[nfbwatlk] FW: [Wcb-l] new call center to only employe blindpeople

[Mike Freeman]

Valid concerns, mary Ellen. Moreover, I suspect that such a call center 
couldn't legally be set up here in the United States due to 
antidiscrimination laws (it's no more within the law to discriminate 
against the sighted than it is to discriminate against the blind, no 
matter what the good intentions, sheltered workshops being a special 
case carved out by legal exception).

Mike Freeman

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mary Ellen" <gabias at telus.net>
To: "'NFB of Washington Talk Mailing List'" <nfbwatlk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Saturday, October 17, 2009 10:20 PM
Subject: Re: [nfbwatlk] FW: [Wcb-l] new call center to only employe 
blindpeople


Great news for the blind people getting jobs -- provided their wages are 
on
par with the wages of sighted people doing similar work there.


-----Original Message-----
From: nfbwatlk-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nfbwatlk-bounces at nfbnet.org] 
On
Behalf Of Alco Canfield
Sent: October 16, 2009 6:13 PM
To: nfbwatlk at nfbnet.org
Subject: [nfbwatlk] FW: [Wcb-l] new call center to only employe blind 
people




-----Original Message-----
From: Glenn McCully <glennmccully at comcast.net>
Sent: Friday, October 16, 2009 2:38 PM
To: wcb-l at wcbinfo.org
Subject: [Wcb-l] new call center to only employe blind people


Philippine call center to employ blind people only
GMANews.TV - Friday, October 16
Next week, the Philippines will open its first ever call center that 
only
employs blind persons, a milestone in the struggle of disabled people to
cross the digital divide. With eight training rooms and three desks
dedicated for outbound calls, the call center facility will be equipped 
with
adaptive hardware and software customized to the needs and abilities of 
the
blind. Six totally blind, low vision and sighted graduates are currently
being trained as trainors in Taipei, Taiwan, the headquarters of the the
Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Digital Opportunity Center 
(ADOC).
ADOC provided funds for the facility, a project of the Adaptive 
Technology
for Rehabilitation, Integration, and Empowerment of the Visually 
Impaired
(ATRIEV) Inc. The six trainors all came from ATRIEV, an organization 
that
pioneered computer training for the blind in the country, the Resources 
for
the Blind, National Council on Disability Affairs, Philippine National
School for the Blind, and the Department of Education. The facility's
customized outbound call center software and refreshable Braille display 
as
hardware will allow totally blind individuals to provide customer 
assistance
while listening to the client on the phone and reading the responses in
Braille. With the technology, the blind will hopefully gain the same 
speed
and efficiency as the sighted call center agent, ATRIEV said. ATRIEV has
provided IT-related training for the blind for the last 15 years, with 
the
use of a screen reader - a software application that translates text to
speech - and a screen magnification software. ATRIEV also provides
on-the-job training in voicemail transcription to its qualified 
IT-related
training graduates, in partnership with Gallop IT Solutions, a local
transcription company. The launching ceremony for the project will be 
held
on October 20 ATRIEV's Training Center for the Blind in Quezon City. The
project is expected to be presented at the APEC Conference to be held in
Singapore in November 2009. - GMANews.TV


_______________________________________________
nfbwatlk mailing list
nfbwatlk at nfbnet.org
http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nfbwatlk_nfbnet.org
To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for 
nfbwatlk:
http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nfbwatlk_nfbnet.org/k7uij%40panix.com