Claude Almansi <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Peter S. Lopez wrote:
>(..)
> We must always strive to maximize human potential
> to the utmost of one's real capacity.
> The DDN Movement should strive to remove all obstacles
> that stand in the way of really bridging the 'tech divide'
> {a reflection of dominant class-economic property
> relations in present-day society}.
True but at times it's really uphill to try to make deciders understand
issues. Recently an equal-chances-through-ICT lady guru showed me the
prototype learning platform she was using in a program to enable women
to acquire needed skills in ICT in order go back on the work market
after their kids start going to school. The platform was in old flash,
i.e. non vocalizable and with no possibility to copy the text, so wide
you had to keep scrolling left and right. She herself acknowledged that
she had to have a tech person upload the files for the courses as the
platform was rather complicated to manage.
I pointed out that participants should learn how to use normal
platforms/groups/communities/mailing lists for when they would have
finished the course and wouldn't be able to access that "prototype"
anymore, and added that said prototype was not accessible to blind
people anyway. The equal-chances-through-ICT guru retorted: "Come on!
How could a blind person possibly use a computer?!" And her program is
funded by the Swiss Federal Equal Chances Office, because equal chances
here is exclusively understood in gender terms. Besides, the same
"prototype" platform is being experimented in a few middle schools here
for grade 6 math, and there is a strong risk it will be adopted in all
middle schools for all subjects in grades 6-9.
The Swiss Disability Insurance won't pay for disabled people's broadband
connection, on the pretext that the rest of the family might use it too.
So disabled people here remain cut off from the opportunities the
internet would offer them: in particular from the opportunities to
learn about devices like the ones described in this thread, and to
organize and lobby through the internet.
Switzerland in particularly backwards in this, granted. But I wonder if
this deciders' tech and tech-accessibility illiteracy isn't slowing down
progress elsewhere too.
Claude
--
Claude Almansi
Castione, Switzerland
claude.almansi_at_bluewin.ch
http://www.adisi.ch http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ADISI
http://www.digitaldivide.net/profile/Claude
http://www.digitaldivide.net/blog/claude
http://www.digitaldivide.net/community/languages
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Thanks for your respnse and input Senorita Claude. I added you as a friend
on the DDN Home Page. I suspect most of us have an image of Switzerland
as being at the head of the Learning Curve.
When I first got online a few years back I got into a lot of online groups,
including the DDN. Over the years I have found that DDN is the most relevant in
terms of how to get about helping to get other peole onto the Internet and
networkng with others on a global scale. Plus, I learned not to isolate or
exclude myself from others by being at my computer on the Internet while
someone is collapsing right by me onto the floor to get my attention.
For us, smile!.
My 'legally blind' friend John says that "an expert is a drip under pressure"
and a continuous multi-tasker is scatter-brained. Even the educator requires
further education. Brother John also now has a huge TV screen in his bedroom
that he uses. His wife will get a printout of an article in EXTRA LARGE FONT
and he can read it then, literally with his nose to the grind. It is a slow
laborous process but he has a lot of persistent perseverance. Plus, he has
taught me to pay more attention more to what my ears are hearing that helps me
actually feel more secure and not so eye-dependent. Plus, being more conscious
of my diction in pronouncing words to be understood better. The important thing
is to be teachable, good at learning and have a lot for
educational pedagogy.
Help Build Bridges, Not Borders!~
Peter S. Lopez~Field Coordinator
Sacramento, Califas, USA
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HumaneRightsAgenda/
http://www.digitaldivide.net/profile/sacranative
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