[Athen] Athen Digest, Vol 7, Issue 12

[Tim Sears]

I have a question.  Does anyone else have a problem with camera arms and
zooming them in on the white boards.  I have several complaints from
students regarding the glare that the lights cause.  Has anyone found a
good workaround or recommendation. 

Tim Sears
Adaptive Technology Specialist
3200 Broadway Blvd.
Kansas City MO 64111
email: tim.sears at mcckc.edu
telephone: 816-759-1092
"Encourage the Discouraged" 

>>> <athen-request at athenpro.org> 08/31/06 2:00 PM >>>

Send Athen mailing list submissions to
	athen at athenpro.org

To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
	http://athenpro.org/mailman/listinfo/athen_athenpro.org
or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
	athen-request at athenpro.org

You can reach the person managing the list at
	athen-owner at athenpro.org

When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
than "Re: Contents of Athen digest..."


Today's Topics:

   1. Re: Dragon NS and Math/Engineering (Wink Harner)
   2. Angel online courseware (Robert Beach)
   3. Lecture Recording/Note-Taking Software (Sesock, Kevin A)
   4. Google makes thousands of classics available for	downloading
      - The Boston Globe (Berkowitz, Daniel J)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Wed, 30 Aug 2006 16:02:52 -0700
From: "Wink Harner" <wink.harner at mcmail.maricopa.edu>
Subject: Re: [Athen] Dragon NS and Math/Engineering
To: "Access Technologists in Higher Education Network"
	<athen at athenpro.org>
Message-ID: <44D64C7400003987 at email3.dist.maricopa.edu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

Hu John,

Math Talk is for anyone with a math disability, orthopedic impairment or
who is visually impaired/blind. It is easy to use & train...really easy!


If you toggle between Dragon Professional (after training the
engineering
vocabulary which can, by the way, be scanned with OCR, copied from
another
file into the student's computer or manually entered--Dragon will 'mine'
the vocabulary from the hard drive and make it easy to train) and MATH
TALK,
the student can dictate the math problems, copy to MSW & dictate words
with
Dragon. It may be a bit awkward at first but with the alt + tab key it's
very simple to toggle between programs/screens.

Blessings!

Wink
 



>-- Original Message --

>Date: Wed, 30 Aug 2006 15:45:03 -0700

>To: Access Technologists in Higher Education Network

<athen at athenpro.org>

>From: John Gardner <john.gardner at orst.edu>

>Subject: Re: [Athen] Dragon NS and Math/Engineering

>Reply-To: Access Technologists in Higher Education Network

<athen at athenpro.org>

>

>

>Sarah, MathTalk was (I believe) intended primarily for people who are 

>blind and cannot, for whatever reason, use a keyboard.  If your 

>student is not blind and can use a trackball, then he should be able 

>to use an on-screen keyboard and to compose math with more or less 

>any conventional math authoring application.  Try Word with the 

>MathType equation editor.  Writing math will be tedious, but frankly 

>I doubt that anything that composes math with speech is likely to be 

>fast either.

>

>Am I missing something?

>

>John

>

>

>

>

>At 01:53 PM 8/30/2006, you wrote:

>

>>Hello, I am currently working with a student at Colorado State 

>>University who experienced a spinal cord injury and is now at an 

>>incomplete C5-C6 level. He is using Dragon right now for all his 

>>computing needs, although he can successfully manipulate a trackball 

>>mouse which helps. His main issue is that he is an engineering 

>>student and is looking for a program that interfaces well with 

>>Dragon but will allow him to dictate math and engineering lingo he 

>>needs. I am not too familiar with the engineering aspect so wanted 

>>to query all of you to see if anyone has experienced a similar 

>>situation and has any advice as to math or engineering programs that 

>>would interface well with Dragon.

>>

>>I've looked up and have demo Cds of mathtalk by metroplex but the 

>>student did not feel it would meet his needs for engineering entirely.

>>

>>Any suggestions?

>>

>>Thanks!

>>

>>sara

>>

>>Sara Tuman, MS, OTR

>>Assistive Technology Resource Center (ATRC)

>>Department of Occupational Therapy

>>Colorado State University

>>Fort Collins, CO 80523-1573

>>(970) 491-0625

>>F: (970) 491-6290

>><mailto:tumans at cahs.colostate.edu>tumans at cahs.colostate.edu

>>www.colostate.edu/Depts/ATRC

>>Hours: T/W/F 9am-5pm

>>

>>

>>

>>----------

>>From: athen-bounces at athenpro.org [mailto:athen-bounces at athenpro.org] 

>>On Behalf Of Michael Goldhammer

>>Sent: Wednesday, August 30, 2006 11:19 AM

>>To: Athen at athenpro.org

>>Subject: [Athen] Jenzabar Portal Accessibility?

>>

>>Colleagues - Haven't posted in a while, been trying to drain swamps 

>>and you know what happens then! I'm trying to ascertain 

>>functionality and accessibility of Jenzabar Academic Portal for use 

>>by students with disabilities. Any comments on portals in general 

>>and Ideas as to how I can determine access for blind users would be 

>>appreciated.

>>

>>Here is a list of questions that I'm working on:

>>

>>1. JAWS and Jenzabar keyboard shortcuts?

>>

>>2 . Do I use web page verifiers to check for 508 standards for 

>>password protected portals?

>>

>>3. What kind of training materials need to be in place to be 

>>effective for individuals with disabilities to use portals and 

>>specifically Jenzabar?

>>

>>Feedback is appreciated!

>>

>>

>>Michael Goldhammer

>>Assistive Technology Computer Specialist

>>Mt Hood Community College

>>26000 S.E. Stark Street

>>Gresham, Oregon 97030

>>503.491-7593

>>E-mail: 

>><mailto:Michael.Goldhammer at Michael.Goldhammer@mhcc.edu>Michael.Goldhammer at mhcc.edu

>>Web Site: <http://www.mhcc.edu/dso>http://www.mhcc.edu/dso

>>

>>NOTICE: This e-mail (including attachments) is covered by the 

>>Electronic Communications Privacy Act, 18 U.S.C._2510-2521, is 

>>confidential and may be privileged. If you are not the intended 

>>recipient, please be aware that any retention, dissemination, 

>>distribution, or copying of this communication is prohibited. Please 

>>reply to the sender that you have received this message in error, 

>>then delete it. Thank you for helping to maintain privacy.

>>

>>_______________________________________________

>>Athen mailing list

>>Athen at athenpro.org

>>http://athenpro.org/mailman/listinfo/athen_athenpro.org

>

>John A. Gardner

>Professor and Director, Science Access Project

>Department of Physics

>Oregon State University

>Corvallis, OR 97331

>tel: (541) 737 3278

>FAX: (541) 737 1683

>	SAP URL: http://dots.physics.orst.edu/

>

>

>_______________________________________________

>Athen mailing list

>Athen at athenpro.org

>http://athenpro.org/mailman/listinfo/athen_athenpro.org


Ms. Wink Harner
Manager
Disability Resources & Services
Mesa Community College
Mesa AZ

480-461-7447





------------------------------

Message: 2
Date: Thu, 31 Aug 2006 10:46:44 -0500
From: "Robert Beach" <rbeach at kckcc.edu>
Subject: [Athen] Angel online courseware
To: <athen at athenpro.org>
Message-ID: <s4f6be21.084 at netware.kckcc.edu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII

Hi all,

I found out, in a non-related meeting, that our institution is moving
from WebCT to Angel for online courses.  Since I know eventually the
issue of accessibility will come up (and should have come up long before
the decision was made), I was wondering if anybody has experience with
the program.  Any tips, tricks, hints, etc. will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.



Robert Lee Beach
Assistive Technology Specialist
Kansas City Kansas Community College
7250 State Avenue
Kansas City, KS  66112
Phone:  (913) 288-7671
Fax: (913) 288-7678
E-mail:  rbeach at kckcc.edu




------------------------------

Message: 3
Date: Thu, 31 Aug 2006 11:09:45 -0500
From: "Sesock, Kevin A" <kevin.sesock at okstate.edu>
Subject: [Athen] Lecture Recording/Note-Taking Software
To: "Access Technologists in Higher Education Network"
	<athen at athenpro.org>
Message-ID:
	<987761BC3F676843B8EAB3E0BEA07C8F8DF968 at EXE2.ad.okstate.edu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

All:
 
We're trying to find a good OneNote alternative, or at least an
alternative for two of the features in OneNote that seem pretty vital to
many students. What we're looking for is note-taking synchronized with
audio (video support a plus, but not required), but the best I can find
is GoBinder or EverNote, which don't seem to do recordings.
 
Open-Source would also be a plus, due to the fact that much of this
software is expensive, and college students stereotypically aren't the
wealthiest demographic.
 
Thanks for the help.
 
Kevin A. Sesock, A+, NET+, CNA, MCSA
Assistive Technology Specialist
Student Disability Services
Division of Student Affairs
Oklahoma State University
 
http://access.it.okstate.edu <http://access.it.okstate.edu/> 
 
"Hail to the speaker, hail to the knower; joy to he who has understood,
delight to they who have listened." --Odin
 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
/pipermail/athen_athenpro.org/attachments/20060831/f3a70ff0/attachment-0001.htm


------------------------------

Message: 4
Date: Thu, 31 Aug 2006 13:38:13 -0400
From: "Berkowitz, Daniel J" <djbrky at bu.edu>
Subject: [Athen] Google makes thousands of classics available for
	downloading - The Boston Globe
To: "Alternate Media" <altmedia at htclistserv.htctu.fhda.edu>,	"Access
	Technologists in Higher Education Network" <athen at athenpro.org>
Message-ID: <E4FC2772DD884046B7319F7C6CBD2214010DAFD1 at XMS.ad2.bu.edu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2006/08/31/joyce_dickens_g
oogle____classics_are_there_to_download/


>From the Business Section of the Boston Globe -


Just in time for the start of a new school year, the popular Google
search service is making available thousands of classic books free. For
now, the Google Book Search service offers full downloads only of
"public domain" books, whose copyrights have expired. These include many
of the most famous titles of all time, such as the writings of Dickens,
Shakespeare, and Dante. 

It's the latest milestone in Google's campaign to do for books what it
has done for
websites. "Our goal is to create a comprehensive, full-text index of all
the world's books," said Google Book Search group business product
manager Adam Smith. 

Discussion about the Google Book Search
<http://books.google.com/intl/en/googlebooks/about.html>  project has
taken place [on and off] on various listservs and at professional get
togethers and till now the general consensus has been "well ... that's
nice - but it doesn't do much for us." Because, you see, the Google
project creates digital books that are in accessible for our needs. They
are locked-formated and cannot be run through OCR or read by a
Text-to-Speech program. The on-line library being created by Google was
akin to the "look inside" samples one finds on the Amazon.com catalog.
You could see more then just a few pages, but they were only available
on-line with no downloading or other hanky-panky allowed. many were
missing key passages and pages in order to comply with "fair use"
doctrine that doesn't actually say how much of a given work is 'fair' to
'use' but merely stipulates that as long is it ain't the whole
kit-n-kaboodle you can get away with it.

But now it appears that Google has found it's booksharing backbone --
sorta. They have decided to offer downloadable PDF versions of
out-of-copyright public domain (orphan?) works. Interesting, but nothing
earth shattering to folks who have come to rely for years upon good ol'
Gutenbgrg.net <http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page>  for the
occasional title. Andthe best part - Gutenberg is years ahead of Google
in having available clean versions that do need to be futzed
<http://www.thefreedictionary.com/futzed>  with in order to prep them
for further processing.

Anyway - getting back to the texts available as complete PDF's, I
semi-randomly chose "Flatland
<http://books.google.com/books?vid=0PO8Zb8GuSvhGZx2&id=u8HOxy7lQYUC&prin
tsec=titlepage> " from the 'download the classics
<http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/08/download-classics.html> ' post
at the GoogleBlog <http://googleblog.blogspot.com/> . Downloaded it and
ran it through Abby FineReader (v.8). The output is just as good as any
other PDF we have run through OCR. Google has stamped each page with
"Scanned by Google" which we would likely keep on the pages and convert
to page number tags in the DAISY production process. Just when I was
weighing the odds of the liklihood we would need to actually access any
of the books Google has available, one of my student staff walked into
the alt-media lab, saw what I was doing and said, "Yuck! I had to read
that book for a math class and hated it!". This, of course, led to a
discussion of what it was about, which led to a discussion of mid-19th
cen. literature, which led to a discussion of the less well known works
of Rousseau <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emile:_Or%2C_On_Education>
and from there onto the novel-before-movie
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Princess_Bride>  version of The
Princess Bride <http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093779/> . But around here
-- pretty much every discussion leads to TPB ... huuuum ... funny that.

Well --- it looks like the Google Book Search and ones we can download
for free is going to become part of my usual search for materials ritual
<http://www.bu.edu/disability/resources/alternative.html> . 

--
Posted by D. Berkowitz to Access Technologists Higher Education Network
<http://athenpro.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-makes-thousands-of-classics
.html>  at 8/31/2006 12:14:00 PM

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
/pipermail/athen_athenpro.org/attachments/20060831/9c4bdca4/attachment-0001.htm


------------------------------

_______________________________________________
Athen mailing list
Athen at athenpro.org
http://athenpro.org/mailman/listinfo/athen_athenpro.org


End of Athen Digest, Vol 7, Issue 12
************************************