Saturday, November 26, 2016

a technology to visualize sounds

"A deaf musician is creating a universal algorithm to make beautiful, visual music," reports Quartz. Watch a video about the work of Myles de Bastion and CymaSpace here.

NTID 1st Deaf Prof gets his own Postage Stamp

Robert Panara will be honored with a U.S. postage stamp. The stamp "shows Panara, who died in 2014 at 94, signing the word 'respect,'" according to the Rochester Institute of Technology's National Technical Institute for the Deaf. Read more about NTID's first deaf professor be-immortalized-postage-stamp">here.

Friday, November 25, 2016

Champions on the Football Field

A deaf school's football team is undefeated this season. WGNO-TV has a video report on the success of the the Louisiana School for the Deaf War Eagles and their female coach. No captions but there is some text here.

Thursday, November 24, 2016

Deaf man sues Florida over truck driving license

"A Central Florida man said the state of Florida is discriminating against him-- it won't let him take the test to obtain his commercial driver's license because he is deaf," reports WKMG-TV. Here's a video report.

Saturday, November 19, 2016

Settlement for Deaf Man Jailed for 40 days

The Arlington County jail will pay Abreham Zemedagegehu $250,000 as part of a settlement for leaving him behind bars for 40 days without an interpreter. WJIA-TV has more of the Ethiopian immigrant's story here.

Friday, November 18, 2016

5 Years for Molesting Teen

A Chicago-area man will spend five years behind bars for sexually assaulting a deaf teen. The Daily Herald has more on the story here.

Vice: Why the Deaf Community Fears President Trump

Deaf novelist Sara Nović explains why the Deaf Community is concerned about what may lie ahead for them during a Trump presidency. She explains how potential budget cuts, a roll back of ADA enforcement and changes to health care coverage leaves many fearful in a Vice article here.

Thursday, November 17, 2016

deaf literacy vital for blended families

"Research shows that a lack of early access to visual language, like ASL, can limit literacy for the rest of a person’s life," reports Minnesota Daily. "That’s why University of Minnesota associate professor of deaf education Debbie Golos created a set of online resources in 2010 to help children and adults learn language visually." Read about her effort here.

Sunday, November 13, 2016

Lawsuit: Sports Arena not ADA complient

A class action lawsuit has been filed against a Denver arena. The jumbotron at the Pepsi Center could provide captioning.. but doesn't. A deaf woman is suing after a year of trying to get that changed. KDVR-TV has a video report.. that ironically doesn't include captioning. But you can read the story here.

Saturday, November 12, 2016

Video of Arrest of Deaf Man Outrages Activists

A video of Toronto area police officers arresting a deaf man in Canada has gone viral and outraged activists. A police officer repeatedly tells a deaf man to turn around and put his hands behind his back.. while the deaf man makes a writing motion to the officer. The man is soon taken down and handcuffed. You can see the video and a story about it from the CBC here.

#NoMoreCraptions movement

"A new campaign dubbed #NoMoreCraptions is calling out 'crappy' captions on YouTube, where creators are asking each other to make their content more accessible by writing their own captions on their videos," reports Mashable. Read the full story here.

Thursday, November 10, 2016

Goal for 1st deaf student at Miami Culinary School: Top Chef

Joselyn Escobar is the Miami Culinary Institute’s first deaf student. The Miami Herald shares her journey in this article here. Below is a video about her effort.


Monday, November 7, 2016

Can deep learning help solve lip reading?

A new lip-reading program called LipNet was able to "outperform experienced lip readers to a significant degree, achieving 93.4 percent accuracy in certain tests, compared to 52.3 percent accuracy from human lip readers." The Verge has a story about the research here. A video about the Artificial Intelligence built on deep learning is below.

Students get to Vote

Some students from the Colorado School for the Deaf and Blind got a chance to cast their ballot for the first time today. KRDO-TV has the full story in a video report here.

A 1st for a Deaf Canadian

Jonathon Anderson is the first deaf Canadian iron worker to earn a red seal certificate. "The national designation lets qualified tradespeople use their skills anywhere in the country, something Anderson said he’s very proud of," reports CTV. Here's a video report.

Sunday, November 6, 2016

"Strange and illogical" Hollywood stereotypes

from the Ruderman Family Foundation 
Acadamy Award winner Marlee Matlin took part in a panel at the Ruderman Studio-Wide Roundtable on Disability Inclusion in Los Angeles. Matlin, along with other actors and filmmakers debunked some of the weird myths and preconceptions they had to work around in their careers. Read the full story from BuzzFeed here.

Deaf man wins $400k in lawsuit

A former Oregon inmate has won $400k in a jury verdict against the Oregon Department of Corrections. David VanValkenburg claimed the state "didn’t provide him with a qualified interpreter for prison medical appointments and denied him a prison job and a class to help him prepare for his release." KEZI-TV has a video report.

Thursday, November 3, 2016

Meet Gallaudet's 1st Female Deaf President

Roberta Cordano explains how she plans to approach her new job of leading Gallaudet University.. and why she never attended the school herself in a Washington Post article here.

Tuesday, November 1, 2016

Roll Tide!

Issues related to the deaf community at the University of Alabama is featured in an article in the student newspaper of the school. Read what The Crimson White has to say about accessibility and education here.

The Who’s Tommy

American Sign Language is integrated into a stage presentation of “The Who’s Tommy” playing now at the Silver Spring Black Box Theatre in the DC suburbs. It started this past Friday and runs through Nov. 20. The Washington Post has an article about the play here. There's info on tickets here.