What's Available at the College?
The college has a wide variety of adaptive equipment available in classrooms, campus libraries, computer labs, and the learning and academic skills centers. Contact the disability services office on your home campus for specific locations.
Dragon Naturally Speaking
Dragon Naturally Speaking is a speech-recognition program. It can be used to compose email messages, create reports, draft letters, edit proposals and more, all by speaking naturally to the computer instead of typing. With Dragon Naturally Speaking, the user speaks at a normal pace and whatever is said appears as text in the document. Simple voice commands can be used to revise text, move around documents and control the computer.
Kurzweil 1000
Kurzweil 1000 was designed specifically for blind and low-vision students, but has many of the same features and advantages found in Kurzweil 3000. It can highlight words as they are read and has tools for reading the screens and adjusting magnification levels, up to 8x, and screen colors. It can also be used without a monitor, using only a small keypad for commands. Kurzweil 1000 has a built-in word processor that can work with any plain text document. It can be configured to read along as you type by character, word or sentence. Kurzweil 1000 does not maintain the visual appearance of the printed original and ignores any graphics on a page.
Kurzweil 3000
Kurzweil 3000 was designed as a learning aid for people who have difficulty reading. It can help users read faster and understand more. By speaking and highlighting or enlarging text, it provides both auditory and visual input to the reader. The program reads text scanned from a book or document or it can open and read a word processing file. The original page layout, including pictures and charts, etc., are maintained and displayed on the screen. Changing the reading speed and voice is simple and words can be spelled, broken into syllables and defined with the click of a button.
JAWS for Windows
JAWS (Job Access With Speech) for Windows is a screen reading software package that enables the computer to read the screen out loud using an integrated voice synthesizer. With JAWS for Windows, blind and visually impaired users can browse the Web, read or write email messages, or access database information. Using JAWS for Windows is relatively easy to do. The pitch, speed and gender of the voice can be easily altered to match the user's comfort range.
ZoomText
ZoomText is a program for low-vision users that combines magnification and screen reading. It allows the user to enlarge, up to 16x, the entire screen or only a small section of the screen. Screen colors can also be changed to meet individual preferences. ZoomText works with most Windows-based software, making it useful with spreadsheets, databases, tutorials and the Internet, as well as word processors. It can read the Windows toolbars, dialog boxes and pull-down menus. Target areas on the screen can be defined to provide instant access to frequently referenced locations.
Adjustable Tables
These tables adjust easily to accommodate different height requirements. Individuals in wheelchairs often need to adjust their workstation to accommodate their wheelchair.
Magnifiers
Smart View and Optelec Clear View magnifiers provide magnification of printed material onto a TV monitor. The reading material is placed on the viewing table and projected onto a screen magnified to the size needed by the individual.
