Marty: Good afternoon. My name is Marty Blair with the National Center on Disability and Access to Education and we welcome you to this the next in our series of audio webcasts. We present this in collaboration with the National on Accessible Information IT at University of Washington. NCDAE has over 500 affiliates nationwide with a growing number of international affiliates and many of you are with us today and we’re glad you’re here. We are dedicated to improving access to electronic mediated educational services including distance education for all students by monitoring and promoting practices that enhance the lives of students with disabilities.
Today’s web cast is entitled Mobile education and access for students with disabilities. It is focused on issues related to mobile and wireless technologies as they relate to the education student with disabilities in the K12 and post secondary settings. This topic has surfaces in national meetings we have held with out affiliates. As we all know the digital divide is in the process of being addressed. Though we still have a long way to go, efforts have been made to close this divide. When we start thinking about mobile wireless technologies, the digital divide in this area is widening extremely fast. In fact the bridges seem to be more and more difficult to build.
We are joined today by two panelists. The first is John Peifer, who’s the Research Director at the Biomedical Interactive Technology Center and Co-director of the Mobile Wireless Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center, or RERC. John conducts research, programs in Telehealth, medical visualization, and rehabilitation., In 2001, Mr Peifer became the co director of the Mobile Wireless RERC which is working to improve community access, independence and quality of life using mobile wireless technologies.
Our second panelist is Dr Paul Baker, who is the Director of the Research Center for Advanced Communication Policy. Paul is the Project Director of Policy Initiatives for both the RERC on Mobile Wireless Technologies and the Workplace Accommodations RERC. He is Adjunct Professor for the School of Public Policy at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He is currently researching the role of policy in advancing technology and universal technology goals for persons with disabilities, and institutional issues involved in public sector information policy development at a state and local government use of technologies.
We had a third panelist scheduled, but he is ill today. Mr. Ed Price. We’re sorry that he’s not with us, but we will include him in a future webcast.
Paul and John welcome. We are glad to have you with us today.
Panelist: Good afternoon
Marty: Throughout this webcast, the next hour. We are going to be inviting your questions and comments regarding our discussion to make this discussion usefully and helpful for all of us, your questions and comments will be very much needed. We would ask you to use the form that is on the bottom of the screen that you used to tune in to this webcast. You may submit questions at any time throughout the webcast. First we will hear form our panelist, then we will do our best to address as many question as time permits. So, let us start with John Peifer. Take it away.
John: Thank you Marty. This is John Peifer, and as the co-director of the wireless RERC in Atlanta. We are a national center. One of 22 sponsored by the Department of Education National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research. The idea behind RERC is that wireless technologies are becoming so much a part of life, that if there are barriers to access to this technology, that people with disabilities would be left our and government and community participation. So we have two primary goals, parallel goals related to the RERC. One is to promote accessibly of the wireless technologies and the other goal is to explore what types of innovative application can be developed using wireless technologies. The idea is that there is some very things, such as education perhaps, that could be delivered more effectively using mobile wireless technology, Why does the Department education view this as an important priority for funding? They recognize that wireless today is a part of life. Mobile phone usage is almost universal in the United States. We have almost 200 millions wireless subscribers. Worldwide mobile phones are surpassing the one and a half billion mark and today many mobile computing devices, more mobile computing devices are being sold than desktops and televisions combined. So we keep talking about the differences between 500 million versus 1 ½ billion mobile phone devices. What are mobile wireless technologies? It covers a broad range of cellular technologies. People talk about first generation, second generation, now third generation fourth generation , or 3G and 4G wireless technologies that are providing not just Not just voice communication but data an internet access from a mobile device anywhere\, anytime. There are wireless technology such as WiFi and WiMax, that are promising much greater band that you can get on your cell phones today, but in bubbles of access, back to a few hundred yards or with WiMax maybes several miles covering an urban center. Bluetooth technologies eliminate cables from devices so you don’t have to think up from your to your computer with a cable, a Bluetooth connection, automatically upload your calendar or phone book form your desktop computer to your mobile device. Offers lower costs and wireless data networking dish within a building, very low costs, data networks. Another wireless technology, such as the Global Positioning System (GPS) and other location tracking technologies make it possible for the devices to become smarter, location aware or context aware o where and this might simplify the interface, particularly the educational setting. They may become smart enough to know that they’re in a classroom setting and literately and change some of the interface options and deliver the content in a different way than in another location. Radio frequency and ID tags are another area that represents another idea that represents sub wireless capabilities. To labeling products or options and mobile device may be able to read these tags, but keep so that an individual can locate objects around them and get information about what’s in their environment, and interact with their environment.
So some of the other services that are beginning to take off the data offices are becoming very powerful. Text messaging is considered a data serviced that now is very popular on the mobile phones. They can be used for delivering education content or information. There are over 300 billion messages sent in Europe over the cell phone and catching up rapidly in the United States. The multimedia messaging is a popular communication mode. Where people can send audio and video communication and there new location that are exploiting the location tracking technology.
The data connections are also providing voice, proving another avenue for voice communication. Voice over internet protocol is becoming an important data application that may change the way we do voice calling. With all of this potential, what are some of the problems that we need to be concerned about, some of the issues of accessibility? Mobile wireless devices, particularly, because of the mobile nature the small format, the tiny keyboards, the small displays, the audio and the speakers that may not be as high of quality. So these represent barriers to access. They also have problems with providing an alternative interface. Many assistive technologies that have worked well with desktops computers don’t work with the mobile computing platforms because there is not an alternative interface standard to communicate with those mobile devices, and there is a real need in that area. So, I just wanted ton introduces a few technologies, some of the exciting possibilities that you can do with wireless technology and accessibility issues, then open it up for questions.
Marty: Great John, Thank you. We will be taking question and I hope those of you that are listening. I have actually writing down a couple myself from based on what you’ve provided to us. So please send us some questions. Again, use your form at the bottom of the screen. Our next panelist in Paul Baker.
Paul: Good afternoon. Thank you. I find It appropriate that we are doing this in a non-physical location. From this represent some of the barriers that use these technologies that we are faced with. Since most of the work that I do have the barriers that I am going to talk briefly about are ones that are related to policy. As a rule, there are several big barriers to the adoption of these mobile technologies in general, there are economic barriers, there are technological in compatibility barriers and there are regulatory barriers. First and foremost it is very well in good to say that we are going to make use of the technologies, but if they individual can not afford that, then you have a significant bridge for them. As a rule, people with disabilities people tend to characterize then as lower than average income you would already expect it to be more difficult. In terms of technological barriers you have issues of compatibilities. The standard example of this is the example of hearing aid and the issues of cell phones in which cell phones operate perfectly properly compliance with communication regulation. Hearing aids offer perfectly in accordance with the FDA regulations, but occasionally there was interference between the two. The issue here was not a strictly technological one, but more of a compatibility issue dealing with standards and regulation. The problem being here being, there wasn’t a complete coordination between varying agencies. It was like pushing the balloon and you push one side and it comes out on the other, there needs to be coordination. Finally there are issues, and I don’t I know it you sure aware of this. It might be the end uses is unaware of the available of theses devices, or is the say in the case of communication that the computer may be well aware of it, but the transmitter, the professor may not be aware of the disadvantages. The manufacturers may not be producing to an individual or taking a more universal approach could easily configure a device, so it would be relatively available. But simply aware of the needs and so again you have a failures to communicate is From a policy standpoint, you have intervention barriers in which the government says, or frequently the federal regulatory authorities say "Thou shalt do this," or "it is highly recommended we do this. "It's a strict intervention. There's the other way, which is a market intervention, which the consumer or advocacy groups, or groups of people working together pull a product through, that is to say they make their need known, they contact manufacturers, they work together, and when a need or a market is probably the most honest way of putting it, becomes, when manufacturers make them aware that there's a market, then that's another way in which barriers are addressed. Again, it deals with communication of information. And then of course there are technological approaches which John touched upon, and that is to say standards in which manufacturers users and other interests get together and try to bang out common ways of doing things, quite frankly, to avoid regulatory pressure on one hand, or litigation on the other. So this is a broad kind of parameters that affects these devices, at least from my point of view. In a nutshell.
Marty: Thank you very much. We have two different views of this mobile education, mobile wireless technologies from an engineering, or technological standpoint and also from a policy standpoint. One of you brought up, John, I think it was you, something about the use of text messaging.
John: Yes.
Marty: And how text messages are, it's something that happens all the time.
In fact I get text messages from my 14 year old daughter and I have to admit I have no idea how to reply.
John: That's the awareness issue.
Marty: It's part of her world. I would imagine that someone, if they haven't already, is going to be figuring out how to use this text messaging, for distance education purposes. What are we doing, if anything, to not exclude those who have visual impairments? What kinds of things can we do to include all people in this type of educational approach? And John, when you speak I need you to speak right into your phone, please.
John: All right.
Marty: Either one of you.
John: Yes, the text messaging or text streaming capabilities I think can become an effective mode for distributing educational materials. And there are several areas in which that can be useful .One project we're working on here at RERZis to deliver text captioning for classroom lectures. So on his own mobile WIERLSZ device have text did I played from a lecture in a classroom setting.
For people with, the question you asked for people with visual impairments, how do you combine text messaging in an audio format. And of course the promise of each speech recognition technologies have been evolving rapidly but they're still not quite there. But it's a recognition. And some of the mobile devices are beginning to address that. One of the products that is available now on the NOKIA phones has software that will read all of the menus and functions that are provided in a graphical format on that phone. So if you were to receive a text message for your daughter or from anyone the software would convert that to text into synthesized speech. But the problem is, not only cell phones are able to run that software. Many cell phones today have their own proprietary operations. So one software application on one phone could not be easily transferred to another phone. Right now we're looking at a fragmented approach to the problem. Not standards where a common operating system for mobile phones would help disseminate accessibility solutions more quickly.
Paul: Well, on the other hand, I could imagine that a text device would be used in conjunction with other technologies, in which case I propose that something called a cell phone be used. Because you already have a built‑in device that communicates in place of text messaging. However, if one wanted a more portable application, a standard digital recorder such as an I‑pod might be one way of delivering information if it doesn't have to be interactive.
Marty: How would you‑ ‑We mentioned, John, I think you mentioned something about captioning. And I'm thinking in terms of cell phone. How realistic is it to use cell phone or these kind of text devices for captioning? Can they be captioned well enough? I mean is the screen big enough? What are the issues surrounding that?
John: Well, one of the major problems is that the media, the video delivered with a mobile device is delivered in a different format than broadcast for television.
Broadcast has text captioning built into it now. Because part of the video signal that includes the data stream that provides text captioning. So that in your home you can turn captioning on or off on your television. That text stream is not available when the mobile device, where just the video signal, and they don't have the option of turning off their text, and maybe text captioning is available. Now there are ways to address that problem by sending a separate stream with the text messaging or a browser window to provide the text message in addition to the video. But those standards need to be worked out so that people who rely on text captioning are not left out when using mobile devices.
Paul: Let me point out, to tag on to that, that the reason that there is captioning across broadcasting is because it was required by federal regulations. And I'm not sure it would have been would have happened without that. So one approach might be to take and submit requests or file letters of interest asking that, for instance, regulatory bodies, in this case the FCC, instead of the requirement that some uses that the text be included or encoded or made provision for on mobile devices. Whether you'll see it on a cell phone, given its limited screen real estate available is one thing. But you might see in, say, a larger device like a black berry or a device that is primarily designed to carry a text message rather than voice.
Again, the earlier black berries are what comes to mind.
John: There's an issues of alternative interface, there's another possible approach to this, to have an alternative output format where you could read the text and it will provide larger text. Right now we don't have the ability on many of these devices they don't have the option for the information for an alternative output.
Paul: John let me ask you this.
Would it be possible to use something like blue tooth to send text to an auxiliary device?
John: Certainly. That would be, in fact that would be a good solution.
Because many of them right now include blue tooth technology.
Of developing a standard approach or how to handle that data and how to transfer it to an interface.
Marty: This is Marty. Are there alternative interface standards that are fairly well accepted? Are they voluntary standards? Are there government, federal standards for this sort of thing?
John: They're not the standards for that kind of, to address all of the inputs and outputs. That's going to be a major challenge and a big step forward if you can achieve that. So you have an alternative output channels that are standard. There are some standards that would call for an alternative interface that allows electronic products to communicate with a universal console. And this has the potential for providing an alternative interface for mobile devices themselves. Let me explain that just a little bit more. Universal remote console would be similar to your television remote control. But when you walk into the room the remote control is smart enough to recognize that there are electronic products that it can control.
And there's an exchange of information between those two devices. Silently and automatic, they exchange what is present, the television says I'm here, I can be controlled, this is what you can do. And then your universal remote controller recognizes that, and then makes the control available to you to the format you prefer, the tiny buttons, you can use that or a Braille interface but you can take control of that television. With an alternative interface manager is used to control many different types of electronic products. And if that standard is embraced by industry it could be incorporated to mobile devices itself so you could have an alternative interface controller that you preferred, maybe built by a technology company. But you could take control of a mobile device that works well for you except the display is too small, or the audio is not your preference or you may want to have a different type of input. So I think there's potential, there. The two standards was just last summer and we're working with industry to try and incorporate that. If that's successful then that could open up many different solutions for accessibility and alternative interfaces.
Paul: Paul here, and that probably is, in this particular case, a superior solution than to have a regulatory approach specifying certain standards or equipment, and partly simply because by the nature of regulation moves more slowly than a voluntary standard setting. And also, given the rate of change in technology, by the time a standard came out it may be something to solve the problem, there may have been a technological solution and/or standard solution. Though you might want to consider a regulatory approach broadly, in the sense of saying that the federal government feels that it is in the interest of access that phones, captioning, or any kind of text‑based displays, for instance, be made readily accessible, and leave it broadly rather than making specific technological, specifying specific technologies. So, you see the balance, here, that the development of these voluntary standards and interfaces is, in fact, one solution to the problem, and one that's probably superior than the alternative.
Marty: We have our first question, and I would remind those of you who are listening today, that if you do have a question or a comment for our panelists, please submit those questions or comments using the form that's on the bottom of the screen that you used to tune in today. This first question comes from Liz, and I'm not sure how to say your last name, but it starts with a P, from Thompson Business and Economics. I'm going to paraphrase this question a little bit.
It has to do with national standards. And she's wondering if there are national standards for accessible mobile products for the K‑12 students such as NIMUS, the instructional materials access standards or section 508. You've already answered the question that those do not request. How do those requirements apply in this situation? Or do they at all? Does that question make sense?
Paul: He was just thinking about it. I don't know if you were, John.
John: Let Paul answer that.
Paul: Thank you. Well, going a little out on a limb, here.
Part of the problem with 508 is it's a federal standard, and it's a standard that's applied via the mechanism of contracting. That is to say if you want to do business with the federal government products must be client accessible.
The problem, and again the other side of the issue is that education is frequently a local and state matter. And the requirements that localities and states, and specifically 508 compliance is some question it is tied to the use of federal funds. In this case, it is a gray area, which is why you're hearing me hesitate, in a sense that the federal government requires certain things, but on the other hand as a rule administration of education has been a matter of state and local government, which is not entirely, again the question is open to the degree to which they must be compliant. So you're in a bit of a gray area at the moment. If that's not enough of a hedge.
Marty: That's a great waffly answer.
Paul: A new policy for living, thank you.
Marty: John, did you want to add to that?
John: Well, I guess one of the issues we keep hearing is that people aren't aware of some of the solutions that are out there. There are accessible solutions that manufacturers are making available. All of their cell phones, all of the cell phones in a product line may not be accessible. But they are offering products that can solve problems. There are loop sets that are available for people with hearing aids to help them avoid hearing aids, there are the NOKIA phony mentioned has software that can read all of the menu’s. There are some phones that do have alternative interfaces to an option for increasing the volume, black berry has software tools where increasing the size of the font which makes it more accessible for people with visual impairment. So, the solutions are out there that people aren't aware of, and when people are trying to select technology for the classroom, they should start look at the products that can meet the needs of all of their students.
Paul: John makes a good point that while the regulations don't exist, that is to say they're not mandated solutions, there are, in fact, technological solutions which exist that might solve the problem. But that isn't quite what the question was asking, as I heard the question. Am I mishearing the question, was what the federal regulation was?
Marty: Yes, I mean, are there any federal regulations?
Paul: Other than peripherally they're not direct other than I'm aware of.
I could be wrong. There aren't direct regulations. But the ideal act in terms of disability in education does make certain broad requirements, but in terms of the way it was phrased, 508 is peripherally applicable, but again, it's how you're dealing with the flow of moneys, in this case.
Marty: Well thank you. Let's move on to another question. Considering mobile technology specifically for use in education, either the K‑12 level or in the post‑secondary level, are there any that appear to be taking hold, or what are people introducing mobile technology‑wise into education? And what are the issues with respect to accessibility? I know there's been some discussion about wireless PDA's, for example. Any thoughts about what the accessibility issues are with respect to that technology?
Paul: John you want to go, or do you want me to?
John: I'll start and I'll let you chime in. PDA's now have several potential problems with some of the new graphical interfacing on the touch screen.
That represents a barrier for somebody with a visual impairment. If there are no buttons or keys to interact with, even if there's an audio output if it requires a graphical interface to interact with that device, that represents a barrier.
So the potential for the PDA's though is that they do have some alternative interfaces available, so that they can output this information and afford access.
Some capabilities allow for a different type of keyboard, it's difficult but not impossible to emulate. But there are several that have blue tooth capability that allow you to connect a much larger or special purpose keyboard to operate the PDA's. Paul?
Paul: I was thinking again from a policy standpoint, I was thinking institutional issues. First of all, it all good, but it's fairly expensive to purchase and if they're required you run into the same thing. It pushes the cost of education up. And again, I'm thinking the TERTIARY college and university. From an institutional standpoint if you want to use these wireless devices, a lot of them, or some of the most readily available ones are WYFY based devices, and you run the risk of putting sufficient nodes or. If they are cellular based you run for the opposite problem of who's going to pay for the cell time? But I could see some sort of special modification of this, the Sprint/NEXTEL group messaging thing, but I haven't thought that through, it's just occurred to me. There are instructional issues. If you want to use these wireless devices, these wireless PDA's, it usually means the course content is going to have to be modified or altered, and as it is now faculty have enough trouble staying on top of things as it is. You then, as a matter of policy are either going to require or strongly suggest they basically alter their courses or create new content so the load, there's an additional load.
Not saying it's not a good idea, but an additional load shifts on faculty who may only be barely familiar with the technologies themselves, to come up with new formats of delivery of the information. On the plus side, you have, for instance, a recent example of, at Duke University, the, I can't remember what it's called.
The Duke University I‑pod initiative or something like that, in which Duke University gave out 1600 I‑pods to entering students in August, 2004, to experiment with the use of these. And these aren't wireless but they were mobile devices. And there were some issues with, aside from the obvious issue of property and licensing issues, they were left with some very positive outcomes, not necessarily at the individual level but at the institutional level, which at some extent is critical. Because if the institution doesn't see a particular reason to do these, or don't perceive some sort of benefit to the institution, this shuts off one additional avenue for the delivery of very valuable approach. And the Duke found a couple of benefits, which was increased collaboration and communication among campus technology support groups, which is useful, because it's really a good idea not to have to reinvent the wheel, and these support groups had a good sense of problems, and solutions. It's more likely, the device is more likely to be deployed and diffusion is more likely to occur. There were some other issues with publicity. The fact that brought these into play generated tremendous publicity both for Duke and for a certain fruit shaped computer manufacturer in California. It's saying one of the other impacts was that the use of these technologies took the conversation of the role of technology in teaching which is always an important dialogue to have particularly if some of your purveyors, that is to say faculty, are slower than others to adopt alternative and innovative technology delivery modalities.
Marty: I would imagine that the I-pod, the kinds of things that were being used over the I‑pod were audio files. And I wonder what kind of impact that would have on students who were deaf or had a hearing impairment. How would they participate in this type of educational experience? Or could they at all? That's, I guess, a question that would get to the whole digital divide issue. We have another question that's related to that from Phillip Minyard of the University of Memphis. The question is, are there legal issues in creating and sending out MP3 files? I guess you could look at this in several ways, from a technology standpoint, a standards standpoint, or from an accessibility standpoint. What are the legal issues in creating and sending out MP 3 files with respect to education?
John: I guess.
Paul: I guess I go first on this one, John?
John: I'm not expert in that area. There certainly would be legal issues, just ask Napster about that.
Paul: I don't think they're around any more.
John: But from the technology side there's work being done in digital right management. How you can manage intellectual property and your copyrighted material being public. And it's very interesting some of the some of those developments could be also applied to communication. Paul, go ahead and give me the policy about that.
Paul: I was going to start with, I was going to take it the other way.
For instance, I‑tunes, the whole I‑tunes system is set up to, as a rule kind of minimize the possibility of the rights being violated in terms of specific answer. More broadly, I'm not sure it's really, depending on how you set it up I'm not sure it's that big a problem. In the same way there are standards dealing with how we disseminate written materials, for instance, I'm going to say Xerox but that's a registered trade mark. You can't copy an entire book and hand it out to your class. Even though it was practiced it's certainly not legal. And if you wish to use those people's intellectual property, as is the case at least in my field and I just say every educational field is well aware of the attribution and other people's intellectual property. If you're producing MP3's, and that's just simply a format, right. It's not just like you're sending an MP3 out. It's an MP 3 of something.
If you are, for instance, sending out an MP 3 of someone's lecture, it seems to me that securing the proper rights to the dissemination of the lecture solves that problem. If you're cutting and pasting sound bites or musical samples, and that sort of thing, well once again, you're back to the situation of most of us are trained to get permission or attribution, or get the rights to use these things.
For me it's six apply an extent of the procedures for use of other people's material.
John: One last point on that. The wireless aspect of this makes it a little bit more vulnerable for security, people hacking into the system.
Paul: That's true.
John: This issue occurs on wired networks as well. But the schools and facilities are broadcasting information using wireless networks to transfer information.
They have to be a little more careful with access to that and make sure there are policies in place to keep unauthorized users from obtaining the material.
Paul: Then again if you go on the web now, if you get Google searches or Yahoo searches or MSN searches, a lot of times you find links that take you to people's web site that will not let you access the material because it's limited to students or official users. And you said wireless is easier to hack into. On the face of it if you knew everything in defense against litigation is that you've done best practices or standard approaches to protection.
John: There's a point here that that practice for wireless is that you don't the default password wireless‑ ‑
Paul: Supervisor.
John: That's right.
You set up a‑ ‑
Some people are forgetting to so that. they're leaving their wireless networks wide open.
Marty: One of the things that we'll be talking about likely in our next web cast that will be held the end of June will be this whole issue of security and accessibility.
And as we strive to make our technologies more and more secure, are we making them so secure that people who have alternative interface issues, are we locking them out? I do have a couple of questions here. The first is from Ms. Warren from the Illinois assistive project. Our panelists suggest using the internet as one of the main means of communication and the possibility of changing or replacing the telephone. Do you think it is likely that we will move quickly into video casts or meetings or video telephones for education? Have you had any success with the next talk service and the IP relay systems?
John: I guess, I think there's real potential for much of the voice track to become voice traffic to become voice over the internet protocol, or VOIP. There are already products available today that allow people to bypass the traditional phone company and use the internet as their telephone, voice telephone. So yes, I see this coming. It may offer a less expensive way to voice communicate, especially long distance calls. But it does introduce some issues about access.
One of them might be that there won't be broad band internet capable of supporting that everywhere, and we may reach the tipping point where urban centers have voice over IP and rapidly drop, or begin to drop the traditional telephone service, and other areas that don't have the broad band network capabilities will then face a time when they're left out. So we have to worry about access in certain pockets of limited wireless access.
Marty: So it may not be just the people with disabilities are locked out, it may be the rural versus urban issues.
John: Both.
Paul: This actually is already coming up. You are beginning to see a battle between the telephone companies, traditional telephone companies and the cable service providers. In some rural areas telephone is supported by federal subsidation There's a small charge on your phone bill to help support rural areas, which as a matter of policy, are considered to be a good idea that communication be available. But this is based on telephone line usage. And if, for instance, you have cable companies or other providers cherry picking off voice over IP users, it may not even be a far rural area but in small‑town clusters so that the cable company picks up all thousand users in the town, you wipe out the ability of the local rural telephone user, provider to be able to economically provide service.
So there are some real serious potential dislocations. But as far as voice over IP or the use of the internet to provide education, you already have a number of proprietary trade schools, I won't mention any names, as well as a number of public institutions, you can get degrees entirely over the internet in varying degrees of speed. So I think we're already at that point right now.
Marty: Just a question of whether or not, or if they are serving students with disabilities, and how are those accommodations made?
Paul: Well, as long as‑ ‑To some extent there are a number of standards that basically are indicators of whether at least your web base delivery is more or less compatible, I mean these tools exist out here. And the question is whether‑ ‑ And that's something I HPT thought about and I need to look into, to what extent are people who deliver a distance learning across state lines, to what extent, and what are the source of applicable laws and regulations that govern them? And I quite honestly don't know off the top of my head.
Marty: It would be interesting SNS section 504 should be interpreted so broadly if any of those entities receive funds through PELL grants and support would they be covered under 504?
Paul: That's an interesting question. And I know there is an analog of that which is receiving like title R8 or any kind of money has been used as a fairly powerful tool to get schools to comply with federal regulation. In fact there are only three or four universities of higher education I'm aware of that are exempt from certain types of federal law because as a matter of practice they do not, not only do they not accept federal funds, you can't even get a student a federally‑subsidized loan to go to one of these schools, because if they were to accept the students who received the loan potentially this brings them under federal guidelines. Again I'm not going to name names, but this is, there are less than a handful of institutions that are not bound by the section.
Marty: There are some people section 255 describes accessibility in hardware it may at some future point, in the next year or two in the deliberation, may include internet types of technology, things that were not considered when the telecommunications act was last passed. I do have another question here from
Liz. The question is this. Could the DAISY XML standard be a possible universal method of delivering data to mobile accessible devices?
Sounds like a technical question to me.
Paul: John, I know I've heard of‑ ‑I can't say anything about it.
John: Yes, I think you could but it may be more limited.
Ideally we have a broader standard for doing the interface as opposed to input and output. The daisy standard, I don't know it well enough. But I think she's talking about the output format, the interactive format.
Marty: I think so. Well looking at the clock, we are quickly approaching the end of our hour. We appreciate those of you that have submitted questions. If you'd like to submit one in the next 25 seconds, please feel free. If you'd like to, you're welcome to, and we'll try and get to it here in our remaining minutes. But I would like to give each of our panelists a couple of minutes just for some closing thoughts, some closing comments on this issue of mobile education and access for students with disabilities.
And we will start with Paul and then with John and if we have any questions submitted after that we will take that. Otherwise we will wrap it up. So, Paul.
Paul: Quickly, I think probably, and this is beating a dead dog to some extent, even though real dogs were used in the example, that is awareness is really a critical issue. Awareness on all parties. Because to some extent policy solutions flow from awareness of problems. Policy makers and regulators are not going to take and rock the boat or upset the regulators, be it manufacturers, or service providers, unless there's a sufficient reason to do so. So one of the greatest, indeed, changes need. And in some cases change is very appropriate.
One of the best things to be ton is for people who are impacted, advocates for people with disabilities, educator and advocates to take and submit comments and input to the appropriate regulatory agencies. I'd also, it is incumbent upon end users to get educated, as well as students to try to stay as up on these technologies as possible, because to some extent, when the technologies operate properly they do provide a tremendous enabling tool.
Assistive technologies can't function without them. I'm reading my notes through a pair of glasses, very old fashioned assistive technology. So once again, a policy, like the market, is an appropriate and great approach, but the stake holders need to make their voices heard.
Marty: Thank You, John?
John: Well, I would second those comments, and also emphasize that the world is changing to mobile computing devices, mobile communications. Cell phones are everywhere today and they're becoming more powerful and more capable and people will be taking advantage of those capabilities, in the classroom. They’ll be taking class notes and making assignments, and calendars. Wireless will make life easier for the teacher and for the students. But we need to make sure that those tools and resources are accessible.
Marty: And I guess that is our challenge is to figure out how best to do that, whether we do it through technological standards, or whether we do it through interventions such as government requirements, or market demands. And we're at that juncture I think, in the history of technology, that we have to figure that out. And we appreciate those of you that have been with us today for this hour, for your comments, for your questions. We are especially grateful to John and Paul for their participation as panelists today. Our next web cast will be held the end of June, we do not have a specific date yet, but we will be addressing the issue of security and access. I was interested in this discussion of digital rights management, and the effect that those discussions may have on our ability to access information. We would invite you to continue to visit our web site as we update it regularly. We do have an RSS speed feature that deals with technology and accessibility in education. So please visit us at our web site for more information and for daily updated news. Our web site as you know is NCDAE.org.
Contact us if you'd like to join as an affiliate, please do so. Thank you very much for your time, and have a great afternoon.