[Athen] Looking to add/update our tech for blind/visually impaired students

[Robert Spangler]

I have a Romeo Pro 50 that I use at home that I received through a grant in
2002 when I was in 7th grade.  It still works, just squeaks a little when
it brailles.  I had to get a parallel card for my PC since it doesn't have
USB, and my PC doesn't have native parallel ports!

I imagine that it is no longer being supported, so when it goes belly-up,
it's done.

Robert


On Wed, Sep 29, 2021 at 2:27 PM Stager, Catherine <
Catherine.Stager at frontrange.edu> wrote:


> Ha ha – we had a Romeo embosser at CU that was kind of like that (the

> Juliet Susan speaks of was the replacement purchased pre-2008).

> Interestingly enough, we ended up donating the Romeo to the National

> Library of Azerbaijan – it was very gratefully received!

>

>

>

> *From:* athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> *On

> Behalf Of *Normajean.Brand

> *Sent:* Tuesday, September 28, 2021 4:25 PM

> *To:* Access Technology Higher Education Network <

> athen-list at u.washington.edu>

> *Subject:* Re: [Athen] Looking to add/update our tech for blind/visually

> impaired students

>

>

>

>

>

> *CAUTION:* This email originated from outside of the Colorado Community

> College System. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize

> the sender and know the content is safe. Please contact your college IT

> Help Desk if you have any questions.

>

> Thank you Susan!

>

>

>

> After talking to someone who has been in our ADA office only a year or two

> longer than I have (mutter…20yrs), he seems to remember some type of

> embosser that no one knew how to use, and it ended up being a closet and

> then just, I guess, dissolving into dust in the closet because no one knows

> what happened to it!

>

>

>

> NJ

>

>

>

> *From:* athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> *On

> Behalf Of *Susan Kelmer

> *Sent:* Tuesday, September 28, 2021 2:50 PM

> *To:* Access Technology Higher Education Network <

> athen-list at u.washington.edu>

> *Subject:* Re: [Athen] Looking to add/update our tech for blind/visually

> impaired students

>

>

>

> We are using an ancient (well, in technological terms -15 years old or so)

> Juliet duplexing/interpoint embosser.  We’ve had to have her fixed a few

> times, but it has been worth it.  She no longer talks to the network so I

> have to print from a local machine, but I still don’t care.  Her

> replacement, the Trident, broke down after 14 months of very limited use.

> It was sent off for repair, and when it came back, it went into storage.

>

>

>

> Even after sitting off/idle/in a coma throughout the pandemic, when I

> fired her up to print some Braille for a student a couple weeks ago, she

> worked completely flawlessly.  I do believe they now make a new version of

> Juliet, and Trident has been retired.  I hope the new ones are as good as

> the old ones.

>

>

>

> We use Duxbury Braille Translator to take Word files to whatever format

> Braille is needed (including pre-UEB text and pre-UEB Nemeth).

>

>

>

>

>

> *Susan Kelmer *

>

> Alternate Format Production Program Manager

>

> Disability Services

>

> Division of Student Affairs

>

> *T* 303 735 4836

>

> *www.colorado.edu/disabilityservices

> <http://www.colorado.edu/disabilityservices> *

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

> *Due to the nature of electronic communication, the security of this

> message cannot be guaranteed. If you’ve received this email in error please

> notify the sender immediately and delete this message. *

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

> *From:* athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> *On

> Behalf Of *Normajean.Brand

> *Sent:* Tuesday, September 28, 2021 12:29 PM

> *To:* Access Technology Higher Education Network <

> athen-list at u.washington.edu>

> *Subject:* Re: [Athen] Looking to add/update our tech for blind/visually

> impaired students

>

>

>

> Thank you, Cath! This was my next question – what embosser does everyone

> find best/easiest to use for someone (me!) who doesn’t know Braille and get

> started with, and what you are using to produce tactile graphics. I was

> looking at PIAF but feeling a bit overwhelmed and definitely out of my

> league on this one. Thank you for the suggestions.

>

> Best,

>

> NJ

>

>

>

> *From:* athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> *On

> Behalf Of *Stager, Catherine

> *Sent:* Monday, September 27, 2021 3:24 PM

> *To:* 'Access Technology Higher Education Network' <

> athen-list at u.washington.edu>

> *Subject:* Re: [Athen] Looking to add/update our tech for blind/visually

> impaired students

>

>

>

> Hi NJ,

>

> Independence science is a great resource, as Wink mentioned. I echo the

> need for the would be engineer to learn LaTex – it can be a valuable tool

> for anyone wishing to do any publishing in the field and it makes

> interacting with math much easier.

>

> Even if you do not produce Braille it may be worth investigating the

> Phoenix embosser for the tactile graphics support.  I would probably go

> this direction rather than a PIAF: the Phoenix has tactile graphics

> software included in its software package and can easily make use of images

> the APH Tactile Images library, or even just emboss a PDF.  There is about

> $1000 difference in price, but the cost of the paper the PIAF uses is high

> and small errors make an entire drawing unusable. Since a Phoenix uses

> Braille paper it is more cost effective in that sense.

> I loved working with the Tactile Talking Pen and the STEM binder

> <http://touchgraphics.com/portfolio/ttpen-stem-binder/> from

> TouchGraphics – their Periodic Table of the Elements was a favorite of

> students I have worked with.

>

> Best,

>

> Cath

>

>

>

> *From:* athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> *On

> Behalf Of *Normajean.Brand

> *Sent:* Monday, September 27, 2021 9:08 AM

> *To:* Access Technology Higher Education Network <

> athen-list at u.washington.edu>

> *Subject:* Re: [Athen] Looking to add/update our tech for blind/visually

> impaired students

>

>

>

>

>

> *CAUTION:* This email originated from outside of the Colorado Community

> College System. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize

> the sender and know the content is safe. Please contact your college IT

> Help Desk if you have any questions.

>

> Hi Wink,

>

> No, unfortunately, I’m not able to attend this year either in person or

> virtually. Budgets have been slashed tremendously.

>

>

>

> NJ

>

>

>

> *From:* athen-list <athen-list-bounces at mailman12.u.washington.edu> *On

> Behalf Of *foreigntype at gmail.com

> *Sent:* Friday, September 24, 2021 7:04 PM

> *To:* Access Technology Higher Education Network <

> athen-list at u.washington.edu>

> *Subject:* Re: [Athen] Looking to add/update our tech for blind/visually

> impaired students

>

>

>

> NJ,

> Are you going to sign up for the Accessing Higher Conference? There is a

> specific presentation by Volker Sorge on Wednesday afternoon 11/17 on Easy

> Accessibility for Chemistry. It's available on the virtual conference so if

> you can go in person, it's available online. Volker is also doing a

> presentation on Thursday at the conference entitled "Automated Generation

> of Tactile Math." I know this is not an immediate fix, but either one of

> those or both of those presentations might be helpful to you in the future.

> Joe Polizotto is also giving a presentation on math conversion into HTML &

> Nemeth code.

>

>

>

> My two cents on student responsibilities for preparing for upper division

> science & math? Either one or both of the students need to learn Nemeth

> code for their math courses and/or LaTeX coding. Learning Braille would

> benefit them in college work in general.

>

>

>

> Here is an organization you need to hook up with. It's an organization of

> blind scientists which, I assume, would include aerospace engineers. It is

> called Independence Science: https://independencescience.com/resources/

>

>

>

> You might pass this information onto your student for their future contact.

>

>

>

> You'll need some kind of process to create raised tactile drawings,

> illustrations, graphs, etc. You won't be able to send it all out so having

> some in-house mechanism would be helpful. The raised line picture in a

> flash (PIAF) device from Freedom Scientific would be helpful.

> https://store.humanware.com/hus/piaf-picture-in-a-flash-tactile-graphic-maker.html#:~:text=Piaf%20is%20a%20machine%20that,called%20capsule%20or%20swell%20paper.&text=The%20heat%20of%20the%20Piaf,are%20blind%20and%20vision%20impaired.

>

>

>

> Hope this helps. At least it's a start. I'm sure others will Japan with

> some more useful information & contacts.

>

>

>

> Wink Harner

>

> Accessibility Consultant/Alternative Text Production

>

> The Foreign Type

>

> Portland OR

> foreigntype at gmail.com

> 480-984-0034

>

> This email was dictated using Dragon NaturallySpeaking. Please forgive

> quirks, misrecognitions, or errata .

>

>

>

>

>

> On Fri, Sep 24, 2021 at 3:40 PM Normajean.Brand <normajean.brand at hccs.edu>

> wrote:

>

> Hello all,

>

> We’ve been given a little money to “add new or update” our technologies

> for our blind or visually impaired student’s use on campus. We already

> offer Fusion/JAWS/ZoomText, and Dragon on campus. We have the Kurzweil web

> license and Glean, which students can download to their personal computers,

> a partnership with Freedom Scientific for Fusion/JAWS/ZoomText for the

> Sponsored Software license for our students, and Microsoft 365.

>

> My thought is to add items from the APH store like the Tactile Drawing

> Board but not sure what else to add to my wish list. We don’t have any one

> who knows how to Braille, or own an embosser or software for creating; so,

> I’m open to suggestions on these items. What else should I be looking for?

>

> Note: It is rare that I have any students who know any level of Braille or

> who own an embosser or any Braille reading technology, however, this

> semester I have two and as luck would have it, both are in level 1

> chemistry classes and algebra. One is dead set on becoming a aerospace

> engineer, the other is general/liberal arts – neither have had sight since

> birth. Most of my blind students have come to us totally relying on JAWS

> for their technology because that is what they were taught.

>

> Thank you for your insights and suggestions,

>

> NJ

>

>

>

> *NJ Brand,  ATAC*

> ADA Tech/Assistive Technology Technician, Center for Learning Innovation

> ● Spring Branch Campus ● Suite RC12/13 – Note: Working remotely,

> off-campus, due to COVID-19 until further notice

>

> ● T: 713.718.5604 ● F:713.718.5430 ● HCCS <http://hccs.edu/>

> <http://hccs.edu/>

>

>

>

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-- 
Robert Spangler
Disability Services Technical Support Specialist, Office of Learning
Resources (OLR)
University of Dayton
Ryan C. Harris Learning Teaching Center (LTC)
Roesch Library Room: 023
Phone: 937-229-2066
* All appointments are being held remotely at this time.
For Deaf/Hard of Hearing, call 711 (Ohio Relay)
For office hours and further OLR information, please visit
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