 Let's begin. So our last presentation of the day. So what I'm super excited about is Dr. Tina Childress. She's an audiologist advocate, late deaf and adult, bilateral cochlear implant user fluent in ASL and self proclaimed communication access engineer. She's also an award winning presenter, adjunct lecturer and mentor for children and adults, and is active on various local, state and national boards and committees, as well as social media. She's renowned for her knowledge on assistive technology and accessibility, and creating shared resources on her website, which is listed in your welcome programs. She has worked for several years to try various forms of accessibility equipment, provide feedback to venues, educate them about accommodations with the focus on assistive technologies and discuss effective ways to get this information to patrons. Dr. Childress has presented extensively on these topics and has also created resources for others to share and use. She's one of the most knowledgeable people I know, and we are so lucky to have her with us today. And we also have the wonderful branch leader with us today who will be interpreting for Dr. Childress. Thank you so much. So, um, okay, I know that there are not any people that need captioning. Are there any people that are blind, low vision, either in this room or online that would like a visual description or anything like that? Okay, or we'll need visual descriptions of the slides. I want to be mindful of that. Okay. And if you could also, if there's any other kind of accommodation or something that I can do that can make this presentation more accessible, just please let me know. So, I'd like to start with that just to make sure that I know. So, how many here are students? Acting, like acting majors. Theater, I'm sorry, theater majors. My kid who's a theater major at UIUC would probably be very bad that I said that. They just added musical theater to their to their program as well. Okay, and then do we have any faculty that's here? Any administrators of cultural species? Okay, Ish, what do you guys do over there? Okay, so in the element, like the public school system? Okay, so wonderful. So thank you. So, if anyone still needs to take a snapshot of this QR code, let me know. Otherwise, I'm going to go on to the next slide. Okay, so thank you very much to Ashna and to the Inclusive Theater Festival for asking me to present today. This is something near and dear to my heart and something that I experienced, you know, multiple times a year. Most recently last night, my kid was just in a show. They did the wild party. And my kid Madeline was Madeline True. And so they were amazing. And I'm proud to be a Thespian mom. At the same time, I also, I think I made some assumptions. So like when I was talking about being an advocate. When you're a theater mom and you have to juggle some things, I thought it was really interesting because I thought, okay, I asked for what I needed. And I assume they were going to do what I needed and I got there. And I didn't get what I needed. So lesson learned. So we'll talk about some of that today. So as Ashna mentioned, I don't have to go through this again. So I am very, very hearing passing. And I understand that that can be a privilege. When we talk about invisible disabilities, it's a good thing and a bad thing. Right. People hear my voice. And oftentimes with people that are deaf or hard of hearing, they equate the ability to speak with the ability to hear. And so just like people that use wheelchairs and sometimes, you know, they're not in their wheelchair and people are like, oh, you're faking it. I get the same thing because people are like, well, I hear you talk. I heard you like I saw you turn or I saw you have a conversation and you went looking at someone. And they're like, okay, what does that mean? Okay, we know with all disabilities, disabilities are a spectrum. And there are times when the disability is more impactful than other times like in this space, you know, it is pretty quiet. But if someone were to ask me a question, I would probably look straight at Braun to make sure that I had it accessible. Okay. I do want to mention two things before I forget. So when was it Terry Hudson that was just speaking. And we were talking about institutions in the area that can help people. You know, actors as well as patrons that are that have disabilities. How many people here have heard of the Chicago cultural access consortium. Okay. CCAC. Did you know it changed names? So it is now known as the cultural access collaboration or CAC. And whereas it used to be mostly just the Chicago area by switching names and taking out the Chicago part. We're talking about not just the state of Chicago, which is, you know, if you're from Chicago, that's what everyone thinks, you know, the Illinois is like the state of Chicago. I live in Champaign. I am on the steering committee and I'm kind of the only representative south of 80 that is part of the steering committee right now. We're hoping to expand, but the goal is to talk about resources that we have. We have YouTube videos on different, all different kinds of things that are on there. So that's a great resource. The second resource that I wanted to talk about is called the Kennedy Center Leadership Exchange in Arts and Disability Program. So it's the acronym for that is LEAD. So that is a conference that happens every year. Next year it's going to be in Seattle. Okay. And it is a fantastic and I might implant just that I knew it would. And so I'm going to look at you, Brian. And so it's a conference that happens every year and it talks about all different kinds of disabilities and it's not just theater, but it's also cultural spaces, museums, parks, gardens, outdoor spaces, all different kinds of disabilities. There are scholarships for students. There are, if you submit for doing a presentation, you can go for a reduced price for registration. It's fantastic. So I've gone for like the past five or six years. And I just wanted to make sure that you knew about those things. Because they also, if you join, they have a listserv also so you can ask questions about all different kinds of things. So those two resources, I wanted to get that out of the way before I went through. And so let's see what else. So Ashna mentioned the things that I love to do. I was actually an engineering major first at the U of I so I live in Champaign. I grew up in Skokie so I went to Nels. I went to Fairview. That was my elementary school and then I went to Nels last before U of I. And I just, I love technology and I love all of this. So that's my perspective. I grew up with normal hearing. I became deaf at age 30. And so, you know, when Terry was talking about, you know, people that hadn't acquired disability, that would be me. I feel like, you know, I've been doing this now for over 20 years. And so I feel comfortable in my skin, but there are so many people that still are learning how to be deaf or hard of hearing. Right. If you have a disability that's either acquired, or has changed and evolved and look like different things, you're going to realize that things have to change also like the way that you navigate different situations. Okay. So this is kind of the topics that I'd like to cover today. Just some different facts so that you know kind of who is the audience that you're talking about. We'll talk about some examples of communication needs and preferences. And then I'll tell you a little bit about some of the different accommodations that are out there. Because I think that people aren't always aware of things that are possible for people that are deaf or hard of hearing. And then hopefully I'll have some time for Q&A. So let's start out with facts. So when we think of a person that is deaf or hard of hearing. Would you look at me and say, oh, she's deaf or hard of hearing. Okay. If we looked at an older person. Would we think, oh, they might have some hearing loss. Right. You know, for kids, little kids, we're not always seeing that. And my point is when it comes to being deaf or hard of hearing, it can impact people of all ages. We do see more people that are older that have hearing loss, but definitely there are people that are younger that also have hearing loss. And if you've met one deaf person, you've met one deaf person. Okay. Just because one person has hearing aids or cochlear implants doesn't mean that they're going to function exactly like someone else that has hearing aids or cochlear implants. Okay. So to be aware of kind of what the community is saying about terminology, right, we want to be mindful and respectful. So it is okay to use the terminology deaf with a big D deaf. That's kind of that cultural kind of like name that we use for the community. There's little D deaf. Let me go back. So culturally D deaf, big D deaf would be people likely that use ASL or American Sign Language or Language. They culturally identify as being deaf. That's part of their identity. Okay. When we look at little D deaf, that might be someone that is more audiologically deaf, meaning they still kind of, they still associate more with kind of the hearing community, but they can't hear as well. Okay. People that are deafblind, hard of hearing, late deaf in. For an umbrella term, I know it's a mouthful, but I tend to say individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing. Okay. Just because you never know who's going to be in a mixed audience, I feel like that it does a decent job of kind of encompassing the whole thing. Sometimes people will talk about hearing status or hearing level. Some terms to avoid. So hearing impaired. For some people in the deaf community, when you use that term hearing impaired, it can be offensive. Okay. And so it's one of those. Well, I know my grandma says that she's hearing impaired. Right. And the other thing that we navigate as people with a disability is is that going to be people first or disability first. Okay. And it's a landline. You're never going to be right. There's no way to satisfy all of the people all of the time. But if you have a one on one conversation with someone. And that's something that's important to the topic. Ask them what they prefer. Okay, but know that probably the safest one would be individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing. Okay. So, but my point is there are many people, especially older people that still talk about themselves as being hearing impaired. And so what I do in that situation, rather than say, Oh, you're wrong. That's an offensive term. They'll be like, who are you? Right. I'll be like, Oh, okay. So, you know, in that situation, you were functioning more hard of hearing. Right. So I kind of modeled the language that I will use, but acknowledging the label maybe that they use, but I don't want to use it. Right. There's like some words that I know what's out there, but I that's not my place or my space to use that terminology. Okay. Very much older kind of labels deaf and dumb hearing challenge just kind of a youth of like a euphemism. Right. Just say you're deaf or hard of hearing doesn't have to be challenged hearing problem again negative connotation. So hearing loss, I used to be team individuals with hearing loss. And then my friends who were born deaf. They're like, Tina, I never had hearing to begin with. What did I lose? Okay. So again, that's why it's important to ask people kind of how they identify and be respectful. This is a very, very busy chart, but what I like about it is that it shows kind of as you get older after about age 50, you are seeing how more and more people have hearing loss. So why is this important? Think about your audience. Think about the people that you're going to be performing for. Okay, a lot of people that especially go to theater tend to be a little bit older. They have more disposable income, maybe then some young adults. So it's important to to think about that in terms of communication. Okay. So we're looking when we talk when we think about people that have hearing loss. The rough estimate is about like almost one in five people will have some kind of, you know, we'll either we'll be deaf or hard of hearing. So let's talk about, oh, let me back up. And so when we look at that up at the top, you're like, what does mild moderate mean. Okay, mild moderate are categories that we as audiologists use to describe hearing your hearing levels. So for example, if you take your fingers right now and plug up your ears, go ahead and plug up your ears. Okay, and I'm going to go ahead and keep talking. This is an example of a mild hearing loss. Okay, you can still hear me. Go ahead and keep your fingers in your ears. You can still hear me. But then now I'm going to cover my mouth. And you're going to have to work a little bit harder. Keep your fingers in your ear. I'm going to step back from the microphone. This is an example of a moderate hearing loss. You can take your fingers out. And the reason that I do that is so that you understand that most of the people that you're going to encounter, especially older people are going to have hearing levels in that area. Okay, how many of you have grandma's grandpa's older people that you deal with where you're like, we have to shout at them. Right. Or they say, Oh, I hear you but you're mumbling. Okay, it's because they're experiencing exactly what you experienced. You can hear, but you may not always understand. You add noise, you take away lip reading cues, and it's going to be harder. Okay, so most of the patrons that have hearing loss are going to have that level. People that use ASL are going to be fewer. And secondly, that's something that you want to accommodate. But I just really, because most people don't think of deaf people as looking like this and talking like this. You know, they think of either like Nile DeMarco or Marlee Matlin, or they think about grandma grandpa's. But that's not what it looks like. Some myths. So, if you were to ask a patron or anybody, actually, if they disclose that they have hearing loss, and you are talking about communication. And if you ask, can you read my lips? That's really a microaggression. Right, because who does the burden for communication then go to me, the person that has a disability. Okay, so that is something one, please don't ask that. And two, don't make the assumption that we all do because it's actually pretty hard to do lip reading. Like, if I were to just turn off my voice right now. So, you had a little bit of context, but what if I were saying something completely random, like, and what I just said is it's a beautiful day outside. Okay. And so it's not easy. Again, we all sign. I just talked about that. If you're deaf, you hear nothing. If you're hard of hearing, you hear well enough. Okay. And this is significant because when it comes to identity, I think there are some situations where people that consider themselves hard of hearing aren't quite sure where they fit in. Right. They're not exactly in the hearing community. They're not exactly in the deaf community. But people assume, oh, because they can speak so well that they can hear so well. When I travel, for example, like when I'm in an airport, people that follow me on social media know this, I don't use my voice because the minute they hear my voice, they think I can hear. How many of you are still using masks sometimes in certain situations? Okay. So, masks were very, very difficult for people that are deaf or hard of hearing. My personal belief was that in the grand scheme of things, I would rather be alive and you be alive rather than me struggling. We'll figure out a way. Okay. But there are some situations where people still need to wear masks and people assume that when you're working with a deaf or hard of hearing patron or interacting with the public, that the masks with the clear window are always the best. That's not actually the case. Okay. The reason why is if most of the people are hard of hearing, especially older people. The paper masks actually let more sound come through acoustically and it's easier for them to hear. Now, are there people that can benefit from masks with a clear window? Absolutely. My point, have both. Have both and ask the patron what they want or they need again instead of making that assumption. When you have that clear window, it actually prevents some of the sounds from getting through and makes it harder to hear. It makes it easier to lip read if you don't fog up, but not all people need that. So try asking instead of assuming. So ASL, so American Sign Language interpreters or ALDs, which stands for assistive listening devices, satisfy the spirit of the ADA. So why do I say that? Every institution that I've had to fight for access has offered me those two when that's not what I asked for. Okay. Can I use ASL interpreters on a cruise ship? Absolutely. But I didn't ask for ASL interpreters. Why? Because I was going with my best friend who's also deaf but doesn't sign and cannot benefit from an ALD. So I specifically asked for captioning. And so the point, and we'll talk about this. I think institutions don't realize that captioning is always is available. And there are technologies that can be used in different spaces. So my current soapbox is anywhere that you can request an ASL interpreter. You can request captioning. So that means theater. That means medical appointments. That means all different kinds of things. So anywhere you can ask for an ASL interpreter. You can also request captioning because there are a lot more people that are out there that can benefit from captioning. Because there aren't, you know, that meant there aren't as many signers. Okay. Patrons are familiar with assistive listening devices. How many of you have ever worked in the front office and had to dole out assistive listening devices? Okay. Do you know how they work? Do you know how to set the channel? Do you know how to troubleshoot? Do you know what a telecoil is? So, um, sorry, I didn't mean to put you on the spot and be all like, blah, blah, blah. But my point is, is when we talk about like training and we talk about these devices, if there's not a resource that says this is what this piece of equipment does, this is what you do when it's broken. What's the point? Okay. So that's from the staff perspective from my perspective as a consumer. I know as an audiologist that people don't know how to use ALDs either effectively. Okay. So we, you know, I think institutions make this assumption. Oh, we provide ALDs. People will know how to use them. They don't know how to use them. Okay. So we'll talk about that. So our goal is we want access to communication. We want to be nice and inviting and welcome. Okay. But it does start with figuring out what works for them. Okay, now I know it is impossible to satisfy all of the people all of the time. Okay. And depending on your, you know, your venue or all of that, you may be willing to just offer, you know, different kinds of accommodations for the whole audience. But what about those situations where a patron specifically asked for a specific accommodation? You know, how do you go about that? Or, you know, do you have a mechanism where you can actually ask people, do you need an or what ADA accommodations you need? Okay. So I'm going to, I'm a big fan of not using yes no questions. Okay. I think sometimes you have to do that on surveys and I get that. But I'm also a fan of open ended questions instead of do you need an ADA accommodation? How about what ADA accommodation do you need? And then let the patron let you know what works best for them. Okay. So let's talk about some communication options. So if you are with a patron that uses speaking and lip reading, face to face communication is always going to work best so that you have those lip reading cues. Try like right now when I'm doing blocking my mouth with this microphone or, you know, if I had this remote control and I was putting it by my face is not going to make it accessible. Turning away. So I think of teachers. Please, please don't write on the board and keep talking when you have deaf or hard of hearing students in your class. Okay. I do. It's hard sometimes for I need to remember to slow down to allow people to read the slide. You know, and if Bronwyn was actually interpreting for a deaf audience member being able to like split yourself between looking at the slide and looking at the interpreter is tough. Okay. So, you know, I love presenters that say, okay, I'm talking this read. Okay, now I'm going to make a comment. As a former hearing person, I really, there are times when I'm able to take notes where I don't have to watch an interpreter or read captioning if it's a good listening situation. And it just reminds me of that privilege and that advantage that hearing people have of being able to look down and take notes. Okay, now as a late deafened person, I take notes with my computer so I can still read. Okay, but it's hard. Um, don't exaggerate. I love my mom but she talks like a Filipino. Sometimes like, what do you want for dinner? Like, mom, don't talk like that. Okay, because it distorts your speech yelling actually also distorts speech and you know this is what happens with older people when you're talking to grandma grandpa and they don't understand you. There is an art to elevating your voice to make it louder without seeming angry. Okay, that person that's deaf or hard of hearing is already frustrated because it's difficult to communicate. You add that extra layer of emotion like you're mad at them. And it makes it worse. Okay, so you can raise your voice make it a little bit louder without seeming like you're shouting. If there's more than one person. I love my friends to understand my communication needs they'll kind of like raise their hand so that I know who's talking. You know, and talking one at a time so like Lord of the Flies I've got the conch is fantastic because there's only one person to librae. If you are communicating with someone that you know uses some gestures or maybe uses sign language. I contact is really important, especially if you're trying to start communication. Don't assume that if you start talking that they're going to be able to hear you. So I'm a big fan of like kind of getting in their visual space. I'm not a fan of tapping people, especially since COVID to personally, I you're lucky if I don't elbow you in the face if you tap me on the shoulder without me knowing. Okay, so, and I think people nowadays we're all just kind of a little bit more aware of keeping our personal space so, you know, get in their visual field. Okay. How many people here know ASL or know a little bit of sign language. Okay, so if you know a little bit, even if it's not that, you know, even if you're not fluent, when you show a deaf person that you know how to sign even a little bit. It shows that you tried to get a little bit into their world. You know, we don't expect everyone to be fluent in ASL, but showing that is a beginning to like building rapport. You know, and so when you think about like your your spaces, even if it's like a simple phrase, like thank you. Even if it's like nice to meet you. You know, something like that can go a long way. So I always appreciate it when I go somewhere like to a store and they know I'm deaf and they always end with thank you. I'm like, good job. Thank you. Okay, it'll put a smile on their face. Um, so if you work with people that are deaf blind. Um, it's a kind of another layer to communication. Either you have to be very close to that deaf person, or they're going to want to touch your hands. If you're signing for, you know, being able to understand what the signs are, we call that protective. Okay. And so there are, you know, different ways that you can communicate with people that are deaf blind, but you ask them. You know, some people need, they call it CV or close vision, just getting into their visual field. If they have some vision, signing instead of having a big box that you're going to sign in the signing mocks, maybe a little bit smaller and closer to your eyes. Okay. We talked about getting attention. So if you know that you're going to have a lot of deaf individuals, or you really want to focus on that part of your accessibility, Terry was talking about this, hire someone with that disability to give you feedback. Instead of someone without a disability again, making assumptions. And then for people that might be using writing notes back and forth or using texting. You know, try again. And if it doesn't work, then you might want to, you know, find pen and paper. How many of you have cell phones. How many of you have a speech to text app on your phone. Okay, so I'm going to show you the one that I use. I have an Android phone. So this one is called live transcribe, and it's native to and it's native to Android. So what I do when I'm with my friends that are deaf or hard of hearing. I tend. Oh, thank you. I will use this app is a scrolling number on. Okay, thank you. And I'll hold it underneath my chin, so that they can lip read me and read the captions at the same time. And okay, this is my test for every speech to text out. Supercalifragilistic expialidocious. How to do. Right. And so anyway, that's just like my fun little parlor trick, but I love this. I love this one is called Google live transcribe. Now, if you look on the screen, if you have Google live transcribe. Oh, if you have an Apple device. And there is something under your accessibility settings. You go to general settings. Accessibility hearing. And then it's called live captions beta. Okay. It's okay. I, I'm shocked that it took until October of 2022 for Apple to come out with a native speech to text out. On their device for being as accessible as they are other ones that friends of mine like to use our order AI. As well as NAL scribe. Okay, so all of this information is on the PDF of the the handouts that that you guys would have downloaded so you don't have to write everything down. Okay. Try to print instead of cursive. Um, you know, sometimes people say, Oh, we'll just write notes back and forth that'll be sufficient for access. Okay. Um, and they assume that it's like medical appointments. That's awful. What if the deaf person that the only way that they communicated was back and forth with writing, it would take a long time. Right. So figure out what works best. Um, when it comes to contacting your venue, when you only have a phone number. Now can deaf people call a phone number. Yes. You know, they can, there's different like services that we can use is that our preferred method of contacting hearing people. No. You know, think about a text number. Think about an email address. Think about a chat box on your website. Okay. Um, you know, sometimes I will call like a bank, and I will do it through an interpreter. And sometimes the, the, the service has to announce that, Oh, this is an interpreter by 432 for, you know, calling the bank and people hang up. Okay. And so, you know, you want, let me talk about training. You want to make sure that your front office staff does not hang up on calls like that. It's not a mobile call. It's not a solicitation. It's for access. Okay. So we have until four or 45. Okay. So let's talk about different kinds of accommodations that you can use in different venues and I did focus on theater and kind of cultural spaces outside. Okay. So, unfortunately, wouldn't it be great if there was a cookie cutter accessibility tool that accommodated all people. It would be fantastic. It's not the case. Okay. So again, like Terry was talking about involve people with disabilities in this conversation. Nothing about us without us. And like I was saying before, sometimes patrons don't know what they don't know. So while you guys are learning about accessibility, sometimes a patron is learning how to be deaf or hard of hearing as well. So we're going to start to include service animals. These are just some kind of general tips. Next, when we are talking about access, when we're talking about communication needs for people that are deaf or hard of hearing, it's all about effective communication. So again, effective communication for my friend on the cruise is not an interpreter is not an ALD their effective communication would have been captioning. And then the other question is, how do you communicate what you offer. You know, Terry was talking about it would be so great on your website. If you say, okay, this is the accessibility page. This is all of the stuff that we offer. That is really important. Scheduling this one. There's not a right or wrong answer to this. So do you only provide accommodations. When someone requests them. Or do you provide accommodations like on a schedule. Okay, so for example, I go to a lot of shows at Broadway and like the Broadway and Chicago theaters. They have a schedule of interpreter, you know, shows with ASL interpreters with open captionings, open captions or that are audio described. You know, sometimes my schedule will fit their schedule. Sometimes it doesn't. What I love about Broadway and Chicago is they're both. They're both scheduled so I know what to expect. But if it doesn't fit my schedule like for example next week I'm seeing Beetlejuice. Right. And their captioned performance is on Saturday. I said, hey, I can't make it on Saturday. Can we do it on Sunday. And they told me yes. Okay. Now, again, like Trey mentioned, you know, we have to prepare months ahead of time. I don't expect a venue to provide me something like that last minute. Okay, but if you could do both, I think that could go a really long way. In terms of budgeting, it's really, really important. If you have any say in budgeting, especially when it comes to accessibility, be proactive. Put it in your budget ahead of time to be proactive, as opposed to scrambling for funds when someone makes a request, and then you're more reactive. The worst that can happen is you don't use all of that money and you move it over as a line item for the following year. Okay. Think about reserving accessible seats. You know, when we're talking about people that are deaf or hard of hearing, if you're going to have a show with interpreters or captioning, you need to be able to make sure that we see it. Right. So, Broadway in Chicago, their philosophy is doing open captioning. So when I go to a show, probably the first 20 rows stage, or house right, are reserved for people that are using captioning or interpreters. Okay. And if, you know, seats aren't sold, then they sell it to the general public. If I go to Broadway, like in New York City, their philosophy, and it's only certain performances for open captioning. Now, if I were to go to Broadway, I have a handheld device, which means I can go to any performance, and I can sit anywhere in the house. Okay. And so that's another way there's two very different approaches. Personally, I really prefer the Chicago way. Okay. I don't like having to hold something for two and a half hours. That's not fun. Making sure that if you have a communication facility facilitator like an interpreter or a captioner, giving them content ahead of time so they know how to spell things they know what to expect. Having that list of facilitators. So if you contact CAC, the cultural access collab, they do have a list of providers kind of in the area. And if you are not like, let's say you land somewhere else, you know, seek out that umbrella organization. Or you can also contact your centers for independent living. They should also have a list of interpreters and captioners and things like that. Okay. Collaborating and forming the community. Again, you know, if you build it, hopefully they will come. But if the community does not know that you offer accessible performances. They're not going to come right because they don't want to pay for something that's inaccessible to them. So think about your outreach and how you can collaborate with them. I don't cast members know if you're using captioning. So I saw once on this island on Broadway with Leah Salonga I was you know I'm Filipino that was all about that right. So it was in the ground. And I had a handheld device. And I thought I was being so smart because I put it on my selfie stick and put it in between my legs and that way I didn't have to hold this thing for two and a half hours. But in the beginning of the show, the cast is coming out and they go like in the round and they introduce themselves to the audience. Well, one of the cast members saw my device and thought it was a camera. He looked at me and he did this. Like, get rid of that camera. So obviously, they didn't know that that was an accommodation that was available to patrons. Okay, so don't forget to inform them. All right. So what are some solutions that are out there. If you have someone that relies on visual support so in that respect, people that need interpreters or captioning versus people that need auditory support, meaning assistive listening devices. Okay, let's go back to visual support. When we're talking about sign language interpreters, they can either be on site, like what Bronwyn is doing right now. Or if we were all in a zoom call, they could have also been remote or, you know, we could have this hybrid thing and maybe the interpreter was remote. Okay. I love it when interpreters are actually part of the set design and part of the cast, either a deaf and hard of hearing actors or interpreters that are kind of part of that and I'll show you some pictures. Okay, so when we talk about captioning captioning also can happen on site. But you know, with the infrastructure with so many people being able to do zoom now, we are able to do remote captioning more easily and just so you know if you're one of those people trying to arrange for it. Remote captioning is less expensive than hiring on site captioning. And it's usually easier because then you have the whole pool of the US to be a captioner. Captioning can be closed, meaning it can be turned on or off. Or I like to think of it as like personal captioning, like the deaf or hard of hearing patron is pretty much the only one that can see it. Excuse me. Oh, I came back from Texas and I think I'm allergic to Texas. Anyway. You can also have open captioning, which is captioning that you cannot turn on or off, or basically everyone in the audience would be able to see it. Again, I have pictures of all of this. Now, when it comes to captioning, the captioning that we're using right now in zoom. Excuse me. Is known as ASR automatic speech recognition, right? So it's using artificial intelligence to kind of guesstimate what words that I'm using to generate speech. That's very different than captioning that is done by what's known as cart or communication access real time translation. And that's by a live person using a stenograph machine. Think of like court reporting. Okay, that's technically cart captioning. Okay. Now, um, ASR captioning is not perfect. I mean, Bronwyn and I were noticing even when I walked in and we were looking at the zoom captioning. It's not perfect. Okay. If you help someone that completely relies on captioning to access something and they've made that request. I would recommend that in some way a human is involved. Either they are captioning it live. Or if they download the script that they're also available to indicate, you know, like to advance the slide so that the captioning is in sync. But there needs to be a human involved in that. Again, captioning involved in the stage assigned to be great. So last night, my kid show was in the theater where they do operas. So they had the proscenium. At the top and they were able to project the captions to the top. Okay, which is great. So when we think about assistive listening devices, you need to think of, do you want something that is only for an individual? Like each individual has their own receiver. Or do you want to do a whole room kind of thing? We'll talk about what we call remote microphone systems. This would be considered remote microphone. Because this is this far away. If I had a lapel mic and I walked around the room, my voice would be steady because my voice doesn't change from this location. Okay. We'll talk about indoor and outdoor use as well. So I love this video. So this is an example of making the assumption that people that are deaf or hard of hearing should sit front and center to a stage. Okay. I'm going to run this kind of animation here. So the bottom one was showing. Sorry, I'm supposed to run on a loop. So the bottom one is showing the interpreter here on the left. And the assumption that, oh, if you put the tougher part of hearing people here, that's a perfect place. Well, they have to keep switching their focus to the interpreter. And to the stage. Whereas if you strategically place a person so that the interpreter is in line with what's happening on the stage, they only have to look one way. Okay. So here are some images. So the yellow dot indicates who the communication facilitator is. So you could have on site. So this was the one on the left was actually in Amsterdam. Oops. So what I love about this captioning can be what we call walking captioning. And so that captioner has the center graph machine actually on a harness, and was sending the signal to my phone so we could walk around this. It was this garden about, okay, it's been golf. I will always say Van Gogh. They're like, no, it's Van Gogh. So I could read the captions because the captioner was following. But that's an example of on site the interpreters on the right. So video remote interpreter. Again, what happened online on stage interpreting the top corner or the top left hand corner they're actually integrated into the cast. The bottom left hand picture they're on stage but they're towards the front and usually to the side. Right top would be, you know, interpreters are standing on the floor and the patron is looking up as well as the one on the bottom just showing you that you can have captioning and interpreters happening at the same time. So it depends on what the patron needs. If I'm going to captioning I'm kind of a stickler for these terms subtitles are if you don't understand the language. And you're trying like, I like K drama right now. I'm what what am I watching the extraordinary attorney who awesome show. And anyway, I don't understand Korean, but I read the sub titles. Okay, captions are if you cannot hear what the spoken languages. So it goes to text captions also often will indicate what environmental sounds are subtitles don't often do that. And I should mention that when I saw my kids show last night. All they provided was, you could tell they had just basically downloaded the script, but they didn't caption the announcements for five minutes at the beginning of the show. I'm not even going to call I'm going to call them craptions. Is that really bad. They were kind of craptions. The craptions didn't indicate who was speaking. So I saw these. I saw the lines. But I'm like, okay, whose mouth is moving. You know, like, I couldn't tell if it was male or female there was all the singing and lots of things were happening. But I didn't know what was happening, because I didn't indicate who the speaker was. And sometimes when there were duets and good, great captioners will actually split the screen, and you'll see them run simultaneously because that's what hearing people here. I should I get that I would have to read two lines at the same time but that would be access, not this this this this and I don't know what the overlay is. Okay. You can have on site captioning like I showed remote captioning. If there's a green check mark on there that to me is kind of like best practices, or the preferred method. It's always better to have something, you know, in person, they can use their eyes and their ears and their contacts and ask questions and all of that. You can't always do that remote with remote kind of systems. So, top left is second city. And so they set up monitors. You know, and it was just for our group which was great. The bottom pictures on the bottom left are the different devices that they have on Broadway. You can either have it on an app on your phone, or there's a special device. Right are, let's see, Broadway in Chicago, Hades town. I'm not sure what that bottom right picture is the one with the big arch. But you can see how the captions are part of the stage design. The bottom one is just I was at Mount Rushmore. And there was captions on all of the museum displays, which is great. We talked about captioning. And we've also talked about ASR. My suggestion. Ask the patron what they prefer. And there's a concept called Gigo. Does anybody know what Gigo is G I G L garbage in garbage. Okay. And your captioning is only going to be as good as the signal. So think about using a microphone. I actually have a Bluetooth microphone that I brought with me if I needed to connect to your computer to make the captioning better. Okay. It's very, very tempting to only want to use ASR captioning because oftentimes it's free. But it's not always effective. Okay, so think about that. When we talk about ALD, sorry, I'm dropping a lot of knowledge here. ALD is, you know, it's best if you have someone install it for you, you know, find a good AV company to do that. You know, there are legal obligations that you have to follow in terms of the number of devices that you need to have. You know, the professional to kind of look at your space and say, okay, I would recommend this system over that system. So on the screen are just some examples of different systems that are out there. We see infrared a lot in theaters because theaters are typically dark and infrared works really well in that kind of environment. There are some people in the deaf and hard of hearing community pushing hard for hearing loops because does anybody here work in a venue with hearing loops? Okay. So hearing loops are great when they work and when patrons know how to use it. What a hearing loop is, it's actually a physical piece of wire that goes around the perimeter of the theater, either a section or the whole theater. Me as a person with that's deaf or hard of hearing sits physically within that loop of wire. I have to switch to a specific program on my device, but not all people know how to do that or know if they even have it. The idea is anything that's might will then go directly to my ears. I don't have to carry anything. I don't need to get a receiver, anything like that, but I find it problematic and it's hard to install them and they're expensive. You can have individual things that are like FM or Wi-Fi, large area ones. So this bottom middle, the personal amplifier, you can get these on Amazon. I've seen tour guides use this. They have a microphone and it just makes it's just a little speaker. Okay. Has anyone here ever heard of Oracast? So Oracast is kind of the next generation Bluetooth protocol. That's going to be very exciting for theater venues. This is what I presented about at the lead conference. And so with Bluetooth or with Oracast, basically what can happen is anybody that has earbuds or hearing aids or cochlear implants with this new Bluetooth chip. And if there is a transmitter, they can get the signal. Okay. And they can use their own device. Their phone would act as an intermediary to tell you, oh, this is the signal that I want to pick up. This can be used for auditoriums for multiple, multiple people. It's unlimited and how many people it can reach. Now, the problem with Oracast is it does not happen overnight. The forecast is anywhere the next five to 10 years as people start making products. But for theater spaces, it's really exciting. And it's not that expensive. Okay. And it can be used in many different ways. Audio description. There's multiple channels. The possibilities, there's a lot. Okay. This is my last slide, I think. So training your staff is really, really important. So, you know, think about having some kind of a consultant come in to do that if you want to focus on a specific disability. You know, asking the patron, what can I do to make this easier or better kind of experience. What I would say is really consider asking for feedback from the community, either in terms of an online survey or a paper survey or something like that to see what worked and what didn't work. So, this is also at the end of my presentation contact information. And I think I have a few minutes for questions. So, I know that was a lot of information. Thank you for letting me drop that knowledge and I'll be like, see you by. Okay. And we do have one question right here. Is it okay if I put the light on since it's getting a little dark. Yes. Hey, Lee, nice to meet you. Hey, Lee. So I am a student here. One of my minors is communication science and disorders. So they offer that here. I think Matthew, do you do that? Yes. Yes, we both do that. And I've taken like ASL courses through Norse, but it's like once a week you have to pay it's like very small kind of outsourced so I'm just wondering like what are some good techniques of like learning ASL becoming more fluid, especially because lots of colleges nowadays offer so many like foreign languages except for ASL I feel like people should be learning ASL more and especially coming from a hearing person. Like how can I learn ASL and like communicate more with people. Great question. Substitute ASL for any other kind of spoken language and think about what would you do for that. The last way to learn another language is to immerse yourself and that other language. So while there are apps and there are websites, find out what deaf events are happening in the area and just be part of that. There are different deaf groups that are here in the Chicago area. NAD, the National Association of the deaf. There's different chapters all across the US and within different states. There's a deaf center, SWABOTA, SWO, B-O-D-A, and that's on. Okay, so Northwest of Chicago a little bit. Um, but also, you know, there might be a ASL club here on campus at Northwestern. See if you can be part of that, but my suggestion, you know, it's great to use those apps and sometimes the on the websites, but it's typically vocabulary. Right. And it'll help you with things like expressive, like being able to do the sign. Communication is a two-way street and you need to receptively understand to. Right. Like, I can speak a lot of Spanish, but the minute they reply back to me, I'm like, okay, I'm busted. You know, that's not going to help me. So, um, Emerson, I think it was, it's going to go the longest. You're welcome. And then going off of that, you mentioned with the terminology like B versus little D. Is it possible for someone who has like no hearing issues like an individual myself to become part of the big D community? Like, does that make sense? Yes. Um, we have allies, right? Just like the LD, LGBTQIA plus community has allies within the disability community that are also allies. Like, I would consider someone like one who has normal hearing to be part of the deaf community. Right. You know, if you're going to consider, well, I am part of the deaf community, but like, for people that have that heart, you know, that want to be part of that, you can be part of that. Um, I also call myself an immigrant because I'm late deafened because I was in the hearing community first and then now I find myself in this new kind of world. Right. So, are you going to go into speech or audiology? Neither. Actually, I'm going into school psychology and I've worked with lots of kids who use the packs or other systems. I've actually encountered more kids who should be using the systems, but their parents don't want them to. So that's a little challenge I'm trying to face and self, but the more classes I take, like the more interesting it is because right now I'm taking an audiology specific class and very interesting. But at this point, not something I can go into a career with. Awesome. If you ever have questions, you have my contact information. All right. Any other anything from the peanut gallery online. I think we're good over there. Yes. Okay, thank you. Um, any other last questions for Dr. Children's. Your eyeballs must be heavy after all day. No, it was amazing. It was so cool to hear. I'm going to go to say hi real quick. Thanks for your presentation. I just stepped down from CAC had been on for three years and delighted that you shared information about them. I wanted to ask you a double question. You, um, and trying to learn sign myself, I find that with dyslexia. And I'm flipping around. I am totally, I'm totally getting confused sometimes. And like the output you're talking to, I can output. But understanding takes me about five times as long. Any suggestions. I mean, I've been working in a mirror and also working with deaf people. How what, how might we address that? I don't know if it's just me or. I think you just have to practice. You just have to retrain your brain and start those synapses going to understand that signal. That's coming in and, and try not to focus so much on the reflection part of it. It's just what you see is what you see. So like if I'm signing right now, you're not going to be seeing this, you're going to be seeing what you see. And it's like, again, like a spoken language. If I took you right now, and I'm going to assume you don't understand Mandarin Chinese. If I took you and put you in the middle of China, you're going to hear lots of things, but you're not going to understand anything. Right. And until someone shows you, oh, that's the word for Apple. This is what Apple tastes like. This is how it sounds. The next time that you hear that word. Oh, it's going to make sense. And that's how it is with ASL also it's just a visual way of processing language as opposed to auditory. But I, if you're, you know, with dyslexia that can make things more complicated for sure. And I think it just it'll take practice. I think it will get confusing if you try to use mirrors and stuff because you're not going to have that available all the time. Okay. And the second part. Thank you. In terms of placing captions, you talked about the dialogue being on two screens left and right. Did I understand that correctly in terms of dialogue back and forth. Yeah. Thank you, Paul. If there's a duet. Or if you have people overlapping, good captioners will know how to split their screens so that you see both lines of dialogue at the same time. As opposed to putting them right next to each other, which is not effective. Thank you. You're welcome. Does anybody else have questions. I know this wasn't like the majority of your presentation, but you mentioned healthcare a couple times and that's like the field I'm looking to go into so that really piqued my interest. Because I hadn't thought about like captioning or interpretation and healthcare setting but of course there should be I just kind of wanted to like get a little bit more of your experience in that like I know you showed so many different pictures of different options and talked about sort of like what a theater front of house might want to have and I guess it does that like all sort of just apply the same thing to like what a doctor's office or a hospital should have. So, next summer also, there's a conference called the Association of medical professionals with hearing loss happening here in Chicago. So it's like the third week in June. Okay. So, contact me. I've done that presentation about healthcare because telehealth is a big issue because so many telehealth platforms are not accessible. So, we can talk about that. Perfect. Thank you. Okay. I can just end us off with one final question I have for you if nobody else any others. I was proposing to a lot of our presenters but I do want to connect this back to the student theater community at Northwestern, and how we can advance our efforts and making our shows more accessible. We usually have very minimal budgets and not a lot of resources. And I was wondering what are like what are the first steps we can take to make them more accessible to the deaf community. So, I know that cultural institutions, they're often broke. I would use resources like CAC to see if there are any grants available. I mean, think about, you just have to think outside the box, think about sponsorships. You know, what if there's like a benefactor, they have a deaf or hard of hearing person in their family. They may be willing to, you know, fund accessibility or accommodations going forward. Again, when we use like the free stuff, sometimes you get what you pay for. And so we have to be careful about that because then it becomes almost performative and it's not really access. So, there's no easy answer to that, but those are just some ideas. Finding sponsors are looking for grants right now. Yeah, or just being really vocal with the, you know, the university and saying, hey, we need this. If we, if we are talking about inclusion, we need to have this available. Absolutely. Thank you so much, Dr. Schilders. We really appreciate having you here today. Yeah, thank you so much everyone for being here. Thank you everybody. That's our last presentation for the day. And we will be reconvening tomorrow at 1015 am on zoom for tomorrow's day with four more amazing presenters. But that is the end of the day for today. Thank you so much all for being here and of course we are welcome packet has all of the information of our presenters. Please feel free to reach out to me the seesaw team or any of our presenters for any information you might need. Thank you so much. Have a lovely evening. Thank you so much.