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Captioners lend helping hand to deaf students
By Tiffany Wan
March 31, 2005
Anagha Gadgil, who is partially deaf, didn't want to draw attention to herself in class and at first objected to the idea of employing a captioner to accompany her to class and type lectures verbatim.
"I wasn't open to the idea at first, because I didn't want people staring at me in class," said Gadgil, a pre-engineering sophomore. "But you get over it. I find it very useful."
Any student that is deaf or hard of hearing can request a captioner, through Disability Resources for Students (DRS), to attend class with them and document lectures. Students sometimes have up to six or seven captioners throughout their college education.
"[Captioning] is a profession that most people aren't aware of," said Ramie Peckham, a captioner working with the UW since 1997. "Even the deaf and hard-of-hearing populations are not too familiar with this technology."
The captioning process is done by using a stenograph like those used in court reporting. Instead of a regular keyboard, a stenograph has 39 keys that consist of only a handful of letters from the alphabet, asterisk keys and number keys. Using short hand, letters are combined in specific patterns to create words.
The stenograph is hooked up to a laptop that displays real-time captions on the screen of what is being said in class.
The UW began to offer captioning services during the late '90s; none of the captioners are actual employees of the University but are hired independently.
"We hire freelance real-time captioners, and that's what we do across the board with sign language and captioning," said Jackie Matthews, interpreter coordinator for DRS. "When students need captioning or a sign language interpreter, the DRS sends the request to me."
Peckham attended the Court Reporting Institute -- which has locations in Seattle and Tacoma -- for two and a half years to learn specific skills, including how to use a stenograph. She later received a license from the state, which requires the ability to type at 225 words per minute with 95 percent accuracy.
In the fast-paced environment of a lecture class, it can be hard to catch the words of a professor who talks a mile a minute.
"At times I do have difficulty hearing the professor, but the majority of the time they are very accommodating," said Peckham. "The first day [of class] is a bit awkward because of unfamiliar terminology, and I'm not used to the professors' speech patterns."
After a day of class, the captioner sends a transcript of the lecture to the student for studying purposes. Gadgil said she sometimes receives up to 60 pages of notes for one day of classes.
But the lengthiness of transcripts doesn't stop her from recommending the service to others.
"People who have hearing impairment should definitely try captioning," said Gadgil. "It's more useful than sign language, because then you have the actual transcript for you later on, when you're doing your homework or whatever you need."
Sounds like a good idea to put it in use more frequently.
By Tiffany Wan
March 31, 2005
Anagha Gadgil, who is partially deaf, didn't want to draw attention to herself in class and at first objected to the idea of employing a captioner to accompany her to class and type lectures verbatim.
"I wasn't open to the idea at first, because I didn't want people staring at me in class," said Gadgil, a pre-engineering sophomore. "But you get over it. I find it very useful."
Any student that is deaf or hard of hearing can request a captioner, through Disability Resources for Students (DRS), to attend class with them and document lectures. Students sometimes have up to six or seven captioners throughout their college education.
"[Captioning] is a profession that most people aren't aware of," said Ramie Peckham, a captioner working with the UW since 1997. "Even the deaf and hard-of-hearing populations are not too familiar with this technology."
The captioning process is done by using a stenograph like those used in court reporting. Instead of a regular keyboard, a stenograph has 39 keys that consist of only a handful of letters from the alphabet, asterisk keys and number keys. Using short hand, letters are combined in specific patterns to create words.
The stenograph is hooked up to a laptop that displays real-time captions on the screen of what is being said in class.
The UW began to offer captioning services during the late '90s; none of the captioners are actual employees of the University but are hired independently.
"We hire freelance real-time captioners, and that's what we do across the board with sign language and captioning," said Jackie Matthews, interpreter coordinator for DRS. "When students need captioning or a sign language interpreter, the DRS sends the request to me."
Peckham attended the Court Reporting Institute -- which has locations in Seattle and Tacoma -- for two and a half years to learn specific skills, including how to use a stenograph. She later received a license from the state, which requires the ability to type at 225 words per minute with 95 percent accuracy.
In the fast-paced environment of a lecture class, it can be hard to catch the words of a professor who talks a mile a minute.
"At times I do have difficulty hearing the professor, but the majority of the time they are very accommodating," said Peckham. "The first day [of class] is a bit awkward because of unfamiliar terminology, and I'm not used to the professors' speech patterns."
After a day of class, the captioner sends a transcript of the lecture to the student for studying purposes. Gadgil said she sometimes receives up to 60 pages of notes for one day of classes.
But the lengthiness of transcripts doesn't stop her from recommending the service to others.
"People who have hearing impairment should definitely try captioning," said Gadgil. "It's more useful than sign language, because then you have the actual transcript for you later on, when you're doing your homework or whatever you need."
Sounds like a good idea to put it in use more frequently.