CSU Center for Alternate Media Providing Timely Access to Instructional Materials for Students with

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CSU Center for Alternate MediaProviding Timely
Access to Instructional Materials for Students
with Print Disabilities

• A presentation to the
• Statewide Academic Affairs Committee
• January 25, 2005

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Todays Presentation

• Background information
• The Work of the CAM
• Current Critical Challenge Timeliness in
  Providing Alternate Formats of Instructional
  Materials

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What is the CSU Center for Alternate Media (CAM)?

• Authorized center coordinating the request and
  distribution of electronic text (e-text) for
  students with print disabilities in the CSU
• Established in July 1, 2004
• Housed at the San Bernardino campus
• Mission is to expedite the delivery of alternate
  formats of instructional materials (primarily
  e-text) to students with disabilities

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Legal mandate to provide accommodations

• Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act
• Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Title II
• Reasonable
• Equally effective

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Office of Civil Rights (OCR) Components of
Effective Communications

• Timeliness of Delivery
• Accuracy of Translation
• Appropriate Manner and Medium

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Electronic Text A New Tool

• Electronic Text (E-text) is digitized text
• Read aloud by Screen Reader software on a
  computer
• Fonts can be enlarged onscreen rather than
  through copier enlargement
• Can be transformed to Braille through Braille
  translation software
• Multimodal, searchable, portable
• Better learning tool

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Students Talk about E-Text

• The Gift produced by students and faculty at
  Tompkins Cortland Community College
• http//www.tc3.edu/bcl/altformhandbook/

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How do we get e-text?

• Produced by campus disability services via a
  scanning process
• - Debind book
• - Scan pages (image file)
• - Convert to digital text via OCR process
• - Edit for spelling, page s, columns, spacing,
  headers, formulas, tables, graphs
• - Secondary conversion to appropriate format as
  required (i.e. MP3)
• - Braille requires much more effort
• Obtained from publishers via state law (AB 422)
• Publishers doing business in California will
  supply electronic file of textbook free of charge
  to eligible students with disabilities provided
  certain conditions are met (proof of purchase of
  book etc.)

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CAMs Role

• Help campuses deliver effective alternate formats
  of textbooks to eligible students in a timely
  manner by
• Enabling the sharing of e-text files to reduce
  redundancy
• Streamlining publisher request processes
• Working to increase publishers timeliness of
  response and to improve quality of e-text files

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CAM Database

• Allows campuses to
• input e-text titles theyve produced or received
  from publishers
• browse for needed titles
• request a title from another campus and obtain it
  electronically
• order books from publishers

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Increase in the number of e-text files obtained
from publishers

• 2001-02
• 167 (27) publisher files
• 451 (73) campus-scanned
• 2004-05
• 1171 (46) publisher files
• 1394 (54) campus-scanned.
• As of 9/6/05, complete files

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Cost Savings and Return on Investments

• Actual e-text files shared 182
• Based on a calculation of 675 for converting a
  book to e-text, the estimated savings is 122,850
• CAM operating expense in 04-05 96,000
• CAM in its first year has exceeded its projected
  return on investment.

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Publisher Requests Made By Campuses 6 month
comparison
Increase in 98 from 04-05 to 05-06 for the 6
month period
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Intercampus Sharing Activity 6 month comparison
Increase in 115 from 04-05 to 05-06 for the 6
month period
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A Picture of Timeliness (or lack thereof)

• Student registers during advance registration and
  turns in request
• (student does not register during advance
  registration or courses are added and dropped)
• Disability Services (DS) staff researches for
  textbook titles based upon course registration
  (no textbook is identified for the course)
• DS staff attempts to contact instructor to find
  out textbook title (cant reach instructor or
  dont know who is assigned to teach the course)
• 1st day of term student buys book and brings in
  to DS office (usually doesnt happen on the first
  day)
• 1st and 2nd week of term DS office checks CAM
  and other repositories for available alternate
  format (not available in CAM or other
  repositories)
• Order e-text from publisher (publisher takes 2 to
  6 weeks to respond)
• 4th week of term DS office receives file from
  publisher (file needs editing)
• 5th week of term e-text file is cleaned up and
  alternate format of textbook is finally ready for
  student

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Responsibilities in Meeting the Timely Provision
of Instructional Materials

• Student registering in advance and submitting
  request to DS office in a timely manner
• DS Office obtaining or producing the alternate
  format of instructional materials in a timely
  manner
• CAM enabling the sharing of e-text files and
  working with publishers to increase their
  response time and e-text file quality
• Faculty identifying textbooks in a timely manner

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How can faculty help?

• Early adoption of textbook
• Make syllabi available online or at least
  available at the department
• Allow use of an older edition of a textbook
  (especially for books in Braille)
• Use digital materials as much as possible, for
  example, in course readers (course packs)
• If using a course reader, provide a copy of the
  to the DS Office in advance of the term
• Follow the suggestions outlined in the QA

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Academic Affairs Committee Support

• Request for your help to get faculty on board to
  assist with this critical issue that has ethical
  and legal ramifications
• the timely provision of instructional
  materials to students with disabilities

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Contact Information

• CAM_at_csusb.edu
• CAM Supervisor
• Mike Ross, Director of Academic Media Computing,
  CSU San Bernardino, mross_at_csusb.edu
• CAM Database Consultant
• Evans Kahuthu, Webmaster, CSU San Bernardino,
  kahuthu_at_csusb.edu
• CAM Interim Liaison
• Rosa Padilla, CSU San Bernardino,
  padilla3_at_csusb.edu
• Director of Accessible Technology Initiative,
• Mary Cheng, Chancellors Office,
  mary.cheng_at_csueastbay.edu