[blindkid] Online Accessibility in College

Sun Feb 22 15:34:15 UTC 2015

Has your daughter had experience yet in using human readers?  That is 
something she can practice.  I think the hardest part for kids is 
becoming able to give directions to someone older (often high school 
students have adult readers), but it is a very important part of 
learning to use a reader effectively.  We'll be holding a workshop 
session on this subject, btw, at the national convention this summer.

Carol

Carol Castellano
Parents of Blind Children-NJ
Director of Programs
National Organization of Parents of Blind Children
973-377-0976
carol_castellano at verizon.net
www.blindchildren.org
www.nfb.org/parents-and-teachers

At 09:47 AM 2/22/2015, you wrote:
>What I learned while going through college - working on my PhD, is 
>that each person uses a reader to meet the individual's needs and 
>surcumstances. I use a reader differently reading a menu at a cafe 
>than I do with my textbooks. Each blind person also has their own 
>idea as to HOW they want something read. There really is NO 
>specialised training involved other than between the blind 
>individual and that reader. Also, a blind individual may have a 
>variety of different readers in college depending on the course. 
>Some people are great textbook readers but not super readers in 
>algebra or chem. because they don't know the signs/symbols. I 
>suggest reading the article by Peggy Pender, Care and Feeding of 
>Readers. As a TVI, I teach by example. I have a driver who is also 
>my reader. Sometimes, I will have him come in and read for me or my 
>student. I had to train him as I did all my others. I also have my 
>students train him to meet their needs. Of course, they can't keep 
>him. Smile. But it does give them the experience of using live 
>readers. Feel free to contact me individually, if you would like to talk.
>
>Merry-Noel Chamberlain, MA, TVI, O&M
>
>
><https://overview.mail.yahoo.com?.src=iOS>Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPad
>
>At Feb 22, 2015, 8:20:14 AM, Shellie Kalinsky via 
>blindkid<'blindkid at nfbnet.org'> wrote:
>My daughter does talk with the disabilities office and has a 
>memorandum of accommodations that includes a reader and a scribe 
>however the reality is that they don't have the trained readers 
>ready for her and she wants to attend college now, not wait a year 
>while they train the 2 readers they have for tests and assessments. 
>She uses a combination of screen readers and technology but 
>sometimes the material is not coded properly so the software can't 
>read it correctly (for example the math problems will say "symbol" 
>instead of "equals" and other mistakes like that). We have consulted 
>with a private technology company because we thought the problem was 
>her computer software, but we found out that the problem is the 
>actual coding of documents by publishing companies and that in some 
>situations human readers will still be necessary. Which leads us 
>back to the original question of where to find people to hire. We 
>know that eventually her disabilities office will have the trained 
>readers available but we are filling a gap in services right now. 
>There is only one other student with a visual disability on her 
>campus so the disabilities office is learning how to provide 
>appropriate accommodations from my daughter. It's good to know my 
>daughter is helping them make positive changes for future students 
>but we also need to make sure her needs are being met now.
>
>Sent from my iPad
>
> > On Feb 22, 2015, at 8:33 AM, EMMOL--- via blindkid wrote:
> >
> > Shellie,
> > I suggest that your daughter speak with the Disabilities Office at her
> > school.
> > They will be in touch with professors if materials are not accessible. She
> > should of course speak with the professors to make them aware, but the
> > Disabilities Office will assist with the accessibility piece.
> >
> > I am wondering what screen reader she uses. My son is a senior in college.
> > His school uses Blackboard, as well, but he uses Jaws.
> >
> > My daughter works in the Disabilities Office at another University and
> > finds that Kurzweil has difficulty reading materials that 
> professors have photo
> > copied, scanned and then upload. Also if they've designed a worksheet
> > using Word it isn't necessarily screen reader accessible. They 
> may not realize
> > this or understand.
> >
> > All materials must be accessible, so I suggest she go back to the
> > Disabilities Office.
> > Eileen Molloy
> >
> >
> > Date: Sat, 21 Feb 2015 20:30:22 +0000 (UTC)
> > From: Shellie Kalinsky
> > To: "Blind Kid Mailing List (for parents of blind children)"
> >
> > Subject: [blindkid] where to hire readers for college level students?
> > Message-ID:
> > <1264816763.1241008.1424550622508.JavaMail.yahoo at mail.yahoo.com>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
> >
> > Hi -?
> >
> > My daughter is a college freshman and sometimes the material she has to
> > read for class is online and her read aloud software doesn't 
> always read the
> > material properly.? So we would like to hire someone to read the material
> > to her.? Have any of you hired a reader before?? Where did you find your
> > readers?? Any suggestions on where my daughter and I should look 
> for someone?
> >
> > Thanks in advance for your advice on this.
> > Shellie Kalinsky
> >
> >
> >
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