2004 Summer Institute : Final Report

Tuesday, June 15, 2004 (afternoon)

Introductory presentation: Gary Birch

Gary Birch, leader of the Dis-IT Retail and Public Services research theme, began with an introductory PowerPoint presentation that addressed the question, "How can we develop information technologies to enhance the participation of people with disabilities?" He focused on three areas:

1. future trends related to assistive technology
2. user need identification
3. possible areas for future research

Birch also discussed his interest in researching a direct brain-controlled switch as an effective interface technology for persons with limited mobility.

Birch also showed a video, "Wireless Delivery of Electronic Public Services for Persons with Disabilities" that explored the question, "What if in the near future, most public services could be accessed by portable wireless technologies?" It summarized the technology that already exists, and the new opportunities they can create for people with disabilities. The video also discussed the crossover benefits that these new opportunities provide to a wider audience. The video is an integral part of knowledge dissemination for his research theme, Retail and Public Services, in the Dis-IT Research Alliance.

Panel discussion

Panelists: Steve Jacobs (IDEAL Group, Inc.), Doug Brolly (RBC Royal Bank), Marshall Ring (SMD AbiTech), Jacquie Ripat (University of Manitoba)

Panelist: Steve Jacobs (IDEAL Group, Inc., Hilliard , Ohio)

Steve Jacobs's presentation addressed the question, "What compels people to design more accessible ICTs?" He discussed the word compels as an acronym that represents the cultural, organizational, moral, political, ethical, legal, and social forces that compel industry to design accessible ICTs. He stressed, however, that profit is ultimately what drives industry: "If you look at the demand-pull market forces, as compared to supply-push market forces-and they're both really complimentary-the need to constantly enhance the quality of employees, competitive advantage, productivity, market share and then profit, is what makes a business survive, and that's their primary focus."

Jacobs argued that many accessible technologies have much broader applications in emerging markets, including for people over 65 and people who cannot read, particularly outside of North America.

He gave many other examples of how to identify crossover benefits between big emerging markets and people with disabilities as a way of compelling industry to design accessible ICTs.

• Steve Jacobs's presentation

Panelist: Doug Brolly (RBC Royal Bank, Toronto)

Doug Brolly delivered the PowerPoint presentation, "Using Accessible Technology to Support Growth and Innovation." He provided a corporate perspective to the discussion of how to develop information technologies to enhance the participation of people with disabilities. His examples came out of his experience as a Manager of contact centre solutions at RBC Royal Bank bis Group.

• Doug Brolly's presentation

Panelist: Marshall Ring (SMD AbiTech)

Marshall Ring delivered the PowerPoint presentation, "How every day ICT consumer products can be developed to enhance the participation of people with disabilities: Industry's Perspective." He asserted that what prevents industry from developing accessible ITs is a market barrier rather than a technical barrier. His presentation outlined two arguments that could be presented to industry for making ITs accessible, including "Triple Bottom Line" accounting (financial, social, and environmental), and market opportunities (e.g., people with disabilities making an alliance with the aging population to increase market size).

• Marshall Ring's presentation

Panelist: Jacquie Ripat (University of Manitoba)

Jacquie Ripat presented "How to develop information technologies to enhance the participation of people with disabilities: The affect side of technology." She discussed the role of physical, cognitive (or thinking), and affective (or emotional) abilities in the development of information technology. She identified the affective or emotional reaction (e.g., fear, frustration, confidence) of the user of ITs as the component that is the least discussed or considered by the technology development world.

• Jacquie Ripat's presentation
• Jacquie Ripat's speech

Discussion

Deborah Stienstra (University of Manitoba) commented on how the panel discussed the development of ITs from the perspectives of industry and at the level of the individual, and called for the discussion to include other policy constraints:

"It seems to me we are developing a theoretical approach to technology and disability that includes the physical, cognitive, affective, and market forces, but what is missing are other policy constraints. For example, some of the things we brought up yesterday like poverty, the implications of policy, isolation, housing policy, home support systems, family circumstances, and employment. This panel focused on either industry as structural force or the individual, whether it's at a biomedical or the emotional/physical level. Let's think also of how our understanding of technology is shaped by these other forces."

Laurie Beachell (Council of Canadians with Disabilities) commented that labour force participation by people with disabilities has declined at the same time as access to the built environment, education, and services has improved:

"While we can argue market share and while we can align ourselves with other market groupings, seniors, etcetera, and while all of those seem like potentials, the reality is that we have a tremendous improvement in access in the built environment, we have tremendous increased inclusive education process, and all of those factors. Yet we have diminishing labour force participation, we have less support in services for people to be able to access community, and those industries that have undertaken major changes using new technology, like the airlines, are actually decreasing service, not recognizing market share even though they know that seniors are one of the big groups that have money and travel and that need supportive services. All of the indicators in the market are that services for the last 5-8 years are getting worse. We are in a battle right now where we are not moving forward. We have tremendously new innovative services, from independent living centres to new models of services in supporting individuals to participate in community life. And frankly, we are reinstitutionalizing people in this country. We should not kid ourselves that things are getting substantially better. We are having to fight battles that we thought we had won twenty years ago. Unless we also put in regulations, and unless we change the legislation, and unless governments use purchasing power to influence accessible design, I don't think we're going to be able, as a community with a limited leadership and resource, to do the education that we need to do to change the mindset of a very strong opposition."

He then added that the disability community can benefit from the industry perspective as presented by Steve Jacobs and Marshall Ring. Beachell commented that the industry perspective offers a strong economic argument for making accessible ITs that does not involve a human rights argument that organizations like CCD normally employ: "We have to find ways of presenting the economic argument in conjunction with the rights-based and values-based argument so that we can move that agenda forward. We don't do the economic piece very well."

Delphine Kinvig (Programmer-Analyst Administrative Systems, Information Services and Technology, University of Manitoba) commented on the importance of educating IT professionals and people within the disability community itself regarding all aspects of disability:

"We may be educating designers and we may be educating program developers, but there is one area of education that we have to remember. We have to educate people with disabilities about other people with disabilities. It is easy to become complacent about other people's problems if your own seems insurmountable. My experience is that if I go into a group and I'm talking to, say, people with cerebral palsy, they are not necessarily cognizant of the needs of, say, someone who is visually impaired. We need to educate ourselves as well as the public at large if we wish to develop a solid, unified implementation plan approach to solving many of the problems we as people with disabilities face everyday."

Small group discussions

Gary Birch asked the participants to divide into three groups to identify opportunities and barriers in developing more accessible ITs and what some of the solutions might be to these barriers. One group discussed the crossover benefits of accessible ITs for people with disabilities and other groups. They identified two categories of existing accessible ITs:

1. ITs that were originally created for people with disabilities that have since become beneficial to many and/or entered the mainstream (http://ideal-group.org/ecc/)
2. mainstream ITs that also have crossover benefits for the disability community

Another group discussed the need for education as a way of addressing and overcoming the public's fear of technology. The group identified a 3-step process for how to develop accessible ITs in the next twenty years:

1. increase awareness to mitigate fear through education
2. legislation needs to be in place
3. aim for universal design

The group also came up with the following question: How do we prevent legislation from limiting innovation?

The third group came up with three key statements from their discussion:

1. Accessibility needs to be considered across socio-economic classes/conditions
2. Use ICT to increase education levels of people with disabilities
3. Involve people with disabilities in the design and implementation of ICT

Closing remarks

Gary Birch summarized the afternoon session, commenting that the discussion ranged from

"the technology itself, to how we identify what kind of technology will be useful, how we identify the needs that people with disabilities want addressed, to regulatory issues: how do we design and develop this technology in ways that are user-friendly. We discussed the models that industry uses, and were reminded of powerful examples of technology that was originally intended for people with disabilities that made it into the mainstream. My concern about that is that there are huge gaps that get left because you end up with 'small markets,' very important markets, that just don't get addressed because there is no market pull." Birch called for the need to bring together the various models of disability, including the social barriers, rights, and citizenship models, along with using economic arguments in order to address the question of how to develop information technologies to enhance the participation of people with disabilities.