Educational Media Description Project

AFB was awarded a two-year subcontract in the fall of 2006 to develop guidelines for description of educational media materials as part of a U.S. Department of Education grant awarded to the Described and Captioned Media Program (DCMP) of the National Association of the Deaf (NAD). We will collaborate with service providers and experts in media description to develop a set of guidelines for educational media description that will increase the availability of predominantly visual curriculum to children and youths who are blind, have low vision, are deaf-blind, or have profound deafness and vision impairment. In the spring of 2008, the guidelines will be evaluated through video description intervention field trials throughout the U.S. for use with P-12 populations. Dr. Kay Ferrell, associate director, policy research, and Mary Ann Siller, project manager, professional development department are leading AFB's efforts.

Description is the verbal depiction of key visual elements in a television program, video, DVD, or other multimedia presentation. Inserted into natural pauses in the program's soundtrack, description provides information that otherwise would remain inaccessible to someone who is blind or visually impaired without the assistance of a sighted person. It is similar to captions in that both are important tools for equal access to educational media for people with disabilities. While captioning has enjoyed almost five decades of development and successful implementation, video or media description is still relatively new to the scene.

AFB has assembled an expert panel to help evaluate description strategies for educational material and to help establish the guidelines. To view brief biographies of the members of the panel, see Expert Panel for the Educational Media Description Project.

AFB Invites Input on Proposed Guidelines for Educational Media Description

AFB Invites Students Who Are Blind or Visually Impaired to View Video Clips

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