Alex Mason and David Schwarte like to say they work to level the playing field at Purdue, but their job has nothing to do with smoothing out the turf for game day at Ross-Ade Stadium.
Mason and Schwarte are assistive technology specialists for the Purdue Teaching and Learning Technologies Consulting and Training team, part of Purdue University Online. Their job is to assist members of the Purdue community with disabilities in accessing tools they need to learn and teach, on campus or online. Whether the disability is physically apparent or more hidden, such as a learning disability, the two work with Purdue’s Disability Resource Center and Purdue IT, among others, to provide tools to advance that goal.
Brad Duerstock, whose research centers around assistive technology, refers to Schwarte as kind of Purdue’s house assistive technology expert.
“He just has a lot of experience,” said Duerstock, professor of engineering practice who leads the Institute for Accessible Science at Purdue. “He’s worked with almost every type of disability one can imagine and the technology does change, so he has to keep up with all the new improvements.”
Meanwhile, Mason is a go-to guy for assistance with and training in creating accessible materials, especially in the digital realm, such as electronic documents, PDFs, websites and Brightspace course resources.
Duerstock has had Schwarte as a regular guest lecturer in his assistive technology practice class. Schwarte also has been a resource for Duerstock’s lab in research to develop new assistive technology, for example a haptics feedback system to help blind and low vision folks make sense of digital images.
Likewise, Byung-Cheol (B.C.) Min has Mason and Schwarte work with students in his introduction to assistive technology and robotics class.
“My students definitely get more motivated about this subject after we have them in my class,” said Min, associate professor of computer and information technology. “I am very thankful that they are here at Purdue. They’re my colleagues and not only because they visit my class and talk about this subject, but also as a member of the university community. They are genuine. They care about people with disabilities.”
Mason works largely with faculty and staff who need to know how to create accessible materials. He consults with individuals on best practices, holds regularly scheduled workshops and does custom workshops that can focus on a specific topic, such as how to create accessible Word documents, PDFs or course materials in Brightspace, and captioning videos. For more information email tlt@purdue.edu.
Schwarte works with students – on campus or online – referred by the Disability Resource Center and faculty and staff referred by Purdue Human Resources. They both work with Purdue IT on providing centrally supported information technology-based assistive resources.
The most common request they get is reading assistance to address disabilities such as blindness, low vision, dyslexia or attention deficit. That often involves technology to read materials to a user out loud.
Purdue makes Read&Write available to all students, faculty and staff. The software, which works in conjunction with other software, can read websites and documents such as PDFs and even make sense of text in images.
In a similar vein, another frequent request is voice recognition software that allows a user to control as well as dictate to their computer. Dragon NaturallySpeaking is one solution they can provide while Apple systems have a built-in capacity to do voice recognition, which they can demonstrate for users.
A long list of other tools they can help with ranges from software and devices to enlarge text or create a more contrasty environment, both for easier reading, to one-handed keyboards, a foot-controlled mouse, and Braille displays and Braille printing. The Braille printer does not only text but images as well, allowing someone to make sense tactilely of graphs, charts, a floor plan or a map, for example.
Schwarte maintains an assistive technology lab in Room 830 of Young Hall where users can be matched with, get instruction on using and use assistive technology that best meets their needs. Blind himself, Schwarte is more than just knowledgeable about technology. He’s also an experienced user of it.
“He has lived experiences of managing the world with visual impairments,” Duerstock said. “I think that’s very useful for students to see someone walking the walk, if you will, and talking the talk.”
Writer: Greg Kline, communications manager, Purdue University Online, 765-426-8545, gkline@purdue.edu