[NFBCS] Summer Research Opportunity for CS Student who is Blind or Visually Impaired

[Paul Ruvolo]

Hi Folks,

My apologies in advance if there is a more suitable place to post this job opportunity.

I am a professor of Computer Science at Olin College of Engineering (a small, undergraduate-only college in the Boston Area).  My research area is in assistive technology for orientation and mobility.  As part of this work, my group developed and released the Clew app for route recording and indoor navigation.

This summer I have funding to hire students to work with me on research projects that will use augmented reality technology on smartphones to create assistive technology for people who are blind or visually impaired.  My funding is from the National Science Foundation and I specifically carved out part of the budget to hire a student who is blind or visually impaired to work on the project.  To be clear, I am hiring this student to work on developing the technology (not as a co-designer or tester).  Also, I have experience working with students who are blind or visually impaired (which I mention only to say that I’m familiar with strategies practices to make the work environment accessible regardless of one’s degree of functional vision).

Students will receive a stipend for their 10 weeks of work (around $5K in total) and housing will be included at no charge.  The time frame of the work will be the beginning of June to early August.  It seems likely that the work will happen on Olin’s campus, but of course the pandemic could change things.  If the work does happen on Olin’s campus, we have a comprehensive testing plan and well-established safety protocols in place.

To participate, students should be proficient in at least one imperative programming language (Java, C++, Python are all good starting points).  Experience in mobile app development is a big plus, but is not required.  Experience in user-centered design is also a big plus, and a desire to learn and develop such skills over the summer is a requirement (you must be excited to work with end-users as part of the internship).

I’m hoping that there may be someone on this list that would be interested in this opportunity.  Alternatively, maybe someone could suggest another venue to post this message?

Thanks in advance for any interest or help finding the right venue for this,
Paul Ruvolo
Olin College of Engineering