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Advance Titan Online
Public buildings in Oshkosh may soon be equipped with phones for the deaf and hearing-impaired.
Carrie Caldwell, the founder and president of the Deaf Culture Diversity organization at UW-Oshkosh, has been contacting local libraries, airports and hospitals to convince them to install public video phones for the deaf and hearing impaired.
The phones, called Video Relay Service systems, are cameras that are mounted on a television. They allow users to call both hearing and deaf people using an Internet connection. The caller is able to sign directly to another deaf person or to an interpreter who relays the information through a headset to the hearing person.
“(With them) we can speak in our own language,” Caldwell said.
Currently, the only public video phone in Oshkosh is at UW-Oshkosh’s Polk Library. Caldwell hopes to change this, as she says it is a very basic need, especially in the case of an emergency.
“When you think about being in a hospital, if something happens and you can’t call anybody, no one knows where you are,” Caldwell said. “No one can get to you.”
Caldwell has been making progress. So far, both Midway Airport and O’Hare Airport in Chicago plan to install VRS systems, and Mt. Sinai Hospital in Chicago installed them in January.
“I just got e-mail confirmation two weeks ago from O’Hare Airport that they will be setting up five,” Caldwell said. “I was really excited about that. I was literally dancing around the house.”
She has also contacted the Oshkosh Public Library about the idea. The library’s director, Jim Gilderson-Duwe, said that the library’s Public Services Improvement Team will be considering installing VRS systems.
“We are looking at the idea; however, we are under budget stress,” he said. “We laid off five people in January ... It is difficult for us to look at adding new services at this time.”
He also said that training the staff and finding facilities for a VRS system may be potential problems.
VRS systems cost about $199 each, but the Federal Communications Commission provides them free for families of deaf people. Also, if a business can show that it serves deaf or hearing-impaired people, it can get a free VRS system.
The VRS at Polk, a Sorenson VP-200, was installed at the end of this year’s fall semester at no cost to the university. John Palmer, the dean of disabled students at Oshkosh, said that the university was able to get the system free by “showing that it would be utilized by students who use interpreters.”
There are six deaf or hearing-impaired students at Oshkosh.
Caldwell said that while wheelchair ramps are mandatory in all public buildings, laws catering to the deaf or hearing-impaired are not at the level they should be. She said that deafness is the most discriminated against disability and that because it is not a visible disability, many people don’t think about it.
“It’s common sense. There are phones everywhere - you need to have phones for deaf people,” she said. “It seems like a no-brainer, but I want to get the education out there so that people are aware of it because it makes perfect sense.”
The main form of telecommunication that has been offered for deaf people for many years is teletypewriters, also known as TTYs. A TTY is a small keyboard with a long screen above it. Using a TTY is much like computer chatting, where one person types and then waits for the other person’s reply, except that it uses phone lines. Caldwell described TTYs as “dinosaurs” in technology and cited many benefits of the VRS system. The main one, she said, is the comfort of having a regular conversation.
“With the VRS, it’s more comfortable because they can speak simultaneously,” she said.
Caldwell said she hopes DCD can help raise funds for buildings that do not meet the FCC requirements for free VRS systems.
Although she estimated that there are fewer than 30 deaf families in Oshkosh, Caldwell said that number is enough to get video phones in public buildings.
“There is a need even if there is just one deaf person,” she said.
Public buildings in Oshkosh may soon be equipped with phones for the deaf and hearing-impaired.
Carrie Caldwell, the founder and president of the Deaf Culture Diversity organization at UW-Oshkosh, has been contacting local libraries, airports and hospitals to convince them to install public video phones for the deaf and hearing impaired.
The phones, called Video Relay Service systems, are cameras that are mounted on a television. They allow users to call both hearing and deaf people using an Internet connection. The caller is able to sign directly to another deaf person or to an interpreter who relays the information through a headset to the hearing person.
“(With them) we can speak in our own language,” Caldwell said.
Currently, the only public video phone in Oshkosh is at UW-Oshkosh’s Polk Library. Caldwell hopes to change this, as she says it is a very basic need, especially in the case of an emergency.
“When you think about being in a hospital, if something happens and you can’t call anybody, no one knows where you are,” Caldwell said. “No one can get to you.”
Caldwell has been making progress. So far, both Midway Airport and O’Hare Airport in Chicago plan to install VRS systems, and Mt. Sinai Hospital in Chicago installed them in January.
“I just got e-mail confirmation two weeks ago from O’Hare Airport that they will be setting up five,” Caldwell said. “I was really excited about that. I was literally dancing around the house.”
She has also contacted the Oshkosh Public Library about the idea. The library’s director, Jim Gilderson-Duwe, said that the library’s Public Services Improvement Team will be considering installing VRS systems.
“We are looking at the idea; however, we are under budget stress,” he said. “We laid off five people in January ... It is difficult for us to look at adding new services at this time.”
He also said that training the staff and finding facilities for a VRS system may be potential problems.
VRS systems cost about $199 each, but the Federal Communications Commission provides them free for families of deaf people. Also, if a business can show that it serves deaf or hearing-impaired people, it can get a free VRS system.
The VRS at Polk, a Sorenson VP-200, was installed at the end of this year’s fall semester at no cost to the university. John Palmer, the dean of disabled students at Oshkosh, said that the university was able to get the system free by “showing that it would be utilized by students who use interpreters.”
There are six deaf or hearing-impaired students at Oshkosh.
Caldwell said that while wheelchair ramps are mandatory in all public buildings, laws catering to the deaf or hearing-impaired are not at the level they should be. She said that deafness is the most discriminated against disability and that because it is not a visible disability, many people don’t think about it.
“It’s common sense. There are phones everywhere - you need to have phones for deaf people,” she said. “It seems like a no-brainer, but I want to get the education out there so that people are aware of it because it makes perfect sense.”
The main form of telecommunication that has been offered for deaf people for many years is teletypewriters, also known as TTYs. A TTY is a small keyboard with a long screen above it. Using a TTY is much like computer chatting, where one person types and then waits for the other person’s reply, except that it uses phone lines. Caldwell described TTYs as “dinosaurs” in technology and cited many benefits of the VRS system. The main one, she said, is the comfort of having a regular conversation.
“With the VRS, it’s more comfortable because they can speak simultaneously,” she said.
Caldwell said she hopes DCD can help raise funds for buildings that do not meet the FCC requirements for free VRS systems.
Although she estimated that there are fewer than 30 deaf families in Oshkosh, Caldwell said that number is enough to get video phones in public buildings.
“There is a need even if there is just one deaf person,” she said.