on the computer screen, others read along in the original text. These students typically use Kurzweil, WYNN, text, pdf, or mp3 files.

Our student orientation includes demonstrating a range of tools from lab-based Kurzweil to Natural Reader that can be used on their own computers. The student decides which is the appropriate tool.

The files we make for these students are unedited and the process is fairly automated. Students are either looking at a picture of the text or following along with the original text. They know that there may be an occasional discrepancy between the audio and the print, but this has never caused a problem for our students.

For students with learning disabilities we convert whole books only. The students are expected to convert short runs or articles themselves on equipment provided in our labs. This promotes independence and usually students can convert their own short runs faster than going through the bureaucracy to have us do it.

Alt-text for Students with Vision Issues
The needs of a student whose print disability is vision related is different from the student with a learning disability. Our students who do not have visual access to the original material get a different set of services.

The first thing we do is assign a dedicated editor to each student receiving services. This gives the student flexible and responsive management of their alt-text production. That is, a student can instruct his/her editor to cancel chapter four and do chapter six instead based on class assignment changes.

Some of our students have developed distinctive and unique preferences for table and chart descriptions. They can convey this to their editors and get more meaningful conversions. Some may say such custom work could become a disadvantage later on and that is a possibility we remind our students of.

As to file type, that is up to each student. Word processing “doc” files and Braille embossing remain the bulk of our production for this population. We are, however, prepared to offer other file types when requested.

Be Student Driven
We try to look beyond technology and stay focused on student academic success. For students with learning disabilities a small program adjustment may encourage adoption. Recently, we have started demonstrating small, free or low cost alternative readers that students can load onto their own computers. These programs lack many of the features of their expensive counterparts, but for some students the portability and independence is just what they need to adopt this form of support. For our students with vision disabilities, managing their own work flow seems to be most helpful. They get to know their editor and know that they set the priorities for their alt-text production.

508 Web Compliance and Higher Education

A report has been published about college Web sites and their 508 compliance. The results are not good. 100 colleges were randomly selected with the condition that each state be represented by 2 schools.

Here are some highlights:

88% had broken or no “skipnav” links

83% of those page containing form elements had a missing or incorrectly associated form label

71% contained at least one image with a missing or inappropriate alt attribute

This is truly not good! One, these elements are the best known accessibility fixes. If these were ignored, I just assume the subtler elements were never even considered. Two, the 508 standards have been around for seven years! What does it say if we cannot adopt a set of accessibility standards in seven years.

What does this mean to a DS coordinator?

I maintain that the DS office cannot get involved with campus Web accessibility at the coding or programming level, but DS is a stakeholder in this issue and must actively promote and support the accessibility of their school Web sites.

A DS coordinator must get some sense of the general accessibility of the school’s Web site and go from there. Many schools are adopting style guidelines for their pages and that is an excellent opportunity to have accessibility policies included.

This is extremely important to students with disabilities. Colleges are transmitting so much important student information over the Web that to ignore this invites trouble.

Read the summary of the report
It was conducted by GOALS which is a project of National Center on Disability & Access to Education . WebAIM is a partner in this effort and mentions this report in their blog . WebAIM, by the way, maintains a great website regarding accessible web design. I highly recommend it.

1.08

Welcome

Welcome to my blog! The fact that blogs are great ways to transmit, discuss and exchange information is old news. That being the case I think it is about time for me to host one about managing AT in higher education. I hope to post 2 to 3 times per month at somewhat regular intervals. The topics will be about current issues in providing AT in higher education and will hopefully stimulate discussion (a pretty important aspect of a blog).

Mardi Gras and AHEAD

AHEAD held it Management Institutes in New Orleans right around the start of February and the Managing AT A to Z was a delight! We had a good group with lots of questions and comments.

I completely updated the web and distance ed modules into a new module called AT 2.0. I hope to expand and elaborate on this topic for AHEAD’s national conference this summer in Reno

Conference Calendar

CSUN - Technology & Persons with Disabilities Conference
March 10-15, 2008 ~ Los Angeles, CA

http://www.csun.edu/cod/conf/