Load2Learn: the impacts and benefits of blind accessible education resources

Transcript

30 November 2014

Roberta: In most countries blind and vision impaired students attend mainstream schools and are provided with levels of support. One of these is accessible resources, particularly textbooks and other materials. The Royal National Institute for Blind People runs a resources program called Load2Learn which will be launched internationally this year. Now, to tell us about the latest developments in blind education programs is Media Access Australia CEO, Alex Varley. Welcome, Alex.

Alex: Thank you, Roberta.

Roberta: Now, Media Access Australia undertook a major review of blind education resource needs in Australia last year. What was the key message from that?

Alex: Well, clearly, one of the things that's needed for any blind and vision impaired students of Australia is resources and what we have in Australia, because we have a state-based system of education and then things like the Catholic system and the independent system, is a fairly disjointed approach to that. So there's lots of resources being created but there's not much coordination going on. Sometimes we have duplication and sometimes there are just some resources that completely miss out.

Roberta: Now, how does a program like this one, Load2Learn, assist with providing much needed resources?

Alex: The Load2Learn program is really interesting because it's run by RNIB, which is the big UK blind organisation, and what they've done is they've coordinated about 3000 resources. So this is mainly in books, textbooks, those kinds of things, and they've sorted out all the copyright issues. They're able to provide the books in lots of different e-formats, so they can be used by the various devices and modified and manipulated how people want and it's all done as part of a standardised subscription program that's just charged to each school. So a school can subscribe and access all of that and, of course, what's happening now is they're looking at launching that internationally this year.

Roberta: How will the Load2Learn program work, Alex?

Alex: Well, basically, as a school, you can sign up and the cost is rumoured to be somewhere around a few hundred dollars a year per school. So it's not actually that expensive, considering they spend tens of thousands a year on developing accessible resources now. Basically they then get access to the whole catalogue and they can download whatever they like and they can manipulate those files to their own needs. So if they need to increase the font sizes or change some little elements of it they can do that. The only additional costs for them, really, are the time need to download, and obviously the data charges around that, and just being able to sort through it all but it's a great service that's just sitting there waiting to go. Of course it also incorporates some newer things, like 3D printing which is incredibly useful for doing tactile diagrams and other resources that schools really struggle with at the moment.

Roberta: What sort of impact would Load2Learn have and are there any other factors which impact on the potential benefits of programs like this?

Alex: Well, I think what it will do for Australia is, certainly, at the very basic level it will provide some additional resources that schools can tap into. Now, obviously the resources are designed around the UK curriculum but for subjects like Science and Mathematics and Geography and History and things there's a lot of common materials they use. So Australia will have access to those and that will help to flesh out the range of resources. I think the other thing that it will do is it will just help to sort out some of those interstate communication and cooperation issues, so they start to share more materials and resources rather than duplicating things. So I think that's a big actual impact, is to get people talking to each other more so there's not that duplication and I think it will also encourage people to actually start to look at things like 3D printing because you can buy a 3D printer for a few hundred dollars now. Rather than going through some fairly old-fashioned ways, like, for example, sticking things on bits of paper to create a tactile diagram, what you can now do is download free files and produce these beautiful 3D tactile models of things that blind students can just use straightaway and they're really good quality.

Roberta: Well Alex, let’s hope that schools take up this beautiful program. I've been speaking with Alex Varley, CEO of Media Access Australia. If you'd like to find out more on the developments in blind education access you can call 02 9212 6242 or email Media Access Australia at info@mediaaccess.org.au. Media Access Australia is a supporter of this program.

Go back to Load2Learn: the impacts and benefits of blind accessible education resources page