[nabs-l] Disability Services and Math

Thu Feb 7 20:31:12 UTC 2013

I suspect a large part of the reason you are getting dirty braille for math is that none of the braille transcription software packages really handle math well on their own.  There is a reason that braillists work to get certifications.  It takes specific knowledge to make sure braille is produced correctly.  

The DSS office at the last school attended assumed that because they knew how to import a file into duxbury and hit the translate button, that was enough to produce quality braille.  For most situations this worked, but not for my textbook on teaching braille. :)

For something technical like math, an expert should truly be hired.  Although, there are other viable solutions for getting access to the materials.  

As Arielle said, much can be done without diagrams using electronic texts and excel.  If you do need access to graphical materials, there are low tech solutions that require very little training, such as a screen board or the draftsman from APH.  I got through a graduate level course that focused on visual data analysis by working with the professor and TAs with a screen board.  The professor would generally have 60+ graphs per lecture.  The TAs would sketch each graph before the lecture and hand me the stack at the beginning of class so that I could review them as they were presented.  This took some exploration of what did and didn't work in sketching the graphs but it quickly became and efficient system.  It very much added to my understanding of the course material and my ability to participate in class.  Participating in class helped me engage the material more than I would have done otherwise.  

If you can find a quick solution like this, graphs can even be sketched in class if necessary.  You would just need to find a willing artist.  This shouldn't be too big of a problem as DSS offices hire notetakers all the time.  This would be something similar to that.  

Btw, not sure if screen board is an official term, but that is what I have always called it.  It is a large clipboard with window screen fastened to one side.  When you put paper over the screen and draw with a crayon, it leaves a raised line of wax that can be easily felt.  The graphs are crude sometimes.  Details are difficult to convey.  They work for many things though.  

I hope some of this was helpful.

Best,
Greg
On Feb 7, 2013, at 2:56 PM, Arielle Silverman <arielle71 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Kaiti,
> If you want to send me one of your homework assignments offlist at
> arielle71 at gmail.com
> I can take a look at it and let you know if I can complete the
> assignment without a graph. If they're asking you to pull specific
> information out of the graph then you might need a tactile version of
> it, but if they're just providing the graph as a guide, you might not
> need it. If the professor can type up verbal descriptions of the
> graphs that's even better.
> If you're taking psych stats then you will soon be transitioning to
> problem sets where you get a data set and have to perform mathematical
> operations on it. No graphs should be necessary for these types of
> problems.
> Arielle
> 
> On 2/7/13, Kaiti Shelton <crazy4clarinet104 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Hi,
>> 
>> Arielle:  So to make sure I'm getting what you're saying is that I
>> basically don't need a diagram at all?  I've found out this semester
>> that my braille instructors in school were increddibly old-fashioned
>> in their teaching methods even through my hig school years, but how
>> else would I take in graph information from the textbook?  I'm really
>> curious.
>> 
>> I went to the office this morning and talked to my advisor.  I told
>> her that there has to be another way we can do this because it's
>> really difficult for me to keep having to run back and forth across
>> campus to get homeowrk assignments.  A lot of the problem is that I
>> guess the professor doesn't post the homework online until an hour or
>> two before the classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so with that there
>> is no way that even in the best circumstances I would have everything
>> on time to do the homework at the same time as everyone else.  I'm
>> going to talk to my professor today about possibly posting assignments
>> on Mondays and Wednesdays instead so that I can stop by the office on
>> Tuesday and Thursday mornings and actually pick up the completed work
>> instead of go there to find it not ready or to have it hastily done
>> and incorrect.  I feel kind of bad asking him for more but that seems
>> to be the biggest obstacle, not having enough time for material turn
>> around.  In addition, we're also going to decrease the amount of
>> brailling the office does.  I have the text in my book so they're
>> going to have one of their hired students look through the assigned
>> problems once they're posted and make sure that the descriptors for
>> the graphs were added in because in the book sometimes editor's notes
>> are there and sometimes they're not.  If they're there I don't need
>> graphs at all, so for the questions where graph descriptors are
>> missing the student will add them in.  I'm also going to get a lot
>> more of my graphs in very large print.  I was used to having tactile
>> and visual graphs in high school because my aid/braillist spoiled me
>> to death with her graph-making abilities, but this will also help the
>> process move faster and eliminate the problems I was having with the
>> tactile graphs being too small and the Tiger not really distinguishing
>> parts of the graph apart from each other.  Hopefully these things will
>> work.
>> 
>> On 2/6/13, Arielle Silverman <arielle71 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> That sounds like a good plan. Also, I suspect you can do the homework
>>> electronically without having to worry about getting the Braille. This
>>> may end up being less time-consuming for you and keep you from being
>>> dependent on the DS office to get things done in a timely fashion. As
>>> you advance in stats, the tactile diagrams will become less important.
>>> I never got a single one in five semesters of stats. Again, write
>>> offlist if you have specific content questions.
>>> Arielle
>>> 
>>> On 2/6/13, Kaiti Shelton <crazy4clarinet104 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> Hi,,
>>>> 
>>>> Stats is actually required because both for my major and for my psych
>>>> minor I will need to be able to read and interpret research data.
>>>> It's listed on some things as strongly encouraged but on our most
>>>> recent course outline it has either this class or another psych
>>>> oriented math class which is stats with slightly different content as
>>>> the recommended math electives.  Either way I need one like it to
>>>> graduate with the major and minor I want.
>>>> 
>>>> Arielle: I haven't really had to get much brailled in hard copy.  All
>>>> my professors have been pretty great about just sending me word files
>>>> or emails with the information since they write everything up on the
>>>> computer anyway.  My math professor is actually really good about
>>>> making most things accessible on his own too, and goes above and
>>>> beyond because he really could just say that accessibility is the ds
>>>> office's issue.  For class he prints out guided note sheets for
>>>> everyone and gives me mine on flashdrives.  These are word files
>>>> complete with tables and graph descriptions where needed.  He also
>>>> allows me to submit my homework on these flashdrives in word and excel
>>>> formats and that has worked out pretty well.  He and I both seem to
>>>> like how the electronic process has worked out and I think he's doing
>>>> all he can to make the class work for me.  As far as graphs are
>>>> concerned though making tactile diagrams is understandably beyond his
>>>> expertees and he doesn't have the equipment to do it on his own.  I
>>>> really do feel like he's been accomodating and understanding though,
>>>> it's just the diagrams which get a little funky but those are out of
>>>> his control.
>>>> 
>>>> Last semester I barely had to set foot in the ds office once I picked
>>>> up my textbooks and now I'm down there several times a week.
>>>> I know it's not an IT specialist's job to proofread, but if we're
>>>> repeatedly having the same problems I don't see why proofreading
>>>> wouldn't come up as a easy fix as it would only take a few minutes
>>>> right after the embosser is done working.  I was going to say
>>>> something about it on Tuesday, but by the time I got down there and
>>>> people were free for me to talk to I had an hour till I actually had
>>>> to be in stats and I had to quite literally run across to campus to
>>>> not be late.  I'm planning on going down there tomorrow morning to
>>>> pick up the homework that was assigned Tuesday and the re-brailled
>>>> files for last Thursday's assignment.  They already know that Tuesday
>>>> and Thursday mornings and Friday afternoons are the only times I can
>>>> get there with my schedule, so I'm going to see if they can work to
>>>> improve the timing or check the work before giving it to me so I don't
>>>> have to run back and forth and they don't have to waste embosser
>>>> paper.  It's also not right that I had to ask a professor for an
>>>> extention because I really couldn't do the work.  Again, he was
>>>> understanding enough to push back my due date the same number of days
>>>> that I didn't have my braille, but I feel like asking him for
>>>> extentions is really not right, especially if it could be helped by a
>>>> few minutes of proofreading.
>>>> 
>>>> On 2/6/13, Arielle Silverman <arielle71 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> Hi Kaiti,
>>>>> Does your DS office give you Braille for other classes? Is the quality
>>>>> better for those classes? If so, who's doing the Brailling?
>>>>> I totally agree that you should not have to proofread your homework,
>>>>> and you should definitely complain to someone higher up in DS about
>>>>> this. If the situation isn't resolved, you could also explore the
>>>>> option of doing the homework electronically and asking your prof to
>>>>> send you descriptions of graphs. Email me off-list if you want more
>>>>> advice about how to do stats electronically as I have done it several
>>>>> times.
>>>>> Oh, and if you're a psych major stats is required.
>>>>> Arielle
>>>>> 
>>>>> On 2/6/13, Nimer M. Jaber, IC³ <nimerjaber1 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>> Kaiti,
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> first, I don't think that stats is required for your major. Second, if
>>>>>> it is, then the university needs to accommodate you much better than
>>>>>> they are, and they need to terminate the position of the idiot they
>>>>>> hired and hire another. I know the person or rather of the person that
>>>>>> you're talking about because I was supposed to come and train her if
>>>>>> Clovernook would've done their job. Unfortunately she wasn't prepared
>>>>>> for the position that she got, and even if she was it's not the IT
>>>>>> specialist's job to proofread math, so it seems like the University
>>>>>> either needs to get their act together and hire someone that knows how
>>>>>> to do it, or they need to have it professionally done. Either way, the
>>>>>> statusquo is not acceptable.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Please let me know what happens, as I am very interested to see how
>>>>>> they and you choose to handle this. And if you need/want help from a
>>>>>> tech specialist, please don't hesitate to call me and I will do what I
>>>>>> can to help you. Just respond to my email if you want contact info.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Thanks.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> On 2/6/13, Kaiti Shelton <crazy4clarinet104 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>> Hi all,
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> This semester I am enrolled in a 200 level stats course necessary for
>>>>>>> my major.  Recently I've been having problems with my disability
>>>>>>> services and the braille material they have been producing for my
>>>>>>> math
>>>>>>> homework.  The course only meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays so the
>>>>>>> professor has to move pretty fast through the material.  To try and
>>>>>>> help me stay on top of the work as far as getting me the braille to
>>>>>>> do
>>>>>>> it goes the office has a woman who they've hired as the assistive
>>>>>>> technology specialist brailling all my math materials with the Tiger
>>>>>>> and my professor has given her access to our Sakai sight so she can
>>>>>>> just go get the material and not have to wait for me to find what it
>>>>>>> is, email it to her, and then have her check her email on a break.
>>>>>>> The ideas are great, but the quality of the braille just isn't there.
>>>>>>> Sometimes graphs will be missing from questions, the embosser will
>>>>>>> mess up several lines of braille and make the question unreadable, or
>>>>>>> other times entire questions will be missing from my braille packets.
>>>>>>> Contributing to the issue is that with my schedule I'm physically not
>>>>>>> able to get to the learning center two days a week due to my classes.
>>>>>>> This often means on the days I have stats and the entire morning free
>>>>>>> beforehand I often have to go to the ds office only several hours to
>>>>>>> pick up materials if they weren't readable the first time and then
>>>>>>> hurry to fix my old answers or do them in the first place before the
>>>>>>> start of the class.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> I feel really frustrated that I have to proofread like this.  Of
>>>>>>> course I don't expect everything to be perfect, but at the same time
>>>>>>> I
>>>>>>> don't think I should have to go down to the ds office to tell the
>>>>>>> braillist she missed a problem or that I can't read the graph because
>>>>>>> she printed it so small that the lines are too close together to read
>>>>>>> several times a week.  She is blind herself and a braille reader, so
>>>>>>> I
>>>>>>> wonder why there is no proofreading involved in the process.  And
>>>>>>> although I realize that she has other responsibilities, I know I'm
>>>>>>> the
>>>>>>> only student who receives braille material so I don't see how
>>>>>>> proofreading a few pages of braille would take much time.  I don't
>>>>>>> feel like with all my classes I'm doing that I should also have to
>>>>>>> worry if I can even do my homework for them.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> If anyone has any suggestions on how to handle this I would
>>>>>>> appreciate
>>>>>>> hearing them.
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> 
>>>>>>> --
>>>>>>> Kaiti
>>>>>>> 
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>>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> --
>>>>>> Cordially,
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Nimer Jaber
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Please take the time to read this signature completely as it contains
>>>>>> some information about the email you have just read and all
>>>>>> attachments contained within as well as some valuable resources and
>>>>>> methods for contacting me if you have any questions or wish to talk.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> The message above is intended for the recipient to whom it was
>>>>>> addressed. If you believe that you are not the intended recipient,
>>>>>> please notify me via reply email and destroy all copies of this
>>>>>> correspondence. Action taken as a result of this email or its contents
>>>>>> by anyone other than the intended recipient may result in civil or
>>>>>> criminal action. I have checked this email and all corresponding
>>>>>> attachments for security threats. However, security of your machine is
>>>>>> up to you. Thanks.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Registered Linux User 529141.
>>>>>> http://counter.li.org/
>>>>>> Vinux testing and documentation coordinator
>>>>>> To get more information about a free and accessible operating system,
>>>>>> please click here:
>>>>>> http://www.vinuxproject.org
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> To find out about a free and versatile screen reader for windows XP
>>>>>> and above, please click here:
>>>>>> http://www.nvda-project.org
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> You can follow @nimerjaber on Twitter for the latest technology news.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Check out my blog related to technology by clicking here:
>>>>>> http://nimertech.blogspot.com
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> To contact me, you can reply to this email or you may call me at (720)
>>>>>> (251-4530) and I will do my best to respond to you promptly. Thank
>>>>>> you, and have a great day!
>>>>>> 
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>>>>> 
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>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> --
>>>> Kaiti
>>>> 
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>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Kaiti
>> 
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