TOOLS AND TECHNOLOGY EVEN THE LEARNING FIELD

As children head back to school, many will be carrying more than books in their backpacks. Some will carry speech synthesizers or computers with braille output -- technology that can enable them to communicate and participate in the classroom and in society.

National Science Foundation (NSF)-supported research in areas such as speech recognition, alternative interfaces with computers and speech/braille output are having a dramatic impact on the lives of people with disabilities.

"We have a number of projects around the country where technology is being used, or developed for use, by students with a variety of disabilities," said Larry Scadden, who directs education programs for persons with disabilities for the agency.

No one should be left behind in the information age, said Gary Strong, an NSF program director for interactive systems. "We're talking about the information-world equivalent of a person in a wheelchair sitting in a front door that is impossible to open, or at a curb impossible to cross, without personal assistance or technological tools, such as a door open button or a curb cut."

NSF-funded research in education and technology is helping to create those tools, and thus ensure the disabled can share the goal of universal access to knowledge.