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Project Type/Research Category: Rehabilitation Engineering Research Centers (RERCs).
Funding Priority: Technology for Access and Function.
For more information on NIDRR's funding priorities, read about NIDRR's Core Areas of Research at http://www.ed.gov/rschstat/research/pubs/core-area.html.
Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center on Telecommunication Access.
University of Wisconsin/Madison.
Trace Research and Development Center.
2107 Engineering Centers Building
1550 Engineering Drive.
Madison, WI 53706.
E-mail: info@trace.wisc.edu.
URL(s): http://trace.wisc.edu/telrerc.
Principal Investigator: Gregg C. Vanderheiden, PhD (Trace); Judy Harkins, PhD (Gallaudet University).
PI Phone: 608/263-5788 (Trace), 202/561-5257 (Gallaudet).
Public Contact: Kate Vanderheiden.
Public Contact Phone: 608/265-4621 (V), 608/263-5408 (TTY).
Fax: 608/262-8848.
Project Number: H133E040013 (See also H133E090001).
Start Date: October 1, 2004.
Length: 60 months.
NIDRR Officer: Thomas Corfman.
NIDRR Funding: FY 04 $850,000; FY 05 $924,988; FY 06 $850,000; FY 07 $850,000; FY 08 $850,000; FY 09 $0.
Abstract:
The primary mission of the Telecommunications Access RERC is to advance accessibility and usability in existing and emerging telecommunications products for people with all types of disabilities. Telecommunications accessibility is addressed along all three of its major dimensions: user interface, transmission (including digitization, compression, etc.), and modality translation services (relay services, gateways, etc.). The RERC looks at advances that have both short- and long-term outcomes related to assistive technologies (AT), interoperability, and universal design of telecommunications. The RERC encompasses research and development programs, as well as training, technical assistance, and dissemination activities. A large part of the RERC’s research and development program is directly related to the rapidly emerging Voice over IP (VoIP) technologies and other IP-based systems. The goal is to help ensure that these new technologies are accessible and usable by people with hearing impairments, blindness, and other disabilities. The research and development program of this RERC covers three areas: (1) Development of tools, techniques, and performance-based measures that can be used to evaluate current and evolving telecommunication technologies. (2) Solving the problems faced by individuals using hearing aids or cochlear implants with digital phones. (3) Improving access to emerging telecommunications - particularly digital and IP based systems. Projects in this area: (a) Identify techniques to alert people about possible emergencies and to ensure accessible communication in emergency or crisis situations; (b) seek solutions for the current incompatibility issues around text communications and ways to build the necessary capabilities into mainstream technologies, to allow them to evolve to new text, speech, and visual communication technologies; and (c) develop guidelines and reference materials to help mainstream telecommunications manufacturers build their regular products in a way that allows individuals with visual, hearing, physical, and cognitive disabilities to be able to use them. The goals of the RERC's training, technical assistance, and dissemination activities are: To increase the number and level of expertise of people working to make standard telecommunication systems and products accessible and usable for people who have disabilities or who are aging; to move ideas and concepts out into the field in the form of standards or commercial products; and to provide useful information from our research to the telecommunications industry, consumers, and policymakers.
Descriptors: Accessibility, Blindness, Developmental disabilities, Hearing impairments, Telecommunications, Universal design.
Documents in REHABDATA:
Access to emergency number services.
An evaluation of digital cellular handsets by hearing aid users.
Comments of the technology access program of Gallaudet University.
Hearing aid compatibility for digital wireless phones.
Location-based emergency alerting to mobile devices.
Magnetic performance requirements for wireless device/hearing aid telecoil mode compatibility.
Potential impact of new technologies on telecommuncation for elders.
Redefining assistive technology, accessibility and disability based on recent technical advances.
Reply comments of the technology access program of Gallaudet University.
What the HAC act means for consumers.
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