SIGACCESS News

January 2012 SIGACCESS Newsletter

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 23:04:33 EDT

The January 2012 edition of the SIGACCESS Newsletter is now available online from the SIGACCESS Newsletter pages.

September 2011 SIGACCESS Newsletter

Sun, 02 Oct 2011 23:04:33 EDT

The September 2011 edition of the SIGACCESS Newsletter is now available online from the SIGACCESS Newsletter pages.

June 2011 SIGACCESS Newsletter

Thu, 09 Jun 2011 23:04:33 EDT

The June 2011 edition of the SIGACCESS Newsletter is now available online from the SIGACCESS Newsletter pages.

ASSETS 2011 Call For Papers

Tue, 15 February 2011 10:45:38 -07:00

The 13th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, 24-26 October 2011, Dundee, UK.

People with disabilities can use Computer and Information Technologies to overcome barriers encountered in day-to-day life, and to participate more fully in society.

The ASSETS series of conferences explores the potential of Computer and Information Technologies to support and include individuals with disabilities, and those around them. ASSETS is the premier forum for presenting innovative research on the design and use of both mainstream and specialized assistive technologies by people with disabilities. Sponsored by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and its SIGACCESS Special Interest Group on Accessible Computing, ASSETS includes formal paper sessions, demonstrations, posters, a doctoral consortium, and a student research competition. The single track and friendly atmosphere make ASSETS the ideal venue to meet researchers, practitioners, developers and policymakers to exchange ideas, share information, and make new contacts.

Topics

High quality, original submissions on topics relevant to computers and accessibility are invited. Appropriate topics include (but are not limited to) the use of technology by and in support of:

Individuals with hearing, sight and other sensory impairments
Individuals with motor impairments
Individuals with memory, learning and cognitive impairments
Individuals with multiple impairments
Older adults

Successful submissions typically present (though submissions from other related areas are encouraged) novel ideas, designs, techniques, systems, evaluations, scientific investigations, methodologies, social issues or policy issues relating to:

Assistive technologies that improve day-to-day life
Assistive technologies that improve access to mainstream Computer and Information Technologies
Innovative use of mainstream technologies to overcome access barriers
Accessibility and usability of mainstream technologies
Identification of barriers to technology access that are not addressed by existing research

Where relevant, work that includes empirical data from the target user groups is strongly preferred. ASSETS strives to publish research that carefully addresses the issues involved when individuals with disabilities interact with information technologies. In general, this means that empirical studies should include participants that are representative of the intended users of the system being studied. This does not mean that all participants must be representative of the intended users, but it does mean that some individuals fitting this description should be included in an appropriate way in the data collection process. In some cases, articles may be accepted for publication if representative users are not included in studies, but only if a sufficiently compelling argument is presented as to why it is appropriate or necessary to use non-representative users and any implications of this decision are adequately addressed. Authors should refer to the General Writing Guidelines for Technology and People with Disabilities when preparing submissions.

Submission Procedures

ASSETS accepts submissions in the following categories:

All submissions will be peer-reviewed by an international panel. Submissions MUST contain substantial original, unpublished material. Please refer to the ACM policy on plagiarism for guidance.

Important Dates

Requesting mentors:: 4 March 2011, Friday
Paper submission:: 6 May 2011, Friday
Notification of acceptance:: 17 June 2011, Friday
Posters and demos submission:: 1 July 2011, Friday
Doctoral consortium submission:: 1 July 2011, Friday
Student research competition submission:: 1 July 2011, Friday
Notification of posters and demos acceptance:: 27 July 2011, Wednesday
Notification of doctoral consortium acceptance:: 27 July 2011, Wednesday
Notification of student research competition acceptance:: 27 July 2011, Wednesday
Camera-ready materials:: 15 August 2011, Monday

All deadlines are at midnight HAST (GMT-10:00) on the specified day.

January 2011 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Tue, 15 February 2011 10:45:38 -07:00

The January 2011 edition of the SIGACCESS Newsletter is now available online from the SIGACCESS Newsletter pages.

September 2010 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Wed, 05 January 2011 10:45:38 -07:00

The January 2010 edition of the SIGACCESS Newsletter is now available online from the SIGACCESS Newsletter pages.

Volume 3, Issue 2 (November 2010) of TACCESS Available Online

Fri, 03 December 2010 10:45:38 -07:00

Volume 3, Issue 2 of ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing is now available in the ACM Digital Library.

Guest Editorial ASSETS 2009
Kathleen F. McCoy
Exploratory Analysis of Collaborative Web Accessibility Improvement
Daisuke Sato, Hironobu Takagi, Masatomo Kobayashi, Shinya Kawanaka, and Chieko Asakawa
Orienting Kinesthetically: A Haptic Handheld Wayfinder for People with Visual Impairments
Tomohiro Amemiya and Hisashi Sugiyama
Usability of a Multimodal Video Game to Improve Navigation Skills for Blind Children
Jaime Sanchez, Mauricio Saenz, and Jose Miguel Garrido
Multimodal Presentation of Two-Dimensional Charts: An Investigation Using Open Office XML and Microsoft Excel
Iyad Abu Doush, Enrico Pontelli, Tran Cao Son, Dominic Simon, and Ou Ma

ASSETS 2010 Student Research Competition Winners

Wed, 10 November 2010 17:45:38 -07:00

This year's ASSETS Conference hosted its fifth Microsoft Student Research Competition (SRC) event. The SRC allows students from diverse ACM areas to present their work and get recognised for achievement. The competition had both Undergraduate and Graduate categories, with the following students winning in their respective categories.

Undergraduate Category

AudioWiz: Nearly Real-time Audio Transcriptions
Samuel White, University of Rochester, USA
Utterance-Based Systems: Organization and Design of AAC Interfaces
Timothy Walsh, The University of Delaware, USA
LocalEyes: Accessible GPS and Points of Interest
Jason Behmer and Stillman Knox, University of Washington, USA

Graduate Category

GoBraille: Enhancing Independence and Safety for Blind and Deaf-Blind Public Transit Riders
Shiri Azenkot and Emily Fortuna, The University of Washington, USA
Investigating Meaning in Uses of Assistive Devices: Implications of Social and Professional Contexts
Kristen Shinohara, University of Washington, USA
Accessible Indoor Navigation
Kyle Montague, University of Dundee, UK

SIGACCESS Best Paper Award 2010

Wed, 10 November 2010 17:45:38 -07:00

The 2010 SIGACCESS Best Paper Award has been awarded to Jennifer Mankoff from Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA, Gillian R. Hayes from University of California, Irvine, California, USA, and Devva Kasnitz from Devvaco Consulting and Society for Disability Studies, Eureka, California, USA, for their paper:

Disability Studies As a Source of Critical Inquiry for the Field of Assistive Technology

Disability studies and assistive technology are two related fields that have long shared common goals - understanding the experience of disability and identifying and addressing relevant issues. Despite these common goals, there are some important differences in what professionals in these fields consider problems, perhaps related to the lack of connection between the fields. To help bridge this gap, we review some of the key literature in disability studies. We present case studies of two research projects in assistive technology and discuss how the field of disability studies influenced that work, led us to identify new or different problems relevant to the field of assistive technology, and helped us to think in new ways about the research process and its impact on the experiences of individuals who live with disability. We also discuss how the field of disability studies has influenced our teaching and highlight some of the key publications and publication venues from which our community may want to draw more deeply in the future.

Full Paper Available from the ACM Digital Library

SIGACCESS Best Student Paper Award 2010

Wed, 10 November 2010 17:45:38 -07:00

The 2010 SIGACCESS Best Student Paper Award has been awarded to Anne Marie Piper from the University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, California, USA, for her contribution to the paper Introducing Multimodal Paper-Digital Interfaces for Speech-Language Therapy. This was written in conjunction with Nadir Weibel and James D. Hollan from the University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, California, USA.

Introducing Multimodal Paper-Digital Interfaces for Speech-Language Therapy

After a stroke or brain injury, it may be more difficult to understand language and communicate with others. Speech-language therapy may help an individual regain language and cope with changes in their communication abilities. Our research examines the process of speech-language therapy with an emphasis on the practices of therapists working with adults with aphasia and apraxia of speech. This paper presents findings from field work undertaken to inform the design of a mixed paper-digital interface prototype using multimodal digital pens. We describe and analyze therapists initial reactions to the system and present two case studies of use by older adults undergoing speech-language therapy. We discuss the utility of multimodal paper-digital interfaces to assist therapy and describe our vision of a system to help therapists independently create custom interactive paper materials for their clients.

Full Paper Available from the ACM Digital Library

Volume 2, Issue 4 (September 2010) of TACCESS Available Online

Wed, 10 November 2010 17:45:38 -07:00

Volume 3, Issue 1 of ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing is now available in the ACM Digital Library.

Multi-Layered Interfaces to Improve Older Adults' Initial Learnability of Mobile Applications
Rock Leung, Leah Findlater, Joanna McGrenere, Peter Graf, and Justine Yang
Accurate and Accessible Motion-Capture Glove Calibration for Sign Language Data Collection
Matt Huenerfauth and Pengfei Lu
Investigating Grid-Based Navigation: The Impact of Physical Disability
Shaojian Zhu, Jinjuan Feng, and Andrew Sears

Registration and Hotel Reservation for the ASSETS 2010 Conference is Now Open

Fri, 23 Jul 2010 10:45:38 -07:00

The 12th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2010)
25 - 27 October 2010, Orlando, Florida, USA

We cordially invite you to come this year to sunny Orlando Florida, USA to share, discuss, and learn about exciting research in the intersection of computers and accessibility. ASSETS is the premier forum for dissemination of research on assistive technologies addressing needs of people with vision, motor, hearing, and speech impairments; cognitive limitations, including learning disabilities; and issues of aging.

To Register for ASSETS 2010

Please Visit: http://www.sigaccess.org/assets10/registration.html. Early registration ends Aug 21, 2010 Authors of Accepted Papers must register by Aug 17, 2010

To Book Hotel Reservations

To book hotel reservations (at the ASSETS discounted rate) are made directly with the hotel Call: +1 407 239 1144 or Visit: http://www.embassysuiteslbv.com/ when booking, please mention to the operator or enter online the following code: Group/Convention Code = AST. Please note, room/space is limited, and filled first-come first-serve basis.

June 2010 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Thu, 15 Jul 2010 11:11:00 +0000

The June 2010 edition of the SIGACCESS Newsletter is now available online from the SIGACCESS Newsletter pages.

A Note from the Editor
Jinjuan Heidi Feng
NTID International Symposium on Technology and Deaf Education - A Review
Anna Cavender and Richard E. Ladner
Participation of High School and Undergraduate Students who are Deaf in Research on American Sign Language Animation
Matt Huenerfauth
Anomaly Detection for Travelling Individuals with Cognitive Impairments
Yao-Jen Chang

Workshop on Accessible Electronic Health Records

Wed, 30 Jun 2010 10:55:00 +0000

October 23-24, 2010; Orlando, Florida [NSF support for this workshop is being pursued]

Electronic solutions for storing, retrieving, sharing, and analyzing health related information are being rapidly developed and deployed. Solutions may be designed for health care professionals or consumers. resulting in a wide range of challenges. Textual and graphical information must be entered, updated, and retrieved. Frequent and infrequent users must be supported. Security must be maintained, collaboration should be supported, and privacy must be ensured.

This workshop focuses on the issues and challenges associated with ensuring access to this information by providers and consumers with disabilities. We seek to bring the health care and accessibility communities together to share experiences, discuss challenges, and develop a research agenda. This includes:

individuals engaged in developing, deploying, or using electronic health records,
individuals engaged in research on electronic health records
individuals engaged in research on information technology accessibility
individuals interested in becoming involved in any of the activities listed above.

This one and one-half day workshop will be co-located with ASSETS 2010 in Orlando, Florida and will take place on October 23-24. Travel funds including airfare, local travel, and hotel will be provided as well as several group meals.

Individuals interested in participating should submit a position statement of no more than two pages which outlines their background, relevant experience, how they anticipate contributing to the workshop, and the benefits they expect to receive through their participation. Position statements should be submitted electronically (send to asears-AT-umbc.edu) no later than August 2, 2010. Individuals will be informed if they have been selected to participate by August 16, 2010.

Workshop Organizers: Andrew Sears, UMBC, Vicki Hanson, University of Dundee

Volume 2, Issue 4 (June 2010) of TACCESS Available Online

Mon, 21 Jun 2010 16:08:00 +0000

Volume 2, Issue 4 of ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing is now available in the ACM Digital Library.

ITHACA: An Open Source Framework for Building Component-Based Augmentative and Alternative Communication Applications
Alexandros Pino and Georgios Kouroupetroglou
Towards A Universally Usable Human Interaction Proof: Evaluation of Task Completion Strategies
Graig Sauer, Jonathan Lazar, Harry Hochheiser, and Jinjuan Feng
Assessing Fit of Nontraditional Assistive Technologies
Adriane B. Randolph and Melody M. Moore Jackson

2010 SIGACCESS Award for Outstanding Contributions to Computing and Accessibility

Mon, 21 Jun 2010 16:08:00 +0000

We are pleased to announce that Dr. Albert Cook (University of Alberta) has been selected as the 2010 recipient of the SIGACCESS Award for Outstanding Contributions to Computing and Accessibility. This award was established to recognize individuals who have made significant and lasting contributions to the development of computing technologies which improve the accessibility of media and services to people with disabilities.

Dr. Cook was selected in recognition of his life-long dedication to accessibility. Dr. Cook began his academic career at the California State University, Sacramento, where he founded the Biomedical Engineering Graduate Program and co-directed the Assistive Device Center. He moved to Canada to assume the position of Dean of the Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine at the University of Alberta, where he helped to establish the Faculty as a world reference in research, development, and service provision in rehabilitation medicine and assistive technology. He authored more than 200 scientific publications. He is the co-author of the classic reference book in the field Assistive Technologies: Principles and Practice. As president of the RESNA, he worked to regulate the profession of Assistive Technology Practitioners and Engineers, bringing scientific methods to everyday practice.

Dr. Cook will present a Keynote address titled "The Future of Assistive Technologies: A Time of Promise and Apprehension" at ASSETS 2010 in Orlando, Florida.

Accessibility Postdoc at IS Department, Interactive Systems Research Center, UMBC

Fri, 04 Jun 2010 10:08:00 +0000

The successful candidate will work under the direction of Dr. Andrew Sears, Professor and Chair of the IS Department at UMBC and Director of the Interactive Systems Research Center. UMBC is one of the few institutions in the US offering an MS and PhD in Human-Centered Computing and the only institution which has identified accessibility as a core research focus for its HCC program.

The individual filling this position will be involved in developing new research activities, designing and conducting studies, analyzing results, and publishing results. There will also be opportunities to gain experience developing grant proposals and supervising graduate and undergraduate students. Ongoing research is supported by a variety of sources, with different projects addressing the needs of individuals with visual, motor, and cognitive impairments as well as the needs of older adults. The successful candidate may engage in one or more of these ongoing activities, or may develop a new project which is consistent with the mission of the research group.

A PhD in human-computer interaction, information systems, information science, computer science, psychology or a related discipline is required as is a strong interest in accessibility and information technologies. A strong background in quantitative research methodologies is required, but knowledge of and experience with qualitative methodologies would be valued as well.

Send cover letter, CV, and three letters of reference to Dr. Sears via email asears-at-umbc.edu

For full consideration, materials should be received by July 15, 2010.

ASSETS 2010 Call For Posters, Demos, Student Research Competition, and Doctoral Consortium

Wed, 19 May 2010 12:08:00 +0000

July 2nd, 2010: Posters, Demos, Doctoral Consortium and Student Research Competition.

People with disabilities can use Computer and Information Technologies to overcome barriers encountered in day-to-day life, and to participate more fully in society. The ASSETS series of conferences explores the potential of Computer and Information Technologies to support and include individuals with disabilities, and those around them. ASSETS is the premier forum for presenting innovative research on the design and use of both mainstream and specialized assistive technologies by people with disabilities. Sponsored by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and its SIGACCESS Special Interest Group on Accessible Computing, ASSETS includes formal paper sessions, demonstrations, posters, a doctoral consortium, and a student research competition. The single track and friendly atmosphere make ASSETS the ideal venue to meet researchers, practitioners, developers and policymakers to exchange ideas, share information, and make new contacts.

Topics

High quality, original submissions on topics relevant to computers and accessibility are invited. Appropriate topics include (but are not limited to) the use of technology by and in support of:

Individuals with hearing, sight and other sensory impairments
Individuals with motor impairments
Individuals with memory, learning and cognitive impairments
Individuals with multiple impairments
Older adults

Assistive technologies that improve day-to-day life
Assistive technologies that improve access to mainstream Computer and Information Technologies
Innovative use of mainstream technologies to overcome access barriers
Accessibility and usability of mainstream technologies
Identification of barriers to technology access that are not addressed by existing research
Where relevant, work that includes empirical data from the target user groups is strongly preferred.

Workshop on Accessible Search Systems

Mon, 15 May 2010 12:08:00 +0000

Current search systems are not adequate for individuals with specific needs: children, older adults, people with visual or motor impairments, and people with intellectual disabilities or low literacy. Search services are typically created for average users (young or middle-aged adults without physical or mental disabilities) and information retrieval methods are based on their perception of relevance as well. The workshop will be the first to raise the discussion on how to make search engines accessible for different types of users, including those with problems in reading, writing or comprehension of complex content. Search accessibility means that people whose abilities are considerably different from those that average users have will be able to successfully use search systems.

The objective of the workshop is to provide a forum and initiate collaborations between academics and industrial practitioners interested in making search more usable for users in general and for users with specific needs in particular. We encourage presentation and participation from researchers working at the intersection of information retrieval, natural language processing, human-computer interaction, ambient intelligence and related areas.

Topics

The workshop welcomes contributions on any issue concerning accessible search, for instance:

Understanding of search behavior of users with specific needs
Understanding of relevance criteria of users with specific needs
Understanding the effects of domain expertise, age, user experience and cognitive abilities on search goals and results evaluation
Non-topical aspects of relevance: text style, readability, appropriateness of language (harassment and explicit content detection)
Development of test collections for evaluation of accessible search systems
Collaborative search techniques for assisting users with specific needs (e.g. parents helping children)
Potential of search personalization techniques to satisfy users with specific needs
Search interfaces and result representation for people with specific needs
Using assistive technologies for interaction with search systems, e.g. speech recognition or eye tracking software for querying and browsing.

Invited Speakers

The organisers are pleased to announce two invited speakers who will present at the workshop:

Dr. T.V. Raman, Senior Research Scientist at Google Labs. Dr. Raman leads the project "Google Accessible Search", helping users with impairments to find accessible Web content.

Dr. Allison Druin, Director of the Human-Computer Interaction Lab at the University of Maryland. Since 1998, Dr. Druin has led an interdisciplinary research teams looking for ways to improve information access for children and understand their search behaviour.

Papers and Posters

The conference language is English. The workshop will be a mix of oral presentations for long papers (maximum of 8 pages), a session for posters (maximum of 2 pages) and a panel discussion. All submissions will be reviewed by at least two program committee members. Workshop proceedings will be available at the workshop.

Please, submit papers in pdf-format, using the ACM SIG Proceedings style using EasyChair

Important Dates

4 June:: Paper submission deadline (previous deadline: 23 May)
16 June:: Notification of acceptance
23 June:: Camera-ready papers due (provisional, awaiting confirmation from the SIGIR conference chairs)
23 July:: Workshop in Geneva, Switzerland

Second ACM SIGACCESS Award for Outstanding Contributions to Computing and Accessibility - Call for Nominations

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 12:08:00 +0000

DEADLINE extended to: 30 APRIL 2010

We are pleased to request nominations for the ACM SIGACCESS Award for Outstanding Contributions to Computing and Accessibility. The award recognizes individuals who have made significant and lasting contributions to the development of computing technologies which improve the accessibility of media and services to people with disabilities. Outstanding contributions through research, practice, or advocacy will be recognized. Towards this goal, contributions will be considered from academia, industry, as well as other professions that focus on computer users with disabilities and the application of computing technology to improve access. The award will recognize members of the community for long-term accomplishments or those who have made a notable impact through a significant innovation.

Candidates’ contributions can include innovative ideas, influence in the community, and/or the social impact of their work.

The award includes a $1000 honorarium, an award certificate of recognition, and an invitation for the recipient to present a keynote talk at the ASSETS 2010 Conference in Orlando, Florida, USA (25-27 October 2010). A public citation for the award will be placed on the SIGACCESS website.

Nomination Procedure

A nomination for the award should include:

A statement summarizing the candidate's accomplishments, description of the significance of the work, and justification of the nomination (two pages maximum)
Curriculum vitae of the nominee;
Three endorsement letters supporting the nomination including the significant contributions of the candidate. Each endorsement should be no more than 300 words;
A concise statement (one sentence) of the achievement(s) for which the award is being given. This statement will appear on the award certificate and on the website.

Nominations should be sent either:

Electronically:: Gerhard Weber gerhard.weber -AT- tu-dresden.de
Hardcopy:: Gerhard Weber,
ACM SIGACCESS Award Chair
Department of Computer Science
TU Dresden
Noethnizer Str. 46
01602 Dresden,
Germany

We kindly request that nominations meet the following conditions:

The nominee can be any member of the scientific community.
The nominator must be a SIGACCESS member.
No self-nomination is allowed.
Current members of the SIGACCESS Executive Committee as well as members of the Awards Committee are not eligible.

Important Dates

Submission of Nominations:: 30th April 2010
Notification of Selection:: 1st June 2010

Selection Committee

Julio Abascal: University of the Basque Country, Spain
Enrico Pontelli: New Mexico State University, USA
Gerhard Weber (Chair): TU Dresden, Germany

Volume 2, Issue 3 (March 2010) of TACCESS Available Online

Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:32:00 +0000

Volume 2, Issue 3 of ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing is now available. This issue includes two articles. The first explores the design of auditory graphs while the second addresses computer use by children with Down Syndrome and is now available in the ACM Digital Library.

Universal Design of Auditory Graphs: A Comparison of Sonification Mappings for Visually Impaired and Sighted Listeners
B. N. Walker and L. M. Mauney
Computer Usage by Children with Down Syndrome: Challenges and Future Research
Jinjuan Feng, Jonathan Lazar, Libby Kumin and Ant Ozok

Google Europe Scholarship for Students with Disabilities

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 10:56:00 +0000

Google is excited to announce the most recent addition to their scholarship programs in Europe, the Google Europe Scholarship for Students with Disabilities. This scholarship is designed for students with disabilities studying Computer Science or Computer Engineering who have shown academic strength and demonstrated a passion for computer science.

Deadline:: 15th March 2010
Website:: http://www.google.com/studentswithdisabilities-europe/

ASSETS 2010 Mentor Program

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 10:45:00 +0000

We are looking for experienced authors to help us with mentoring individuals new to the ASSETS conference. If you have published in ASSETS or similar venues, we encourage you to volunteer to be a mentor. If you are interested, please email the Mentor Chair (mc-assets10@acm.org) with your name, affiliation, and up to 4 keywords that represent your research areas by March 7th, 2010.

Mentoring Request

Help with submissions by seasoned researchers is available through the ASSETS Mentoring Program. You may receive advice on your submission in any of the submission categories provided by ASSETS. Although we do not guarantee that your submission will be accepted by ASSETS, most individuals who have used the mentoring service at ASSETS or at the CHI conference where it began have reported positive experiences and an improved understanding of what is required by reviewers.

If you think you would benefit from mentoring either because you are new to presenting your research, new to the type of category you are interested in submitting to or simply find that preparing English language papers foreign to your paper writing experience, please consider applying for mentoring help by emailing the Mentor Chair (mc-assets10@acm.org) a 1 page extended abstract of your paper. The deadline for mentoring request is March 5th, 2010. A mentor will be assigned to you shortly. You will then need to send your submission to the mentor assigned to you and work with this person through email, voice over IP, etc.

Deadline to request a Mentor:: March 5th, 2010
Deadline to volunteer as a Mentor:: March 7th, 2010
Website:: http://www.sigaccess.org/assets10/mentor.html

January 2010 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 10:39:00 +0000

The January 2010 edition of the SIGACCESS Newsletter is now available online from the SIGACCESS Newsletter pages.

A Note from the Editor
Sri Kurniawan and Jinjuan Heidi Feng
Persuasive Mobile Exercise Companion for Teenagers with Weight Management Issues
Sonia Arteaga
Widget Identification and Modification for Web 2.0 Access Technologies (WIMWAT)
Alex Q. Chen
Sign Language Synthesis: Skeleton Modelling for More Realistic Gestures
Maxime Delorme
AudioNav: A Mixed Reality Navigation System for Individuals Who Are Visually Impaired
Navid Fallah
Using Interactive Objects for Speech Intervention
Foad Hamidi
Assistive Systems for Children with Dyslexia and Autism
Harini Sampath, Jayanthi Sivaswamy, and Bipin Indurkhya
MobileAccessibility: Camera Focalization for Blind and Low- Vision Users On the Go
Chandrika Jayant
Modeling Animations of American Sign Language Verbs through Motion-Capture of Native ASL Signers
Pengfei Lu
An Online Multimedia Language Assistant for People with Aphasia and Other Language Barriers
Xiaojuan Ma
Haptic/Audio Based Exergaming for Visually Impaired Individuals
Anthony Morelli
Improving Vocabulary Organization in Assistive Communication Tools: A Mixed-Initiative Approach
Sonya Nikolova
ASSETS 2010: The 12th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility

ASSETS 2010 Facebook Page

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 12:22:00 +0000

We are very pleased to announce the launch of an ASSETS Conference page on Facebook.

This page will be another venue for past and future ASSETS Conference attendees to share information, get announcements about upcoming conferences, finding and stay connected to colleagues they meet at the ASSETS year to year. In addition, videos and photos of conferences can be posted, to allow us to share links, videos, pictures, and other media from conferences! This Facebook page will be updated with information about each upcoming ASSETS Conference.

The new ASSETS Conference Facebook page is open to anyone who has a Facebook account. Any member will be able to post to the online discussion list, share media and links.

ASSETS 2010 Call For Papers

Wed, 03 Feb 2010 12:59:00 +0000

The 12th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility, 25-27 October 2010, Orlando, Florida, USA.

People with disabilities can use Computer and Information Technologies to overcome barriers encountered in day-to-day life, and to participate more fully in society.

Topics

High quality, original submissions on topics relevant to computers and accessibility are invited. Appropriate topics include (but are not limited to) the use of technology by and in support of:

Individuals with hearing, sight and other sensory impairments
Individuals with motor impairments
Individuals with memory, learning and cognitive impairments
Individuals with multiple impairments
Older adults

Assistive technologies that improve day-to-day life
Assistive technologies that improve access to mainstream Computer and Information Technologies
Innovative use of mainstream technologies to overcome access barriers
Accessibility and usability of mainstream technologies
Identification of barriers to technology access that are not addressed by existing research
Where relevant, work that includes empirical data from the target user groups is strongly preferred.

Important Dates

Paper Submission:: 7th May 2010
Posters, Demos, Doctoral Consortium and Student Research Competition:: 2nd July 2010
URL:: http://www.sigaccess.org/assets10/

Second ACM SIGACCESS Award for Outstanding Contributions to Computing and Accessibility - Call for Nominations

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 10:39:00 +0000

Candidates’ contributions can include innovative ideas, influence in the community, and/or the social impact of their work.

Nomination Procedure

A nomination for the award should include:

A statement summarizing the candidate's accomplishments, description of the significance of the work, and justification of the nomination (two pages maximum)
Curriculum vitae of the nominee;
Three endorsement letters supporting the nomination including the significant contributions of the candidate. Each endorsement should be no more than 300 words;
A concise statement (one sentence) of the achievement(s) for which the award is being given. This statement will appear on the award certificate and on the website.

Nominations should be sent either:

Electronically:: Gerhard Weber gerhard.weber -AT- tu-dresden.de
Hardcopy:: Gerhard Weber,
ACM SIGACCESS Award Chair
Department of Computer Science
TU Dresden
Noethnizer Str. 46
01602 Dresden,
Germany

We kindly request that nominations meet the following conditions:

The nominee can be any member of the scientific community.
The nominator must be a SIGACCESS member.
No self-nomination is allowed.
Current members of the SIGACCESS Executive Committee as well as members of the Awards Committee are not eligible.

Important Dates

Submission of Nominations:: 31st March 2010
Notification of Selection:: 1st June 2010

Selection Committee

Julio Abascal: University of the Basque Country, Spain
Enrico Pontelli: New Mexico State University, USA
Gerhard Weber (Chair): TU Dresden, Germany

W4A 2010 Fourth Web Accessibility Challenge Call for Submissions

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 10:39:00 +0000

The Fourth Web Accessibility Challenge in conjunction with the W4A 2010 Conference will take place at the WWW 2010 conference in April 26 and 27 in Raleigh, NC.

Goal

The Web Accessibility Challenge is organised to give an opportunity to researchers and developers of advanced Web accessibility technologies for showcasing their technologies to technical leaders in this area not only from academia and industry but also from end-users. To encourage and accelerate development of innovative and practically usable Web accessibility technologies; the Challenge is one part of the conference in which new experimental systems and technologies are submitted, compared, and judged by our independent panel of experts as to the most significant advance in research technology in accessibility for that year.

Topic

Please note that submissions can be related to the theme, “Developing Regions: Common Goals, Common Problems?” but it is certainly not a requirement as all accessibility technologies are welcomed for the challenge.

Submission Materials

We invite you to submit your work by submitting a:

Two-page abstract (see the W4A submission page)
Demonstration movie (or audio recording) with audio description.
Software is not required, but encouraged.

System Requirements

Any kind of system is acceptable, such as standalone assistive technologies, voice browsers, browser plug-ins, server-based services, and telephony systems. Other accessibility technologies can be accepted (e.g., tactile browser). Open source systems are welcomed. Please contact us, if you have any questions about the coverage (cc2010@w4a.info).

Important Dates

Submission deadline is 19th February 2010 (Midnight Hawaii Standard Time).

W4A Google Student Awards

Tue, 12 Jan 2010 10:43:00 +0000

We are delighted to announce the W4A Google Student Awards, which will enable two students to attend this year’s W4A in Raleigh, NC, USA.

Thanks to financial support from Google, these Awards will provide financial support towards travel and accommodation, plus free conference registration, to two students conducting postgraduate research in the web accessibility field and who otherwise would be unable to attend W4A.

This award is open to any student in a postgraduate position (part time or full time) at a University or other Higher Education institution, AND who is carrying out research that is directly relevant to the field of web accessibility. We particularly encourage applicants from under-represented parts of the world.

We now invite submissions from interested students - the deadline is Thursday 4th February, midnight Hawaii Standard Time.

Please see the Google Student Awards page for more information including details of the submission procedure.

AAAS Problem Solvers Workshop on Engineers with Disabilities

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 09:45:00 +0000

The AAAS is hosting the Problem Solvers Workshop on Engineers with Disabilities on the13th, 14th, and 15th December 2009. This is an exciting workshop on engineers and engineering students with disabilities at AAAS, starting this Sunday at 4pm. A link to the agenda can be found at http://tiny.cc/x6oLB

Participants will be an extraordinary group of engineers and scientists with all types of disabilities, outstanding speakers, as well as advocates who want to broaden the participation of people with disabilities in STEM fields. At this date they would not require registration. Attendees who could attend all or part could simply let them know by email, so they have a count.

AAAS can be contacted at:

Postal:: Virginia W. Stern, Director
Project on Science, Technology and Disability,
ENTRY POINT! and ACCESS
American Association for the Advancement of Science
1200 New York Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20005
Phone:: +1 202-326-6672 (v/tdd)
Fax:: +1 202-371-9849
Email:: vstern@aaas.org

AccessComputing Alliance Has Funding for Undergraduate Research Internships

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 09:49:00 +0000

The AccessComputing Alliance has funding for undergraduate research internships for students with disabilities. The internships are available for US citizens and permanent residents and cover a summer stipend, travel, housing, and sustenance.

If you have a student at your university you would like to work with or you are interested in bringing a student from another university to work with you, both are possible.

If you are interested please contact me as soon as possible. Funding is limited, so please contact me as soon as possible.

Richard Ladner
Boeing Professor in Computer Science and Engineering
University of Washingtion
AccessComputing Alliance
http://www.washington.edu/accesscomputing/

We welcome applications for the SIGACCESS Scholarship in Computers and Accessibility

Tue, 24 Nov 2009 15:32:00 +0000

The SIGACCESS Scholarship Award aims to provide support for practitioners, researchers, members of advocacy groups, and individuals with disabilities who are interested in the field of computers and accessibility, to actively participate in the ASSETS conference and gain experience and knowledge from interacting with experts in the field. The scholarship award is in the amount of $2,000. SIGACCESS will award up to two scholarships per year, pending availability of funds.

The deadline for application is May 31st, 2010; applicants will be notified of the decision by July 15th, 2010. Applications should be sent in electronic form to: chair_sigaccess@acm.org. For further details on Eligibility Criteria and Application Requirements please see:
The SIGACCESS Scholarship in Computers and Accessibility Award Pages.

Special Note: the 2010 SIGACCESS scholarship will be dedicated to the memory of Dr. Noëlle Carbonell, a leader in the field of accessibility and a strong advocate and supporter of SIGACCESS.

September 2009 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 10:04:00 +0000

The September 2009 edition of the SIGACCESS Newsletter is now available online from the SIGACCESS Newsletter pages.

A Note from the Editors
Adam J Sporka and Sri Kurniawan
MyLexics: An Assistive Courseware for Dyslexic Children to Learn Basic Malay Language
Muhammad Haziq Lim Abdullah, Syariffanor Hisham, and Shahril Parumo
Designing Smart Home Interfaces for the Elderly
Zoraida Callejas, Ramón López-Cózar
Development Framework for Pervasive Computing Applications
Václav Slovácek, Miroslav Macík, Martin Klíma

ASSETS 2009 Student Research Competition Winners

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 14:47:00 +0000

This year's ASSETS Conference hosted its fourth Microsoft Student Research Competition (SRC) event. The SRC allows students from diverse ACM areas to present their work and get recognised for achievement. The competition had both Undergraduate and Graduate categories, with the following students winning in their respective categories.

Undergraduate Category

Sensation Augmentation to Relieve Pressure Sore Formation in Wheelchair Users
Raphael Rush, Queen's University, Canada
Designing AAC Interfaces for Commercial Brain-Computer Interaction Gaming Hardware
Stephen Steward, The University of Delaware, USA

Graduate Category

iSET: Enabling in Situ and Post Hoc Video Labeling
Mish Madsen, MIT, USA; Abdelrahman Mahmoud, American University in Cairo, Egypt; Youssef Kashef, American University in Cairo, Egypt
Defining Virtualization Based System Abstractions for an Indoor Assistive Living for Elderly Care
Nova Ahmed, Georgia Institute of Technology, USA
MGuider: Mobile Guiding and Tracking System in Public Transit System for Individuals with Cognitive Impairments
Wei-Hsun Chen, Chung Yuan Christian University, Taiwan

SIGACCESS Best Paper Award 2009

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 10:02:00 +0000

The 2009 SIGACCESS Best Paper Award has been awarded Hironobu Takagi, Shinya Kawanaka, Masatomo Kobayashi, Daisuke Sato and Chieko Asakawa from IBM Research, Yamato, Japan for their paper:

Collaborative Web Accessibility Improvement: Challenges and Possibilities

Collaborative accessibility improvement has great potential to make the Web more adaptive in a timely manner by inviting users into the improvement process. The Social Accessibility Project is an experimental service for a new needs-driven improvement model based on collaborative metadata authoring technologies. In 10 months, about 18,000 pieces of metadata were created for 2,930 webpages through collaboration. We encountered many challenges as we sought to create a new mainstream approach. The productivity of the volunteer activities exceeded our expectation, but we found large and important problems in the screen reader users' lack of awareness of their own accessibility problems. In this paper, we first introduce examples, analyze some statistics from the pilot service and then discuss our findings and challenges. Three future directions including site-wide authoring are considered.

Full Paper Available from the ACM Digital Library

SIGACCESS Best Student Paper Award 2009

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 09:53:00 +0000

The 2009 SIGACCESS Best Student Paper Award has been awarded to Anna C. Cavender from the University of Washington, USA, for her contribution to the paper “ClassInFocus: Enabling Improved Visual Attention Strategies for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students”. This was written in conjunction with Jeffrey P. Bigham from the University of Rochester, New York, USA and Richard E. Ladner from the University of Washington, USA.

ClassInFocus: Enabling Improved Visual Attention Strategies for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students

Deaf and hard of hearing students must juggle their visual attention in current classroom settings. Managing many visual sources of information (instructor, interpreter or captions, slides or whiteboard, classmates, and personal notes) can be a challenge. ClassInFocus automatically notifies students of classroom changes, such as slide changes or new speakers, helping them employ more beneficial observing strategies. A user study of notification techniques shows that students who liked the notifications were more likely to visually utilize them to improve performance.

Full Paper Available from the ACM Digital Library

ACM-BCS Visions of Computer Science 2010

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 08:41:00 +0000

Edinburgh University, UK, 13-16 April 2010

The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and British Computer Society (BCS) are delighted to invite you to the joint ACM-BCS 2010 “Visions of Computer Science” conference, to be held at the Informatics Forum, Edinburgh University, between April 13-16 2010. This flagship event aims to energise the computing community and bring it together around some positive and inspiring visions of our discipline and follows the highly successful "Visions of Computer Science" conference in 2008.

Topics

The proceedings will be published on the BCS electronic proceedings series and the ACM Digital Library. Some of the best papers will appear in The Computer Journal, the archival research publication of the BCS. Submissions are being solicited in all areas of research covering the broad field of Computer Science and Engineering (CSE). They include but are not limited to:

Computer Architectures and Digital Systems
Theoretical Computer Science: Algorithms and Complexity
Logic and Semantics
Non-standard Models of Computation
Programming Methods and Languages
Software Engineering, and System Design Tools
Quantitative Evaluation of Algorithms, Systems, and Networks
Artificial Intelligence, Agents, and Machine Learning
Computer Networks
Distributed and Pervasive Systems
Grid Computing and eScience
Digital Economy
Databases, Information Retrieval and Data Mining, Web based Computation
Human Computer Interaction
Robotics and Computer Vision
Bioinformatics, Synthetic Biology and Synthetic Chemistry
Medical Applications

Call for Papers

Submissions are being solicited in all areas of research covering the broad field of Computer Science and Engineering. The relevant dates for authors are:

submission:: 18 December 2009
notification:: 19 February 2010
camera-ready:: 5 March 2010

The strict limit for submissions is 12 A4-pages in 10pt two-column style including figures and references. Authors may include a clearly marked appendix, which referees may or may not take into account. For more information see:
http://www.bcs.org/visions2010/.

The Seventh International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A 2010)

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 11:36:00 +0000

Co-Located with the Nineteenth International World Wide Web Conference (WWW2010), in Raleigh, North Carolina, USA, 26-27 April 2010.

Developing Regions: Common Goals, Common Problems?

A revolution in the information society is now starting, based on the use of mobile phones in developing countries. The hyper-growth of mobile phone penetration is deeply changing the lives of people in most of the world; their ways of communicating, working, learning, and structuring their societies. The promising next step is obviously to access the Web. The Web has already touched the lives of over a billion people and now is the time for the next billions.

However, this expansion faces unprecedented accessibility challenges. Even the word “accessibility” needs a new definition for people in the developing regions. How can someone who is illiterate or barely literate access the Web? In some cases, a language may not even have a written form. The affordability of the technology is also a challenge, while access is constrained by low computational power, limited bandwidth, compact keyboards, tiny screens, and even by the lack of electric power. All of these constraints compound the problems of access and inclusion.

The desire for access in developing regions and the resourcefulness of the people who want inclusion unite the communities of people in developing regions and the communities of disabled people in the developed world. Will complex and highly graphical interfaces exclude developing regions from access? What problems exist, what are the newly appearing problems, and what solutions are required? How do the adoption patterns for Web accessibility and inclusion vary across cultures? What effect will the Web in the developing regions have on accessibility in the developed regions and vice versa?

Note that while the commonalities between Web Accessibility and Developing Regions are this years theme, please don’t be deterred if this somewhat unique area is not yours. We would like to see all quality work on Web Accessibility regardless of the particular field within accessibility. The overriding reason for a paper being accepted is its high quality in relation to the broad area of Web Accessibility. In this case topics of interests include (but are not limited to):

Inclusion and Citizen Empowerment in Developing Regions;
Inclusion and Literacy in Developing Regions;
Enhancing Education in Developing Regions;
Accessibility Problems in Developing Regions;
Web Based Employment in Developing Regions;
Web Based Health Care in Developing Regions;
Evaluation and Validation tools and techniques;
User Experimentation looking at Social Networking and Freedom of Expression;
User Agents for Developing Regions and User Agent Guidelines;
Web Authoring Guidelines;
Design and best practice to support Web accessibility;
Technological advances to support Web accessibility;
End user tools;
Accessibility guidelines, best practice, evaluation techniques, and tools;
Psychology of end user experiences and scenarios;
Innovative techniques to support accessibility;
Universally accessible graphical design approaches;
Design Perspectives;
Adapting existing Web content; and
Accessible graphic formats and tools for their creation.

Web Accessibility Challenge

Sponsored by Microsoft since 2008, the “Web Accessibility Challenge” is organised to give an opportunity to researchers and developers of advanced Web accessibility technologies for showcasing their technologies to technical leaders in this area not only from academia and industry but also from end-users. More details:
http://www.w4a.info/2010/submissions/challenge.shtml.

Submission

We will accept position and technical papers, and short communications. Position papers should only be submitted as a communication of (up to 4-pages) whereas technical papers should be in full paper format (up to 10-pages). Accepted papers and communications will appear in the Conference proceedings contained on the Conference CD, and will also be accessible to the general public via the ACM Digital Library website. The official language of the Conference is English. Submission details are available at:
http://www.w4a.info/2010/submissions/index.shtml.

Important Dates

Technical and Communication Papers:: Submission: 01 February 2010 (Midnight Hawaii Standard Time)
Web Accessibility Challenge:: Submission: 19 February 2010 (Midnight Hawaii Standard Time)
More details:: http://www.w4a.info/2010/submissions/dates.shtml

Online Course on Designing Accessible Web Forms

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 08:47:00 +0000

Creating web forms that are accessible to people with disabilities requires understanding of the labelling features of HTML markup and how browsers interpret labelling markup for assistive technologies like screen readers. The course will start by using simulations to help participants understand the issues people with disabilities face when using the web. Participants will learn the basics of labelling form controls, how to indicate required controls and provide feedback on invalid responses in a way that is usable by people with disabilities. Examples of more complex labelling of form controls for dates, phone numbers, validation codes and high density surveys will be included in the course. Participants will learn CSS techniques to layout form controls without using tables and how to highlight the active form control using CSS pseudo elements. The last part of the course will provide a preview of the form labelling capabilities of the new Accessibility Rich Internet Applications! (ARIA) specifications which provide new capabilities to label form controls and provide accessible feedback on form validation as required by the W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0.

Who Should Participate in the Course?

This course is designed for web developers interested in learning about the disability access issues faced by people with disabilities in using the web and how web forms can be designed to be accessible to people with disabilities. Participants should be familiar with HTML coding and the form elements. Knowledge of basic CSS techniques and javascripting will be helpful, but not a required part of the course.

Dates and Registration

Dates:: October 27th to December 1st (5 weeks)
Location:: On-line, mostly synchronous and some asynchronous activities
Cost:: $175 (NOTE: $25 discount to WOW members, educators, and government employees)
More information at:: http://formsonline.cita.illinois.edu/
Instructor:: Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., University of Illinois
Registration link:: http://www.webprotraining.org/AccessibleForms.html

Information Systems Department at UMBC Invites Applications for a Tenure-Track Faculty Position in the Area of Human-Centered Computing

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 10:58:00 +0000

The Information Systems Department at UMBC invites applications for a tenure-track faculty position at the Assistant Professor level in the area of human-centered computing (HCC) starting August 2010. Outstanding candidates in other areas will also be considered.

Candidates must have an earned PhD in Information Systems or a related field no later than August 2010. Applicants engaged in interdisciplinary research addressing accessibility (broadly defined to include issues associated with disabilities, age, culture, and other relevant topics), human-information interaction, or social computing are of primary interest. Ideal candidates will be engaged in research that spans two or more of these areas with preference given to those who can collaborate with current faculty. Candidates should have a strong potential for excellence in research, the ability to develop and sustain an externally funded research program, and the ability to contribute to our graduate and undergraduate teaching mission.

The Department offers undergraduate degrees in Information Systems and Business Technology Administration as well as both the MS and PhD in Information Systems. In addition, the Department offers an MS and PhD in Human-Centered Computing, and was ranked 8th in the nation in 2007 for scholarly productivity by Academic Analytics. Consistent with the UMBC vision, the Department has excellent technical support and teaching facilities as well as outstanding laboratory space and state of the art technology. UMBC?s Technology Center, Research Park, and Center for Entrepreneurship are major indicators of active research and outreach. Further details on our research, academic programs, and faculty can be found at http://www.is.umbc.edu/. Under-represented groups including women and minorities are especially encouraged to apply.

Applications will not be reviewed until the following materials are received: a cover letter, a one-page statement of teaching interests, a one-page statement of research interests, one or more sample research papers, and a curriculum vitae. Applicants should also arrange to have three letters of recommendation sent to the department as soon as possible. Electronic submission of materials as PDF documents is preferred. Electronic copies should be sent to bmorris@umbc.edu. Copies can also be sent to: Dr. Andrew Sears, Chair of Faculty Search Committee, Information Systems Department, UMBC, 1000 Hilltop Circle, Baltimore, MD 21250-5398. For inquiries, please contact Barbara Morris at (410) 455-3795 or bmorris@umbc.edu.

Review of applications will begin immediately and will continue until the position is filled. This position is subject to the availability of funds.

UMBC is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer and welcomes applications from minorities, women and individuals with disabilities.

Call for Submissions to a Special Issue of ACM Transactions on Computing Education on Broadening Participation

Mon, 07 Sep 2009 09:13:00 +0000

A key issue in computing education at all levels is increasing the participation of members from the underrepresented groups (women, Native Americans, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and those with disabilities) in computing. In this special issue of TOCE the editors seek high quality scholarly papers that explore the problem of under representation from an education point of view. Papers may be expository helping readers understand the causes of under representation or may describe educational practices that have improved the participation and success of underrepresented groups.

Papers are welcomed from a broad range of perspectives. But a preliminary one page abstract of the paper should be sent to the Special Issue editors by October 31, 2009 to help the editors know what range of topics will be coming in. A number of papers will be solicited to make sure that the Special Issue covers a wide range of topics.

The deadline for submission to the Special Issue is February 1, 2010. Full papers, solicited or not, should be submitted via Manuscript Central (http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/toce) and will be refereed according to the normal TOCE review criteria (see http://toce.acm.org/authors.html). In the submission cover letter, please indicate that the paper is for the Broadening Participation special issue.

Special Issue editors:

Richard Ladner: University of Washington, ladner@cs.washington.edu
Tammy VanDeGrift: University of Portland, vandegri@up.edu

June 2009 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Tue, 04 Aug 2009 09:10:00 +0000

The June 2009 edition of the SIGACCESS Newsletter is now available online from the SIGACCESS Newsletter pages.

A Note from the Editor
Sri Kurniawan
Web Toolkits Accessibility Study
Zdenek Mikovec, Jan Vystrcil and Pavel Slavík
Pitch in Non-verbal Vocal Input
Adam J. Sporka
Combating Obesity Trends in Teenagers through Persuasive Mobile Technology
Sonia M. Arteaga, Mo Kudeki, and Adrienne Woodworth
CFP: Eleventh International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility

ACM Student Research Competition First Place!

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:05:00 +0000

In May we announced that Xu Liu from the University of Maryland was one of the three winners in this year’s ACM / Microsoft Student Research Competition (SRC) for his paper on “Mobile Currency Reader for People with Visual Impairments”.

At the ACM Awards banquet this past Saturday, it was announced that he won First Place in the graduate student division. Congratulations Xu!

This is the second time in the past few years that a student from the ASSETS Conference SRC has won 1st place. This reflects very well on the quality of entries we get at the conference. We look forward to seeing more outstanding entries at ASSETS’09 in October.

For information about how students can enter the SRC at the upcoming ASSETS conference, see:
http://www.sigaccess.org/assets09/information/student-research-competition.php

SIGACCESS Election Results

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 18:40:00 +0000

We are pleased to announce that the results of the SIGACCESS Election for the coming term, July 1, 2009 - June 30, 2012, are:

Chair:: Andrew Sears
Vice Chair:: Enrico Pontelli
Secretary/Treasurer:: Shari Trewin

We thank all of you who participated in the election and we know that the new officers will serve SIGACCESS well.

SIGACCESS News

January 2012 SIGACCESS Newsletter

September 2011 SIGACCESS Newsletter

June 2011 SIGACCESS Newsletter

ASSETS 2011 Call For Papers

Topics

Submission Procedures

Important Dates

January 2011 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

September 2010 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Volume 3, Issue 2 (November 2010) of TACCESS Available Online

Table of Contents

ASSETS 2010 Student Research Competition Winners

Undergraduate Category

Graduate Category

SIGACCESS Best Paper Award 2010

SIGACCESS Best Student Paper Award 2010

Volume 2, Issue 4 (September 2010) of TACCESS Available Online

Table of Contents

Registration and Hotel Reservation for the ASSETS 2010 Conference is Now Open

To Register for ASSETS 2010

To Book Hotel Reservations

June 2010 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Table of Contents

Workshop on Accessible Electronic Health Records

Volume 2, Issue 4 (June 2010) of TACCESS Available Online

Table of Contents

2010 SIGACCESS Award for Outstanding Contributions to Computing and Accessibility

Accessibility Postdoc at IS Department, Interactive Systems Research Center, UMBC

ASSETS 2010 Call For Posters, Demos, Student Research Competition, and Doctoral Consortium

Topics

Workshop on Accessible Search Systems

Topics

Invited Speakers

Papers and Posters

Important Dates

Second ACM SIGACCESS Award for Outstanding Contributions to Computing and Accessibility - Call for Nominations

Nomination Procedure

Important Dates

Selection Committee

Volume 2, Issue 3 (March 2010) of TACCESS Available Online

Table of Contents

Google Europe Scholarship for Students with Disabilities

ASSETS 2010 Mentor Program

Mentoring Request

January 2010 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Table of Contents

ASSETS 2010 Facebook Page

ASSETS 2010 Call For Papers

Topics

Important Dates

Second ACM SIGACCESS Award for Outstanding Contributions to Computing and Accessibility - Call for Nominations

Nomination Procedure

Important Dates

Selection Committee

W4A 2010 Fourth Web Accessibility Challenge Call for Submissions

Goal

Topic

Submission Materials

System Requirements

Important Dates

W4A Google Student Awards

AAAS Problem Solvers Workshop on Engineers with Disabilities

AccessComputing Alliance Has Funding for Undergraduate Research Internships

We welcome applications for the SIGACCESS Scholarship in Computers and Accessibility

September 2009 SIGACCESS Newsletter Now Available

Table of Contents

ASSETS 2009 Student Research Competition Winners

Undergraduate Category

Graduate Category

SIGACCESS Best Paper Award 2009

SIGACCESS Best Student Paper Award 2009

ACM-BCS Visions of Computer Science 2010

Topics

Call for Papers

The Seventh International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A 2010)

Developing Regions: Common Goals, Common Problems?

Web Accessibility Challenge

Submission

Important Dates