From the web page http://www.annenberg.nwu.edu/pubs/comtech Communications Technology for Everyone Implications for the Classroom and Beyond By Peter David Blanck Senior Fellow Contents Preface Introduction Power in the Mainstream: Using New Technology to Provide an Accessible Curriculum The Challenge to Education Policymakers: Delivering an Accessible Curriculum through Technology Communications Technology: Extending Opportunities in Business and the Community to People with Disabilities Keynote: Inclusion through Technology, Policy, and Conversation Conclusion Related Publications This report is available as an accessible CD-ROM (Macintosh-compatible only) free of charge. For information about receiving this report, contact The Annenberg Washington Program. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Peter David Blanck is a Senior Fellow of The Annenberg Washington Program. He is a Professor of Law and of Psychology at the University of Iowa and concentrates much of his research on the Americans with Disabilities Act. Blanck is a Commissioner on the American Bar Association Commission on Mental and Physical Disability Law and is past President of the American Association on Mental Retardation's Legal Process and Advocacy Division. The U.S. District Court for the State of Wyoming appointed Blanck to the Compliance Advisory Board, which oversees the development of community, educational, and employment services for people with mental disabilities in the state. Blanck has written widely on the Americans with Disabilities Act and has received grants to study its implementation. Before teaching at Iowa, Blanck practiced law at the Washington, D.C., law firm of Covington & Burling and served as a law clerk to the late Judge Carl McGowan of the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. He received his Ph.D. in Psychology from Harvard University and his J.D. from Stanford Law School, where he was President of the Stanford Law Review. COPYRIGHT 1994 by The Annenberg Washington Program in Communications Policy Studies of Northwestern University. Permission is granted for the not-for-profit reproduction and distribution of this report or portions thereof, provided that (1) proper copyright notice is affixed to each copy; and (2) no alterations are made to the content of any file. Permission is granted for the not-for-profit reproduction or distribution of multiple copies of this report or portions thereof, provided that (1) proper copyright notice is affixed to each copy; and (2) no alterations are made to the content of any file. The Annenberg Washington Program would appreciate notice of such use. RECOMMENDED CITATION: The Annenberg Washington Program in Communications Policy Studies of Northwestern University, Communications Technology for Everyone: Implications for the Classroom and Beyond (Washington, D.C.: The Annenberg Washington Program, June 1994). The opinions expressed herein are those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect the views of The Annenberg Washington Program in Communications Policy Studies of Northwestern University. The Annenberg Washington Program The Willard Office Building 1455 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Suite 200 Washington, D.C. 20004-1008 Telephone: (202) 393-7100 Fax: (202) 638-2745 TDD: (202) 393-4121 ---------- Preface Civilization advances, someone once said, when what was perceived as misfortune is recognized as injustice. For too long, American society has barred people with disabilities from countless domains of ordinary life--schools, workplaces, theaters, libraries--in a way that we have perceived only recently as unjust. Communications technology is giving us the opportunity to rectify this injustice. Innovations such as CD-ROMs, digitized books, voice-activated software, and on-line database systems will make the classroom truly inclusive. No longer will students with disabilities be granted only the geographic common ground of shared classroom space; thanks to technology, they will establish meaningful intellectual common ground as well. Their full participation will dilute other students' stereotypes about people with disabilities, to the benefit of society as a whole. There will be other benefits as well. History demonstrates that the advantages of technology are often dispersed more widely than people anticipate. The telephone, for example, grew out of Alexander Graham Bell's efforts to amplify his voice to communicate with his hearing-impaired wife. (Ironically, Bell's invention did not help people with hearing problems for nearly a century, until the invention of TDD.) When I was Chairman of the Public Broadcasting Service in the 1970s, we pioneered the use of closed captions to bring television to people who could not hear. We never dreamed that millions of immigrants would rely on that technology to learn English, as they are doing today. Using technology to help people with disabilities has been an abiding interest of The Annenberg Washington Program. In 1986, well before "information superhighway" had penetrated the vernacular, we worked with the Gallaudet Research Institute on a forum called "Marketplace Problems in Communications Technology for Disabled People". Last year, Peter David Blanck, an Annenberg Senior Fellow and a Law Professor at the University of Iowa, produced a white paper on the employment provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). This year, in addition to convening the conference summarized in this report, Blanck is studying how Sears, Roebuck & Co. uses communications technology to meet the needs of its employees with disabilities. (The "Sears" report is available on-line.) In planning this conference, our goal was to demonstrate as well as discuss educational inclusiveness. The agenda and participant list were printed in Braille and provided on computer diskettes. Four signers translated the proceedings. FM headsets with amplifiers were available for people with hearing impairment. One participant never left his home in Massachusetts; he participated via telephone audio hookup. Most important, this report has been issued on multimedia CD-ROM. Our initial purpose was to make the conference proceedings accessible to people with disabilities, but we soon realized that the CD-ROM would have wider appeal. The printed page cannot begin to capture the technology demonstrations at the conference. The video on the CD-ROM will provide a much better representation of these spellbinding presentations. To receive a complimentary copy of the accesible CD-ROM (Macintosh-compatible only), contact The Annenebrg Washington Program. In that respect, this report exemplifies the unconfinable benefits of new technology. We are pleased to be able to use accessible technology to analyze accessible technology. Newton N. Minow Director The Annenberg Washington Program ---------- Introduction Developing technology to support people with disabilities has rocketed to the top of the national agenda. In February 1994 the Technology-Related Assistance Act authorized $68 million to help people with disabilities use new technologies at home, at school, and at work. A few weeks after that, President Clinton signed the Goals 2000: Educate America Act, a comprehensive education bill that requires a thorough study of the effects of school reform on children with disabilities; in its potential impact, some have likened the statute to the Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education. Only four years after its passage, meanwhile, the landmark ADA has begun to reshape employment, public accommodations, and, perhaps most important, public attitudes. As fast as it is moving, however, policy cannot keep pace with technology. "There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in the home," said the President of Digital Equipment Corporation in 1977; 17 years later, 30 percent of American homes have computers. Consumer sales of educational software in the United States reached roughly $100 million in 1992; they are projected to reach $400 million by 1996. The Annenberg Washington Program conference "Communications Technology for Everyone: Implications for the Classroom and Beyond" featured assessments ofpolicy and technology from leading experts. Never before had a group of such stature come together to discuss these issues. Speakers exchanged ideas on how technology can assist students with disabilities and how government, industry, and advocacy groups can get the technology to the people who need it. For most participants, however, these discussions were overshadowed by the demonstrations. Seven people with disabilities showed how technology is enabling them to learn. A student with cerebral palsy can now make comprehensible oral presentations in class. A student with visual impairment can now hear his textbooks read electronically. Even more remarkably, a student who has had a brain-stem stroke can control a computer by blinking her eyes. One of the students at the conference, a high school junior named Mason Barney, showed the audience how he uses computer graphics to tailor information to his learning style. A participant asked Mason how other students react to his presentations. He replied: "Most of them ask me, `How do you do that? Thursday after school I'm free. Can you show me?' They are really excited by it." In the years to come, we hope that thousands of students with disabilities will be in Mason's position, using technology both to learn and to teach. ---------- Power in the Mainstream: Using New Technology to Provide an Accessible Curriculum The ordinary classroom can present "monumental" communications barriers to students with disabilities, according to Anne Meyer, Co-Executive Director of the Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST). Many people see these barriers as outgrowths of the students' disabilities. "We don't share that view," Meyer said. Just as stairs can bar access to a building, she explained, the medium of print can constitute a barrier for students with disabilities. Electronic media can offer alternative access systems, which have a strong appeal--so strong, in fact, that students without disabilities may be drawn to them. Meyer and CAST Co-Executive Director David Rose introduced seven CAST "pioneers," individuals who have been working with the organization to develop better technologies for communication in school. Three of the pioneers appeared in person at the conference, and four appeared on videotape. * Caroline, a six-year-old in Beverly, Massachusetts, has cerebral palsy with moderate to severe hearing loss; she cannot hold a book. CAST has designed software that permits Caroline to read a book on a computer. The page of text and illustrations appears on the screen alongside video of a signer, and a digitized voice reads the text aloud. Caroline uses a customized chin switch to enter commands. Thanks to this technology, she is able to undertake the kind of independent preliteracy explorations that other kindergartners perform. * Andrea Schneider is a first-year graduate student at Boston University, studying special education with a focus on moderate to mild special needs. She has a learning disability and hearing loss. CAST is working with her to develop software that displays textbook pages on a computer screen. A voice reads aloud as the pertinent text is highlighted on screen. She can pull out part of the text into a notepad for later review and look up the definition of any unfamiliar word in an electronic dictionary. The speech capability in particular is "wonderful," Schneider said. "I hope in the future that there will be more available text on computers or that text can be conveniently put onto the computer, and I won't have to deal with readers and tutors." * Megan, a fourth-grader in a mainstream classroom, loves reading and hopes to be a writer. She has cerebral palsy and significant visual impairment, and her speech is difficult to understand. Now when she is assigned to give a presentation to her class, Megan composes her remarks ahead of time on the computer, then uses the computer's speech output capability to convey the information to her classmates. Other students no longer have to stop her in the middle of a presentation and ask her to repeat something. * Mason Barney, a high school junior from Ipswich, Massachusetts, is both gifted and learning-disabled. He uses a computer to bypass his illegible handwriting and to illustrate his papers. For a science fair project, he used a digital computer camera and a series of still clips to make a motion-picture explanation of his experiment. "It visually shows what is happening and how I got my data much better than any picture could," Mason said. "If a picture can tell a thousand words, a movie can probably tell a million." * George, a 39-year-old worker on a commercial farm in South Hamilton, Massachusetts, has developmental disabilities. As part of his work and as a hobby, he studies weather maps. The maps are readily available on computer databases, but reaching them requires a series of steps--starting the telecommunications program, dialing the database, keying in the password, interpreting questions and options along the way--that exceed George's skills. Using macros and text-to-speech capability, CAST has consolidated these steps into four keystrokes so that George can reach the database on his own. Rose pointed out that in this case the information itself is accessible, but the ordinary access route is not. "One of the concerns we have about the new information highway," he said, "is that there aren't really any ramps onto it for lots of people." * Robert Park, a freshman at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, is legally blind and has cerebral palsy; as a consequence, he has trouble reading and writing. He hopes to study the law and become an attorney, using digitized books that are read aloud electronically. CAST has developed a prototype interface to allow Park to use a commercial electronic information service. The interface magnifies the screen and its icons, reads electronic mail and other digitized texts aloud, and responds to voice commands. The system helps Park move closer to what he describes as his goal of "full independence." * Judy, aged 23, had a brain-stem stroke as a college freshman. The only muscles she can control are her eyelids. Working with other organizations, CAST has developed a system that she can control. A camera attached to a computer focuses just below her hairline. She blinks her eyes to activate computer commands. "Quite a few pieces of this are brand-new," said Meyer. She believes the technology will have wider applications. "As we develop something for an individual, we like to see how that same technology can be applied more generally." Helping students with disabilities, like many other technology applications, requires software. Today, few textbooks have been converted into electronic form, and the standard procedure for doing so--scanning the data into a computer, one page at a time--is costly. Although publishers generally typeset and design books electronically, most companies are unwilling to part with the digital data. According to Rose, CAST has called eight different publishers about getting electronic versions of textbooks to adapt for students with disabilities, and "so far we are zero for eight." Expense is not the only problem. Most digitized books, Rose noted, have an "added quality," like ramps built onto existing structures. Ideally, the alternative access system would be built in from the outset through what is called "universal design." With that goal in mind, CAST approached the Scholastic publishing company about two years ago, proposing to create an instructional program for early reading that would have built-in comprehensive access. The result, newly available, is a series of 72 early reading books that are sold both on paper and on CD-ROM. The CD-ROM version has many advanced features. An introductory cartoon presents the book titles using music and speech. After the student selects a book, each page is displayed on the screen. On command, the CD will read the page aloud, using different voices for different characters. The student can click to hear an individual word pronounced. He can also use a microphone to read the book, then hear his rendition and compare it with that on the CD. "Teachers report to us that kids are reading 10 or 12 times to get it just right for the recording," Rose said, "which they then play for parents and classmates." The student also can magnify illustrations, color them, color the words, write responses to stories, and otherwise make the book his own. For students with disabilities, teachers can customize the learning experience. The pace of the oral reading can be slowed down. The text can be magnified. The system can scan through its options for students who can operate only a single switch. The colors of text and background can also be adjusted to each student's learning preference. As a result, a single CD can virtually republish a book for each child in the classroom. "For every child on the teacher's list," Rose said, "I can set up an instructional path and the kinds of access features that child needs so that the book is structurally correct for them." As for cost, Rose said that the electronic versions of books need not be expensive, but they do require computers. "We are preparing kids for the 21st century with 19th century tools," he said. "It is ludicrous to think of classrooms that don't have computers." Rose noted that technology brought into the classroom to help students with disabilities often ends up aiding other students as well. "We have gone into a lot of classrooms around a specific child with a disability to try to make an accessible curriculum, and the classroom reorganized around good technology," he said. "It became part of their general curriculum plans. People with disabilities once again led the way." My handwriting is atrocious. I myself cannot read it at times. When I'm trying to express my ideas, nobody can read it, and that obviously poses some problems. Also, writing tends to be very laborious for me. I have to sit there for a long time trying to get out what I want to say. I often cut things short just because my hand is getting tired. . . . The computer allows me to organize my ideas and thoughts in a legible and professional manner. For a science project last year on the growth of cells, the computer allowed me to make graphs and charts and to write. If I didn't have a computer, it would be absolutely illegible. On this science fair project I actually won an honorable mention, which is a fairly big accomplishment, especially considering that I'm learning disabled. . . . Later on in the year, one of my teachers asked us to make a presentation showing how land and industry affected the growth of America in the 19th century. Some of the people in my class decided to write an essay, which takes a long time for me to do. Others decided to do drawings or maps, which, because I have fine-motor problems, are also very hard for me to do. It's hard for me even to draw a straight line at times. So what I decided to do was to take digitized pictures I found on a videodisk and movies I found on a VCR tape and put them all into a multimedia presentation titled "Nineteenth-Century America." Mason Barney, a high school junior in Ipswich, Massachusetts, with learning disabilities I have three goals. I would like to be an attorney. I would like to be a politician. And I would like to be, eventually, the United States president. Look out, Washington, here I come! . . . The print medium is too small for me to read. I am legally blind, which affects my tracking ability and lowers my comprehension. Moreover, I am not able to write on my own. In order for me to be a competent attorney and keep up with the likes of Melvin Belli, I will have to be able to read and write very fast. I believe that electronic text and voice recognition are going to make that possible, because my hearing, my brain, and my voice are my greatest assets. If I become a lawyer, electronic text will allow me to link up to a service that will provide digitized legal material. I will be able to link up via modem and bring it onto my desktop computer. Then I can throw away those dusty old lawbooks. . . . The computer voice system has made me much more independent. Before, I had to have my parents do all my writing and reading. Now I am able to sit here and have the computer read to me. That's why electronic text is so crucial: without it, I don't get the information and the education I require. Robert Park, a freshman at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, who is legally blind and has cerebral palsy I represent the parents. My child was one of the pioneers here on the screen this morning. He is almost 40. When he was in elementary school, there was nothing like what we have heard today--never in my wildest dreams. And I would never have believed that at almost 40, he could have learned 11 different technological computer programs that have opened up a whole new world for him. For the challenges you have presented and the hope that you have given, I would like to say thank you from the parents. Joanne H. Patton ---------- The Challenge to Education Policymakers: Delivering an Accessible Curriculum through Technology The students who demonstrated their computers and other technology during the first panel are still the exception, according to Robert Williams, Commissioner of the Administration on Developmental Disabilities in the Department of Health and Human Services. Most students lack access to the technology they need, and many who have the technology lack the training and support that will enable them to put it to everyday use. The challenge, he said, is "not to come up with just a few more exceptions, but to change the rules of the game entirely." One fruitful change would be to design universal access into technology, said Deborah Kaplan, Vice President of the World Institute on Disability. Engineers often design technology for people like themselves, "mostly men in their 20s who don't have any apparent disabilities," said Kaplan, whom President Clinton recently appointed to the National Information Infrastructure Task Force. For example, one of the most popular commercial information services, America Online, has a graphic user interface that renders the service essentially inaccessible to the blind. Kaplan said that schools have a major role to play in promoting universal access. They must be made aware of software and hardware with built-in accessibility, then use their buying power to support it. Doing so is particularly important now, with schools poised to invest heavily in links to the national information infrastructure. Kaplan believes that we should "leverage the buying power of the states and the schools to make sure that disabled kids will be able to use the same technology everybody else is using." As accessible technology becomes more widely disseminated, the price will fall. Kaplan noted that decoder boxes for receiving closed-captioned television initially cost several hundred dollars. Then, when federal policy mandated that all television sets be manufactured with this capacity, the cost plummeted to less than 25 cents per television. "There's a lesson there about market efficiencies and mass-marketing accessibility," she said. Paul G. Hearne, President of the Dole Foundation for Employment of People with Disabilities, noted that one of the standard arguments advanced by industry--that there is no consumer demand for accessible technology--has a familiar ring. About 20 years ago, representatives of bus companies contended that there was no demand for accessible buses because "we never see any people with disabilities on the bus." "That's because they can't get on the bus," retorted advocates for people with disabilities. "It's the same thing with the information infrastructure," Hearne said. "We have to argue that from the beginning the information infrastructure must be accessible to people with disabilities of all types." Along with universal design, other possible approaches for changing the rules of the game include: * Creating "schools without walls" for students with disabilities. H. Rutherford Turnbull III, Co-Director of the University of Kansas's Beach Center on Families and Disability, recommended that to help prepare students for employment, technology should bring the community to the classroom and the classroom to the community. "If you can have driver's education or pilot training where you bring the highway or the skyway to the student," he said, "why can't we do the same thing to bring the community to the student in the public school?" * Bringing higher education into the loop. Colleges and universities ought to provide data and services to state and local education agencies, Turnbull said. "Those agencies in turn could bring the research and demonstration programs into the classrooms for the students." * Making full use of existing legislation and policy initiatives. According to Turnbull, two recent statutes and an initiative--the Technology-Related Assistance Act of 1988, Goals 2000, and the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research's program "Constituency-Oriented Research and Development"-- create important opportunities, and "we ought to take better advantage of those." * Supporting sympathetic people in industry. Some industry people are interested in universal access and other needs of the disability community, said Steve Saleh, a volunteer at the White House Office of Science and Technology, but they are often isolated within company structures. "One of the things that the disability community needs to do is to assist these individuals in developing credibility within their companies." * Getting people with disabilities involved in developing the technology. Michael Hartman, Manager of the Employment Program for People with Disabilities at the NASA/ Goddard Space Flight Center, said that more young people with disabilities should be encouraged to study technology, science, and engineering as a way of gaining power over future technological advances. The issue is not simply how we teach children with disabilities, he noted, but also what we teach them. * Teaching people in government about the technologies. "There are vast bureaucracies at the federal, state, and local levels where we need to be educating bureaucrats about what is possible and why it is necessary," said Clarence J. Sundram, Commissioner of the New York State Commission on Quality of Care for the Mentally Disabled. Many of the battles between advocacy groups and government agencies, he said, result from the fact that "bureaucrats don't understand technology--they haven't been trained on what is possible." * Teaching people with disabilities about the technologies. Paul Parravano, Assistant for Community Relations at MIT, noted that what seem to be technological breakthroughs sometimes turn out to be dead ends; for example, "lots of reading technology did not fulfill its promise." Even successful technologies can pose difficult choices for users. Parravano noted that MIT uses Macintosh computers, whereas many blind people use IBM compatibles. "When I tried to get information on Macintosh disks or help with training, I found it pretty difficult." * Reducing the alienation that many young people with disabilities feel. "When I go around our nation and hear young people tell me that what they expect after high school is to end up on social security, something is terribly wrong," said Robert Williams of the Administration on Developmental Disabilities. "Technology is only a tool. It is up to us to help young people use that power." The students we got to know this morning are all very much exceptions to the rule, in that they all obviously received not just the technology, but also the training and the extensive, ongoing support to put that technology to everyday use. Our challenge is not to come up with just a few more exceptions but to change the rules of the game entirely. This is not simply for the benefit of students with disabilities. We know what the 21st century holds. The key to a full and productive life, as individuals and as a nation, rests on our ability to access and master communication technology of every sort. Robert Williams, Commissioner, Administration on Developmental Disabilities, Department of Health and Human Services Information is the currency of inclusion. If we don't bring the school to the community and the community to the school, if we don't bring the databases, the regulations, the techniques of instruction to the parents and the parents into the schoolhouse, then we will not have completed the seamless web of which the administration has spoken. The seamless web has to include the students, the schools, the families, and the institutions of higher education. . . . If state and local education agencies and parent groups are connected through the technologies, so that the seamless web takes in the research, the demonstrations, the excellence that we have out there, I don't think there will be any end to our capacity to include people with disabilities--not only in the schools but ultimately where they ought to be, in the mainstream of the communities. H. Rutherford Turnbull III, Co-Director, Beach Center on Families and Disability, University of Kansas We have to move away from thinking about adaptive technology as the main solution for making technology accessible to people with disabilities, and begin thinking instead about universal design, where we design technology for everybody. We have to start working with industry to come up with standards and guidelines. . . . Schools and libraries are in a unique position to begin asking vendors: How can disabled kids use the technology that we're about to spend millions of dollars on? Can our kids with disabilities use it, or are we going to saddle special education with extra costs to purchase adaptive technology that may or may not even work with the technology that the other kids are using? Deborah Kaplan, Vice President, World Institute on Disability Part of the difficulty is getting information about the technology. . . . When I attended college and law school, much of this technology was not available. I did my work with tapes and readers, the old-fashioned way. As a matter of fact, I didn't start using computer technology until I started working at MIT, in part because I had a large degree of uncertainty about what kind of computer format my future employer would be using. I raise this, as someone with a disability, because it is confusing, even devastating, to purchase and get trained in technology that ends up not being useful in the school or job you end up in. Paul Parravano, Assistant for Community Relations, MIT ---------- Extending Opportunities in Business and the Community to People with Disabilities The "seamless web," as the administration has called it, includes more than the schools. What happens in the classroom profoundly affects the workplace and the community. Currently, people with disabilities face grave unemployment and underemployment, according to Paul Steven Miller, Deputy Director of the Office of Consumer Affairs. Technologies will not only foster skills in children previously excluded from the classroom; they will also make all children familiar with technology-aided integration and thereby eliminate some phobias and stereotypes. In these ways, he explained, an inclusive classroom can foster an inclusive workplace and society. Miller, whom President Clinton recently nominated to be Commissioner of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, stressed the importance of empowerment instead of paternalism. "For too long we have had able-bodied people sitting around talking about what is best for the `other,' for that group of people." To develop workable, sensible policy, people with disabilities must be included in the discussion, particularly the discussion about the national information infrastructure. "When building standards were developed, people with disabilities were not part of developing those standards, and we saw what happened," he said. According to Carol Rasco, Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy, the Clinton administration is working toward full social inclusion for people with disabilities. Rasco cited some of the administration's actions in this area, such as signing Goals 2000 into law, implementing the ADA, and encouraging public-private partnerships to develop technology. When asked about financial assistance to provide technology for those who need it, Rasco suggested that government incentives, through the tax code or otherwise, might be appropriate. "There are a number of financing approaches we could look at," she said. In the workplace, she added, employers are often surprised to learn how simple and inexpensive inclusive technology can be. "Information-sharing is key here," Rasco said. The United States has established the basic principles of a disability policy, said Robert Silverstein, Staff Director of the Senate Subcommit-tee on Disability Policy. Congress is now "making sure that every piece of legislation that goes through is consistent with that policy." The guiding principles, Silverstein said, are "inclusion, not exclusion; independence, not dependence; and empowerment, not paternalism." Silverstein summarized the provisions of the ADA that cover employment and public accommodations. He stressed that the ADA is premised on the view that "disability is a natural part of the human experience, and we have to remove those attitudinal, architectural, and physical barriers that prevent people with disabilities from fully participating." Katherine Seelman, Director of the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research of the United States Department of Education, noted that the issues have advanced substantially since 1986, when she helped to organize an Annenberg Washington Program forum on communications technology for people with disabilities. Several statutes, most notably the ADA, have been added to the federal code since then. Neverthe-less, she said, "some issues seem to remain very pressing: financing, training, and especially the involvement of individuals with disabilities in all of this." Both personally and professionally, I have a deep commitment to inclusion. As the parent of a 20-year-old son who carries a label of disabled, I have seen what technology can do. . . . Two quotes from the President on work really say something to me about people with disabilities without using the word disability. Maybe it's because I'm going through that transition with my son, and I'm seeing how powerful work is in his life at this point. I think back to the President's speech in Memphis a few months ago, where he said this about work: "I do not believe we can repair the basic fabric of society until people who are willing to work have work. Work organizes life. It gives structure and discipline to life. It gives meaning and self-esteem to people who are parents. It gives a role model to children." . . . I think also of a remark he made in 1987, when he was chair of the National Governors Association. . . . "America won't work if Americans can't work or learn or believe in the promise of tomorrow." I believe that says a great deal about what we are about here in this meeting today, and it certainly helps characterize how we are looking at policy. Carol H. Rasco, Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy I feel as if I am giving a historical perspective today. When we started together down this road, there was no Technology-Related Assistance for Individuals with Disabilities Act. There was no Television Decoder Act, which poses a model for all of us on piggybacking a major technology and the needs of smaller sectors of the economy. There was no ADA. . . . I asked my colleagues if there were any issues remaining after all these years, and they assured me that there are. There continues to be a lack of match between the user and the device in the education setting and in the work setting--and when people get into the work setting, they don't have the same technology that they had in the education setting. . . . We still have tremendous requirements in training for both individuals with disabilities and teachers. . . . There is still the problem of implementation and continued support within the work environment, which is a financing problem. . . . So some issues seem to remain very pressing--financing, training, and especially the involvement of individuals with disabilities in all of this. Finally, I think that if we had written the Bill of Rights today, we would have shown greater consideration for those who are challenged with technological accessibility--not only individuals with disabilities or individuals who are poor, but all underrepresented individuals in society. Katherine Seelman, Director of the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, United States Department of Education For years the physical environment--buildings, public places, schools, and so on--were constructed without regard to people with disabilities. One reason is that disabled people were sheltered away, and they were simply invisible. Not ignored, but invisible. But today, disabled people are invisible no more. Today, through legislation like the ADA, we recognize that public accommodations must be accessible. . . . I want to add this notion: The information superhighway is not just new technology. That is not what we are talking about. What we are talking about is a vehicle for social and cultural change--for shaping public behavior and changing the way that business and social life are organized and conducted. This is what Professor Blanck wrote in his 1993 white paper: "The Americans with Disabilities Act is not just another law. It is also a vehicle for social and cultural change, which will shape public attitudes and behaviors toward people with disabilities well into the next century." It is imperative that these two great social changes be brought together at the inception of the national information infrastructure. No one should be left behind. Paul Steven Miller, Deputy Director of the Office of Consumer Affairs ---------- Keynote Address: Inclusion through Technology, Policy, and Conversation Let me begin with some words of Harvard law professor Martha Minow who, in her seminal book, Making All the Difference: Inclusion, Exclusion, and American Law, observed that "the social reformers, seeking to improve the lot of others, would improve their chances if they would communicate with those they hope to help, and share with them the process of deciding what to do." This good, common-sense advice has not always been applied in the disability field. In earlier decades we found many ways to marginalize, to dominate, and to exclude persons with various types of disabilities from the panorama of American life. . . . We excluded them from our schools, barred others from immigrating here, and segregated many in institutions. We now have the technologies and laws, such as the ADA, to reach voices and talents that might otherwise be lost. But we need the wisdom and the will to include all Americans with disabilities. A fellow named Larry McAfee, now 39 years old, illustrates the pitfalls and potentials of our rehabilitation system. In 1985 Larry was riding his motorcycle on a fine day. He had an accident and wound up as a quadriplegic. After years of being shuttled between hospitals and nursing homes, with little or no activity, Larry said, "I feel like a sack of potatoes. . . . It is very heartbreaking. Every day when I wake up, there is nothing to look forward to. . . . I want to die." He petitioned the Georgia Supreme Court to turn off his respirator, and won the right to die. Then, with the media attention that the case drew, offers of help began to flow in. The United Cerebral Palsy Association, bless their hearts, came to his rescue. They found him a home where he could live with personal care and dignity and technology that would allow him to resume his work as a draftsman. In 1992 he began using voice-activated equipment called "Headmaster" that, just with his voice and the movements of his head, enabled him to use a computer and do the work of a draftsman. So he rescinded his wish to die. Could anything be more dramatic? . . . But for all the glamour and the appeal of the new technologies, we still need the old virtues of listening, of remedying the injustices that we encounter, or, as Martha Minow reminds us, of communicating with those we hope to help. Miles Santamour was one of those individuals who reached out, hoping to help others. Miles was a program specialist in the federal government back in the 1970s, working with the President's Committee on Mental Retardation. He went out to Forest Haven, an institution of the District of Columbia for more than 1,300 people with mental retardation. As one of the experts, he made his investigation and report on the plight of people who had been isolated and segregated there for decades. Here is part of the affidavit he filed with the court: "Late one evening, I visited the residence of a group of older women, all of whom were gathered in a large dayroom, idly watching television or working on some piece of embroidery or knitting. As I circled the group, asking questions and explaining who I was and why I was there, I began to sense the dominance of a large, matronly woman who had positioned herself on a couch in the center of the room. "She watched my every move. As I began to leave, she summoned me back. So that all could hear, she began a series of questions, to which she answered yes without waiting for me to respond: `Are you from downtown? Are you a big shot? Are you here to see how bad we live? Are you here to make the place better? Are you going to get us out of here?' "At that point, she turned to her assembly and began to laugh uproariously, almost hysterically, along with many of the other residents. My usefulness had been fulfilled and, without responding, I left. Their laughter continued as I made my way out of the room and did not subside for some time. "These women had spent a lifetime observing the likes of me, evaluating their situation and then disappearing with no meaningful aftereffects upon their lives. One wonders how many times the likes of me had carried out similar investigations, how many `big shots' from downtown had been responsible for raising the hopes of these individuals, how many times they had waited for such visits to change their lives, and for how many people had the changes never come." There was information galore about what was needed to change all the Forest Havens in this country. But, too often, there was no sustained and active conversation among the people with disabilities, their helpers, the judges, and the larger communities. To achieve the promises of inclusion, new technologies, and the ADA, we will need more than an ocean of information. We will need more than the wonder gadgets to become cheaper and more accessible. We will need the political and moral will to let the Forest Haven residents in. Let's begin that conversation of inclusion now. Stanley S. Herr, Kennedy Public Policy Fellow, White House Domestic Policy Staff (on public service leave from the University of Maryland School of Law) ---------- Conclusion The Annenberg Washington Program conference brought together a wide range of advocates, policymakers, educators, and others concerned about full inclusion for people with disabilities. Although many issues remain unresolved, most speakers did agree on five vital precepts: 1 Accessibility must be built in, not added on. Universal design will benefit all users, not merely those with disabilities. The government's role has yet to be defined in encouraging (perhaps mandating) universal design and in setting standards. 2 As technology becomes more important, accessibility becomes more important. The national information infrastructure must not be off-limits to people with disabilities. 3 Technology has the potential to make education vastly more inclusive through individualized curricula, supported communication with classmates, "schools without walls," and other innovations. 4 Accessible technology has implications beyond education: for health care reform, telemedicine will bring doctors to geographically isolated people; for welfare reform, telecommuting and other innovations will reduce chronic unemployment and underemployment among people with disabilities. 5 Additional dialogue and research are needed on emerging technological accessibility problems, not only for people with disabilities, but for all underrepresented individuals in society-- the poor, the isolated, and the vulnerable. A profound question underlies these five precepts: Will the national information infrastructure help people with disabilities and other underrepresented people move closer to full participation in American society? Or will it further isolate them from the mainstream? ---------- Related Publications * Communicating the Americans With Disabilities Ace - Transcending Compliance: A Case Report on Sears, Roebuck, and Co. (1994) * The Americans with Disabilities Act: Putting the Employment Provisions to Work (1993) * Closed-Captioned Programming: Changing Developments in the Television Landscape (1991) * Extending Telecommunications Service to People with Disabilities (1991) * Marketplace Problems in Communications Technology for Disabled People(1987) To receive one of the above publications or a complete list of Program publications contact: The Annenberg Washington Program The Willard Office Building 1455 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Suite 200 Washington, D.C. 20004-1008 Telephone: (202) 393-7100 Fax: (202) 638-2745 TDD: (202) 393-4121 E-mail: awp@nwu.edu ---------- The Annenberg Washington Program Notice of Copyright and Disclaimer Except where noted, all of the materials in this service are copyrighted by The Annenberg Washington Program in Communications Policy Studies of Northwestern University. Any materials not copyrighted by The Annenberg Washington Program appear with the express permission of the publisher and/or holder of the copyright. Except where noted, The Annenberg Washington Program encourages the not-for-profit reproduction or distribution of the works on this server. Acknowledgements This site was developed by James Grall of The Annenberg Washington Program, in conjunction with Learning Technology Group, Academic Technologies, Northwestern University. Graphics and site maintenance by Ariel Rosenthal. For their time, energy, creativity and guidance, the Program thanks Bob Taylor, Ariel Rosenthal, Brian Nielsen, Paul Hertz, Joe Germuska, Ted Mazza, Gretchen Guo, Rion Odenbach, Jack Graham and Tom Board of Academic Technologies of Northwestern University. Special thanks to John Margolis, Associate Provost, for his inspiration. ---------- End of Document