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Accessible News #21 — Autumn 2004
Should you be using these old newsletters, please bear in mind that the web addresses were correct when the newsletter was created but that they may not be accurate now. We do not plan to change the back issues of the newsletters.
Contents:
- BCIT to Open Medical and Assistive Devices
Commercialization Office
- NBRS Honoured with Award
- Whitehorse City Council Leads the Way in
Municipal Captioning
- Bravo for Maestro!
- Quebec Company Looks at ICT Accessibility for
People with Disabilities
- News Bits
- Our Web Site
- Communications From ADIO
- Where To Find Us
BCIT to Open Medical and Assistive Devices Commercialization Office
Western Economic Diversification Canada will provide $340,000 in federal funding to the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT: www.bcit.ca) for the development of a Medical and Assistive Devices Commercialization Office. The funding was announced in June.
The new office will expand the services of BCIT's Health Technology Research Group (HTRG) and enhance ongoing research and development activities. It will allow health technologies to be marketed across Western Canada by providing detailed business planning to innovators and developers.
For more than 12 years, the HTRG has engaged in the development and evaluation of medical and assistive devices. Core competencies are in prototype development including engineering, industrial design, electronic, plastics and in product evaluation which includes gerontology, biomechanics, human factors and epidemiology. With a core research staff of eight full-tine and seven part-time employees, the HTRG also draws upon BCIT's teaching faculty and staff for expertise as needed. The group works with unique, world-class facilities and equipment, including the Dr. Tong Louie Living Laboratory for state-of-the-art product evaluation and focus groups, and the Centre for Rehabilitation Engineering and Technology that Enables (CREATE) for prototype development.
The new commercialization office will work with BCIT's past and existing clients, who are drawn from private sector device development companies, academic institutions, industry associations and government organizations, to assist them with the development of commercialization plans including independent market research, business plan development and access to investment. For more information about the office, contact Nancy Paris-Seeley, Director, Health Technology Research Group, BCIT Technology Centre at 604-432-8754.
Contents.NBRS Honoured with Award
The CNIB Library for the Blind awarded this year's Dr. Dayton M. Forman Memorial Award to The National Broadcast Reading Service Inc. (NBRS) in recognition of the NBRS' efforts to enhance media access to blind, visually impaired or otherwise print-disabled Canadians.
"It was an honour to receive such an award for the on-going service that we provide," said Paul Thiele, past-chair of the NBRS board. "Access to news and information is our mandate and we plan to continue making print media accessible for millions of print-restricted Canadians."
NBRS received the award at a breakfast reception on June 19 hosted by The CNIB Library during the Canadian Library Association conference. The award is especially poignant this year as Dr. Forman was instrumental in helping establish NBRS and later served as its president from 1991-1993.
Less than 5% of information in Canada ever makes it into a format such as braille or audio, and more than 3 million blind or visually impaired Canadians depend on what little there is. Since 1989, NBRS has worked persistently to address this issue.
"The services that NBRS provides to Canadians who are blind and visually impaired are invaluable," said Margaret McGrory, executive director of the CNIB Library. "It is a privilege to work alongside NBRS to help bridge the gap in access to information."
NBRS is a not-for-profit enterprise, which through its VoicePrint Canada and AudioVision Canada (AVC) operations divisions produces and distributes services that can help reduce barriers to visual media. VoicePrint Canada partners with hundreds of volunteers to produce audio versions of news information published by more than 100 daily and community newspapers and magazines. Its broadcast reaches more than 8 million Canadian homes through licensed program distributions such as cable companies, direct-to-home satellite audio channels, and at VoicePrint Canada (www.voiceprintcanada.com). AVC is the preeminent audio description production centre in Canada, making films and television programs more accessible for those who cannot see the screen or cannot see it well through the addition of audio inserts that describe key elements essential to the story line. Many Canadian libraries, including The CNIB Library for the Blind, loan AVC described videos to their patrons.
Contents.
Whitehorse City Council Leads the Way in Municipal Captioning
On June 21, the City of Whitehorse launched a new service to provide live, closed-captioned broadcasts of City Council meetings. All Council meetings were to be aired on in-Chambers TV monitors and on WHTV Cable Channel 9 with closed captioning for the benefit of Whitehorse residents, particularly those who are deaf or hard of hearing.
To the City of Whitehorse's knowledge, this is a first for a Canadian municipality to offer this service
"We are very pleased to offer this new service," said Mayor Ernie Bourassa. "Whitehorse is proud to be a leader in providing access to municipal services to all citizens, regardless of their ability. This new service will benefit all Whitehorse residents and is just one of many progressive and inclusive initiatives undertaken by Council."
Accurate Real-Time Reporting of Vancouver is the captioning provider. Although the company had demonstrated successful and affordable delivery of similar services to the city of Prince George, British Columbia, this is the first time they have employed their technology for the purpose of council meeting telecasts. The closed-captioning system combines digital technology and human expertise. An audio signal is sent to the offices of Accurate Real-Time Reporting in Vancouver, where it is received by an individual trained in court reporting. The reporter transcribes the proceedings using court reporting equipment and, through the Internet, sends a live, verbatim, digital account of the proceedings back to Whitehorse, where it is decoded and tagged onto the video and audio signals currently being sent to WHTV.
The impetus for providing captioned meetings grew out of a request made in 2003 from the Yukon Association for the Deaf to the Mayor and Council to offer sign language interpretation of Council meetings. Council also agreed to investigate the feasibility of providing broadcast sign language services and to bring forward a recommendation in this regard to the 2004 Budget Committee. That investigation included consultations with the Yukon Council on Disability, which recommended the services of Accurate Real-Time Reporting to provide captioning, which will make the proceeding accessible to a wider audience, many of whom do not sign.
Contents.
Bravo for Maestro!
A mainstream handheld PC that is accessible to blind and visually impaired users was launched by VisuAide and HP on June 30 at the National Federation of the Blind's annual convention in Atlanta, Georgia.
Built on the HP iPAQ Pocket PC h4150 platform, Maestro is accessible through the use of text-to-speech technology and a tactile keyboard membrane over the PDA touch screen. Users can enjoy the ultra-compact size of a real PDA and essential information-access functionality: text and vocal note taking, agenda, contact directory, etc. The visually impaired can benefit from the same applications than sighted users without handling a stylus.
Scheduled to begin shipping in September, Maestro takes advantage of wireless communication networks such as Bluetooth to yield a modular system that can be operated with or without an external keyboard (Braille or standard), depending on user preference and the task at hand. For example, Maestro allows Braille input using either the tactile keyboard on the unit for brief notes, or an external Braille keyboard for extensive note taking.
With its open environment, the system readily integrates third-party or other VisuAide applications, such as Trekker, a GPS orientation system, and Victor Reader, a digital talking-book player. As a mass-market product, Maestro can evolve in price, power and connectivity at the same rate as electronics for the sighted. Users can benefit from the latest innovations in the PDA market much earlier and at a lower price.
Through its Accessibility Program Office, HP builds relationships with assistive technology companies such as VisuAide to meet its goal of designing, producing and marketing products and services that can be used by everyone, including people with disabilities.
Using their free membership in the HP Developer and Solution Partner Program (www.hp.com/dspp), assistive technology companies can use HP technologies, platforms and operating systems to create innovative solutions. The program also offers technical, sales and marketing support. "At HP, we believe that accessibility is the result of combined efforts," said Michael Takemura, director, Accessibility Program Office, Personal Systems Group, HP.
VisuAide is one of the many leading assistive technology companies that use the HP iPAQ Pocket PC as a platform to create products for people with disabilities. VisuAide chose the iPAQ as their platform for its accessibility, efficient keyboard layout and central navigation key. The iPAQ allows for greater connectivity than the average Pocket PC via USB or serial port, and it uses a flexible, standard platform, Microsoft Windows(R) CE.
"VisuAide's objective was to provide users with a low-cost, highly portable mobile-computing solution," said Gilles Pepin, president of VisuAide. "VisuAide hopes to make technological aids available to a larger number of blind and visually impaired individuals." To find out more about VisuAide's products, including Maestro, visit their web site at: Visuaide (www.visuaide.com).
Contents.
Quebec Company Looks at ICT Accessibility for People with Disabilities
A Quebec company, Sol-Vi inc., has begun a project in the Sainte-Thérèse-de-Blainville region of the province to research the role that information and communications technologies (ICT) can play in enabling people with physical or sensory disabilities to enter and remain in the workforce.
The project is funded through Social Development Canada's Opportunities Fund for Persons with Disabilities. Part of the research will include an examination of activities going on in other parts of the world, such as the integrated approaches that are being used in Europe to involve hospitals, the assistive technology industry, university informatics and engineering faculties and organizations of and for people with disabilities in the development of tools and methodologies for improving the accessibility of mainstream ICT. Sol-Vi is in the process of bringing together similar groups of stakeholders both in the Thérèse-de-Blainville region and elsewhere in Quebec and the rest of Canada to participate in the project.
The eventual aim of the project is to foster growth of the assistive technology industry in the region, as well as the development of knowledge and awareness of the ability of people with disabilities to find and hold permanent jobs. The project is also intended to foster a closer working relationship between local AT companies and the various university and hospital research facilities in the region. To this end, leaders in each of these sectors will be identified and their participation will be sought for a public-private industry pilot project that will provide workers with disabilities with the AT they need to become and/or remain employable.
For more information on the project, contact the project coordinator, Daniel Deneault, at Sol-Vi inc. via e-mail at daniel@sol-vi.com or by phone at 450-433-7032. You can also visit Sol-Vi's web site at: (www.sol-vi.com).
Contents.News Bits
- Queen's University conferred an honourary doctorate on Dr.
Morris (Mickey) Milner during its convocation ceremonies on May
28. An expert in assistive technologies, Mickey recently retired
as Chairman, Rehabilitation Medicine at the Bloorview MacMillan
Children's Centre and is a professor emeritus at the University
of Toronto. His distinguished career has been spent in the
development and improvement of assistive technologies for people
with mobility disabilities as well as in active participation in
a number of activities aimed at improving accessibility for
people will all kinds of disabilities. This includes chairmanship
of the Canadian Standards Association's Strategic Steering
Committee on Public Safety and Well-being (the committee
responsible for overseeing such CSA standards as the Accessible
Design for the Built Environment, Barrier-Free Design for
Automated Banking Machines and the Design for Aging guideline)
and membership on the Minister of Industry's Advisory Committee
on Assistive Devices and Persons with Disabilities. Also awarded
an honourary doctorate at Queen's convocation this year was
former Prime Minister, Jean Chrétien.
- On June 23, the Network of Canada Business Service Centres
was awarded the 2004 United Nations Public Service Award in the
category of "Improvement of Public Service Results". Criteria for
this award are increasing responsiveness to the needs of
citizens, promoting equity and delivering public services in a
manner emphasizing timeliness, courtesy and access.
- In July, Betty Dion of Ottawa was elected the new Chair of
the International Commission on Technology and
Accessibility-Global (ICTA-Global). She succeeds Michael Fox, who
was elected President of Rehabilitation International. To learn
more about ICTA-Global,
visit their web site at:
(www.ictaglobal.org).
- In September, VoicePrint Canada launched the first of 100
Local Broadcast Centres (LBCs). These centres are intended to
provide VoicePrint listeners with local news in an audio format
at VoicePrint
Canada (www.voiceprintcanada.com). All LBC
web sites will have five main news and information categories:
News, Births/Deaths, Grocery Specials, Community Events and
Sports. The first LBC office to open was in Toronto, with a
second office opening in Edmonton at the beginning of October.
More LBC sites will open within the next few months with a total
of 100 sites by the year 2010.
- Drummondville, Quebec-based firm Industries Jaro is now a new
dealer for Ultratec's TTY working with payphones. Jaro is also
working on the development of new brackets to install these TTYs
in different models of phonebooths. For more information on Jaro,
its products and activities, visit the Industries Jaro web site
at: (www.industriesjaro.com), call them at
1-877-477-5151 or 819-477-5151, fax them at 819-477-5011 or email Industries Jaro
at: mail@industriesjaro.com .
- Soaring Eagle Communications has added IWAT: Individualized
Web Accessibility Training to its suite of online courses.
Delivered via e-mail, IWAT includes a three-lesson mini-course
called "Web Accessibility: What is This all About?" and a
seven-lesson course based on the W3C Web Content Accessibility
Guidelines 1.0, called "Web Accessibility Simplified". The first
of these courses is designed for managers, decision-makers and
those with a general interest; the other is aimed at those
responsible for web site design or maintenance. For more
information or to register for these courses, Contact Glenda Watson Hyatt via
e-mail at: Glenda@eaglecom.bc.ca .
- The Government of Ontario's Paths to equal Opportunity Office
has produced a French language terminology guide to assist people
in using the appropriate terms to use with regard to disability
and people with disabilities. The guide, called "Guide
Terminologique : Un vocabulaire approprié à
l'égard des personnes handicapées de l'Ontario" is
available in multiple format on demand, as well as in .pdf, html
and text versions on the Paths to equal
Opportunity Office web site at:
(www.equalopportunity.on.ca/fre_g/).
- A new, easy-to-read font has been designed especially for
people with low vision by the American Printing House for the
Blind. Called APHont (pronounced Ay-font), it features heavy,
open characters, large punctuation marks, wide letters, no serifs
and high crossbars. APHont is available as a free download from
the American
Printing House for the Blind web site at:
(www.aph.org/products/aphont.html), (you must
certify its use by or for persons with vision
disabilities).
- Microsoft Canada and the CNIB have been honoured with
Imagine's "New Spirit of Community Partnerships" Award in
recognition of their partnership in developing The CNIB Digital
Library. This award recognizes their commitment to improving
access to information for more than three million print-disabled
Canadians. The award winners were announced September 20 by Chris
Pinney, Director of Imagine at the Canadian Centre for
Philanthropy's Annual Symposium in Toronto. This is the second
consecutive year Microsoft has won this celebrated award
presented by the Canadian Centre for Philanthropy to Canadian
companies and charities that form an innovative partnership to
address a social need. Microsoft Canada and the CNIB began
creating The CNIB Digital Library in 2002 to give thousands of
visually impaired Canadians access to tens of thousands of new
books, over 40 newspapers and hundreds of magazines. The library
also contains The Children's Discovery Portal — the first portal
in the world designed specifically for children who are blind and
visually impaired. Imagine's New Spirit of Community Partnership
Awards were founded in 1996 to recognize and celebrate innovative
and effective partnerships and programs created by companies,
nonprofits and charitable organizations that are making a
difference.
- For his dedication to helping blind and visually impaired
Canadians live independently, Earl Bryenton has been awared the
CNIB's 2004 Winston Gordon Award. This $15,000 annual prize
recognizes advances in technology that benefits people with
vision loss. Mr. Bryenton's company, BRYTECH
(www.brytech.com) develops innovative electronic
products for blind and visually impaired consumers, including an
ultrasonic mobility device, a colorimeter and talking currency
identifers for a number of countries. The award presentation was
made on October 13 at the Bank of Canada, as part of the Bank's
ceremonies to unveil the new $50 bill. "Being able to handle
personal financial transactions with confidence is a fundamental
part of living independently," said CNIB president and CEO Jim
Sanders. "Earl's contribution to helping blind and visually
impaired Canadians is immeasurable."
- The 12th World Congress of International Society for
Prosthetics and Orthotics (ISPO) will be held in Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada on from July 29 — August 3, 2007. The ISPO World Congress
is the premiere global event for multidisciplinary prosthetic and
orthotic care. The ISPO Canada National Society is pleased to
welcome you to Vancouver to enjoy the scientific sessions,
workshops and symposia, expansive trade exhibits, and active
social programs. The ISPO World Congress will enable leading
researchers and practitioners from a broad range of disciplines
to improve the quality of life for individuals requiring an
orthosis or prosthesis. International Society for
Prosthetics and Orthotics World Congress information can be
found at (www.ispo.ca/congress) or by phone at
604-681-5226.
Our Web Site
Our Web site can be found at (www.at-links.gc.ca/as/) . At this site are all our old newsletters as well as different listings and links to other sites of interest. Should you be using these old newsletters, please bear in mind that the web addresses were correct when the newsletter was created but that they may not be accurate now. We do not plan to change the back issues of the newsletters.
Communications From ADIO
If you would prefer to receive our newsletter on disk or by
e-mail, please contact us at the address below.
Where To Find Us
For more information or to get on our mailing list, please
contact:
Mary Frances Laughton or Deb Finn
Assistive Devices Industry Office
Industry Canada
P.O. Box 11490 Station H
Ottawa, Ontario
K2H 8S2
Tel: 613-990-4316 or 613-990-4297
fax: 613-998-5923
TTY: 613-998-3288
Internet: adio@crc.ca
Return to the ADIO home page
