ATU718 – ATIA Follow Up Show with INDATA, ATLAS and Clinical Staff Part 2

Welcome to part two of our ATIA follow-up show. I’m Josh Anderson, and this is your Assistive Technology Update. Hello, and welcome to your Assistive Technology Update, a weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist individuals with disabilities and special needs. I’m your host, Josh Anderson with the Indata Project Easterseals Crossroads. Welcome to episode 718 of Assistive Technology Update. It is scheduled to be released on February 28th, 2025. Listeners, our next guest needs no introduction. She’s been on the show many times over the years. This is Nikol Prieto. Welcome to the show, Nikol.

Thanks for having me.

Yeah. Can you tell our listeners just what you do around here or what your title is, I guess?

Of course. I am the Community Outreach Coordinator for the Indata Project at Easterseals Crossroads.

Awesome.

We love long titles around here.

We do. We don’t give raises, we give words. That’s how we keep it going around here. Well, Nikol, this was certainly not your first ATIA. So, I guess what I’ve been asking folks that have been there before is this is the second year at the new location, and what are your thoughts?

The new location’s great. We are at the world’s largest Marriott. It’s a beautiful location. I was a little more adept at finding my room this time because it is confusing, but it’s a lovely place to be, even though we don’t get a lot of downtime. Just walking out in the beautiful 72 degree air to get to the conference and being able to have dinner outside with everyone is just wonderful.

Yeah, no, it really is. Well, I’ve been asking a whole lot of folks what their favorite session was, and listeners, just so you know, Nikol actually doesn’t go to the session. She goes into the vendor hall. She’s getting information. She’s doing outreach, education, getting all kinds of stuff from folks. So, as you were there and touring around the vendor hall and everything else, Nikol, what were some of your favorite pieces of tech that you saw or people that you got to meet?

So I would say that is usually my job is that’s all I do the entire time. So, the vendor hall is open for three days. So, it’s a really significant opportunity for us to obtain all that knowledge and then come back and share all the valuable insights that we have and pass that along to people using our services or listening to our podcasts or watching our tech tip. So, I had the opportunity to see and I’ve been going for years, but something I’d never seen was… There was lots and lots of impressive assistive technology device, but one that stood out to me was the Tactonom, it’s tactile, T-A-C-T-O-N-O-M. I’m probably butchering, but the Tactonom Reader.

It is a device that enables individuals who are blind to access graphs, graphics that they have through a combination of touch and speech explanations. So, it’s a really cool device. It looks like if your listeners are familiar to a scan and read system. So, it’s foldable and it will open up and it’ll have an arm with a camera on the top and then a flat tray. So, again, that’s foldable. So, then you take a printing graphic that includes a QR code in the corner and then you put that on there. The camera scans that QR code and it uploads the information of what’s on the graphic. So, it’s going to provide a description of that graphic to the user. What they demonstrated to me was a map of the United States.

So, the user can take their finger over the map, and when they land on the state, they can then press a speech button and hear the name of the state along with other details if they want those additional details. It also allows you to go in the menu and select a specific state. So, you can choose Indiana, and then you would trace your fingers along the map. It’s going to give you guided commands. It’ll use a clock like go 6:00, go 3:00, 9:00, and then it’ll also give you beeping sounds. That will increase in the speed as you get closer to it. Once you get to the state, it’ll say you’re in Indiana. So, that’s really cool. They have lots of different graphics that they have there. I think they told me 2,200 downloadable graphics that are free.

They work for a non-profit that’s printing those. You can upload your own graphics. You can modify existing graphics. They can do 3D models. They had a cathedral. It was really cool. When you touch different areas of the cathedral, it would tell you where you were touching. If you touch the bell tower, it would say bell tower and the bells would start to ring. So, that was pretty cool. Then they also do a lot of cool stuff with math graphs, which was really interesting to watch. Each line on the graph will have a different sound, so you can distinguish the different lines. So, just being able to teach students who are blind different math graphics.

Awesome. As far as the trip as a whole, Nikol, what was your favorite part of the whole trip?

Gosh, always seeing the new technology is fantastic and be able to get so much content in just a short amount of time and then also connecting with our team. We are all busy and everyone’s out and about serving our community and serving the entire state of Indiana. So, in the evening, we’d be able to debrief and we would be able to have dinner together and just connect with each other and also get what other people have learned. Everyone else is in training sessions and we’re all in different training sessions, so it’s just so nice to connect with our team. We’re a very close knit team. It’s just wonderful to be able to share that experience together, but also bring all the information back from all the different experiences everybody else is having.

Yeah, I have to agree there. It’s amazing how close knit our team is for almost never getting to see each other it seems like. So, it is nice to actually be able to have that time. Nikol, I know it’s a great time. It’s an amazing thing. If you have, are there any suggestions you’d have for improvement or something that can make the experience even better?

I think just with the vendors, I always want to see more variety. Lots and lots of variety. So, I think just the more variety of vendors that can be there, the better. I think for me personally, I love coffee stations around.

Oh, my gosh. Wouldn’t that be amazing? Yes.

Yes. I know. I say it all the time, but I am carrying a tripod and carrying a tripod around and I’m on my feet on the hard floor all day long. So, just to have my go-go juice readily available in the conference room, I think that would be a top of my wish list.

I think just about anybody would take that, because I must admit, even though it’s not being at work, I guess, and it’s over a Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, I’m exhausted by the time it’s over. So, yeah, a little bit of coffee in the middle of the day because I will say that line at Starbucks during breaks gets long there at the place. Yes, the coffee stations would be a great one. Well, Nikol, thank you so much for all you do for us, for all the videos, the tech tips you get there, for helping set up the podcast, for going to ATIA, and especially for coming on the show today and telling us all about it.

Well, thank you for all the wonderful things that you do. You are our wonderful leader and we are so tight knit. You’re just a wonderful host of this program, and so it’s an honor to be able to bring you some good guests that you can enjoy and get out to the folks.

I appreciate that, but we’re still giving you more words and no more money. I’m just kidding.

I try. I tried.

It was a good try. It was a good try. Thanks, Nikol.

Thank you.

Listeners, our next guest is Belva Smith. Belva, can you tell our listeners what it is that you do here at Easterseals Crossroads?

Sure. Thanks. I’m Belva Smith. I’m the CATIS, and I’m our sensory in the clinical side of our services here at Easterseals Crossroads.

Belva, you have been to ATIA before, but I believe this was your first time at the new venue. What were your initial or first thoughts about the new place?

So yeah, this was not my first time at ATIA, but definitely my first time at the new facility. It was amazing. I would have to say hats off to Orlando’s World Center Marriott because they did an amazing job hosting this and helping people get where they needed to be on time with the directions and stuff. So, I was very impressed and really appreciated the facility as well as the services that they gave us.

Nice. Yeah, I really, really loved it too. As you were there, did you have a favorite session you attended?

Well, yeah, it’s been a long-time favorite of mine. Each and every time that I think I’ve attended, one of the last sessions that I go to is what they call the App Smackdown. I love that session because it’s a room full of people who do what I do, and all they do is share their favorite apps and why they’re their favorite apps. Then the best part about that is it’s an ongoing spreadsheet that gets shared with everyone who attends. So, yup, that’s always been my favorite and still is.

Well, it’s great, you come home with so many different resources. So, that is absolutely awesome. Was there a favorite piece of tech that you saw wandering around the vendor hall?

Yeah, and I knew you were going to ask me that question and I was all prepared for it. Irie, I believe?

Yes.

Is it Irie or Irie? Okay, Irie. They have a B-book notetaker, which is a Braille notetaker, but it happens to be running Windows as the operating system. I absolutely was enamored by that device because I love that it has Windows and it can have JAWS or NVDA for the screen reader. So, it virtually is an all-in-one note-taking device for individuals that are blind and do use Braille. The individual that would get that and really benefit from it would have to be someone using Braille.

Very, very cool. What was the best part of the trip for you, Belva?

Well, I think one of the best parts about ATIA is that sometimes people who do what we do, we tend to get so busy and wrapped up in what we’re doing that we forget that there’s a world of people out there doing what we do and we feel like we’re alone sometimes. When you go ATIA, you realize that we’re not. There’s lots of us, and we all work very hard to make sure that we’re doing the best that we can. When you get, I don’t know how many people, I’m just going to say 5,000 of us together.

Something like that. It looks like it. Yeah.

Yeah, it feels like it. Yeah, it absolutely feels like it, but we’re just reminded that there’s a large number of us that do what we do and love what we do. So, I think that for me, on top of just seeing all the newest technology and meeting, I think it’s a great time for developing relationships with the vendors, the product people, as well as the service people. So, I think that is priceless. That’s what I always call it, it is priceless.

Yeah, no, it definitely is. If you could make any suggestions or anything like that for improvements for ATIA, what could have made the experience even better?

Well, I’m glad that you’re asking me that question, Josh, and I hope that someone from Apple might be listening because I was a little disappointed in the sessions that I attended or tried to attend for Apple because it was like an open session. For me, it was very overwhelming and I felt a little panicky in there because I didn’t feel like I could pull the information that I needed to. It was just too congested. I know that Apple has a lot of good tools and information to share. So, I don’t know if it was just the sessions that I made it to, but I would just hope that they would maybe do a little bit different of a format for upcoming ATIAs.

Awesome. I think that’s a great suggestion. Well, Belva, thank you so much for going, for attending, and then for coming on and telling us all about your experience. Thanks again.

All right. Thank you, Josh.

Listeners, our next guest is Justin. Justin, can you introduce yourselves to our listeners?

Yeah, my name is Justin Amber. I’m an assistive technology technician here with our Clinical Team at Easterseals.

This was definitely not your first ATIA. In full disclosure, Justin paid for himself to go this year. We had folks that went and Justin did, but he definitely wanted to go. This is the second year at the new venue. Just what are your thoughts about the new venue?

It’s really big. That’s probably the most noteworthy thing, but along with that, I think the workers are just a lot more helpful in finding things, and if you need to find a particular session, they’re there for you. So, I really do enjoy it a lot. There’s a lot more food choices and amenities. So, if you need to take a break from something, you can find whatever you need there.

Yeah, yeah, I definitely, definitely have to agree. Did you have a favorite session that you attended while you were there?

Yeah, I went to one for policies on AI, basically these people who had done research on AI. It was a discussion over what they’re doing with policies, and I think it’s an important topic to discuss surrounding the safeguard of the people that we serve, because a lot of that stuff, it can take a lot of your information. So, we just want to make sure that people are safe and doing what they’re doing. I’ve worked with a lot of people recently, so I found it very interesting.

Very cool. Very, very cool. Yeah, definitely cutting edge and something that I’m sure there’ll be a lot of changes in as we go back these next few years. What was maybe the coolest piece of tech or even person that you met while you’re hanging around the vendor hall?

So Irie-AT has a bunch of new magnification devices, Braille devices. One of them is a CCTV that is super lightweight. You can change the orientation of the screen from landscape to portrait.

Oh, nice.

You can also hook up an Android phone, like the way you do with Apple CarPlay, but it’s only Android phones right now. But it basically blows up the screen of your Android phone and you can click on the screen of the CCTV and use it as your phone. So, you can make calls, you can surf the internet, you can text people, you can magnify the texts and do text-to-speech. So, it’s a very, very cool thing that’s coming out here in March.

Very, very cool. What was your favorite part of the trip?

My favorite part about going to these things, this is my sixth time going, I looked, but is connecting with coworkers. We’re on the road a lot. We don’t always see each other. So, it’s just a different way of being able to talk to each other and come up with ideas and just discuss things that we’ve got going on, really enjoy that.

Yeah, it is really nice to be able to do it away from work because in the few minutes we ever get to see each other around the office, it’s always fast and furious to try to say everything we possibly can. So, that does make it nice. Would you have any suggestions for improvements or something that could have made the experience even better?

I’d really like some of the big tech places like Apple and Google to have bigger rooms. They were put in small rooms this year and they had different tables that you could walk around in these rooms and they had maybe 50 or 60 people in there. It was just very loud and very hard to understand what was going on. So, it was just a little overwhelming, but you could still get stuff out of it. But I think if they’re going to have or invite some of those bigger tech companies that they need to have a bigger room because they’re very, very popular.

Yes, they are. Everybody always wants to go to those. If you can use the built-ins, even better. It just always definitely helps. Well, Justin, thank you so much for going to ATIA, for what you do here, and for coming on the show.

Yeah, thank you.

Listeners, our next guest is Keri Bridges. Keri, welcome to the show.

Hi.

So before we get started, can you just let our listeners know who you are and what you do?

Sure. So, like you said, I’m Keri Bridges. I’m the program manager for the Atlas Project at Easterseals. So, we provide a lending library of assistive technology and other services and training for K-12 schools in the State of Indiana.

We are so happy to have you now. This was your very first time going to ATIA, so I guess let’s just start with what were your initial thoughts or first impressions of it?

Sure. So, this was my first time going. I was really excited to see everything that was there. It’s definitely bigger than you will even think to begin how big it is. It’s huge. So, the vendor hall or exhibit hall was huge as well. So, that was overwhelming trying to visit everyone there and get a chance to see all the new items and devices that they had on display, but it was also great because they had such a huge, almost too many options of sessions to learn about while you were there.

Yeah, it definitely was. Did you have a favorite session that you attended?

I had a couple. One was about a program similar to our Atlas Project out on the northwest coast. I think they do more of an area versus state, and they had a similar program to what we are doing. It was really cool to listen, to hear about different tools that they use, how they lend items out, little things like they’ve created guides for comparing items. So, when a school borrows something, they can have a really easy way to be like, “This is what this does and this other item compares this way.” Also just some different types of things that they do when they are borrowing items out.

So, providing data tracking so it’s easier for schools to be able to prove, “Hey, this device was great for this student, we really ought to get it.” So just some different things like that. Then there was another session about blind or low vision that was really just a resource sharing and it was people in the room and online. It was an online session as well, just sharing all these resources, most of them free or very low cost that would be helpful for those who are blind or have low vision.

Awesome. I always think that that information sharing is just one of the best things you can get from there.

Yeah, I was like, “You can’t write fast enough.”

I know. It gets like that or I love it. You mentioned the first session you talked about when you get to learn about other programs and what they did. It makes it so much easier to be like, “Oh, that’s the way we’re going,” or “Wow, I never thought about that. I can really, really implement that.”

Exactly. One that makes you feel like you’re on the right path and the other’s like, “Ooh, we could add that and make it even better.”

Yeah, most definitely. Now, you talked about the vendor hall. Did you have a coolest piece of tech you saw there, maybe person you got to meet while in there?

Actually, I guess I saw the Tobii Dynavox booth, which was humongous as per expected. But while I was familiar with eye gaze devices, I hadn’t really been up close and personal with their new one or exactly how easy is it to use or how complicated is it to use. So, one of their staff members just happened to come up to myself and Rain while we were there and she’s like, “Do you want to use it?” I was like, “Okay.” So it took literally 30 seconds to set it up to be for my eye gaze and then you could use it. It was insane how easy it was. I was just shocked because you in the back of your head know what the eye gaze devices are, what they do, how they’re supposed to be easy.

But I mean in the literal two minutes we were there, she was able to calibrate it to me, have me be able to use it, and then my eyes were moving too fast for me. So, she’s like, “Oh, I can slow it down.” So it was just amazing to see for me how simple it was, and I was like, “Oh, my gosh.” I was like, “This is so great. Now I know why everybody wants these.” So it was really cool to see.

Awesome. Yeah, and I love how far those have come. So, Keri, what would you say was the best part of the trip for you?

I really just think getting to connect with people who do similar jobs or obviously in similar settings, but also just getting to see all these different devices and different things that we can just utilize in the Atlas Project. So, it’s hard sometimes to look online or look in a catalog and really understand what do they do? How do they work? Is this going to be beneficial? So it was great to see that. I was at another booth just asking about a specific product, and the person I was talking to mentioned something. I was like, “Wait, what is this?”

It was something that wasn’t on my radar, but I had seen online for a go talk and just seeing it there, I was like, “Oh, my gosh. This is so great. This would be great. I could see where this would be so beneficial with students.” We came back and we purchased that item. So, it was just great to see things that we wouldn’t have otherwise either known about or seen their value. So, I love that.

Awesome. If you could make any suggestions for improvement or is there something that could have made the experience better?

I think for me, I think it was just trying to choose which sessions I wanted to go to. It was hard. So, sometimes I felt like unprepared or I was trying to choose between, but there’s so many sessions. It’s hard to read through all of them. A lot of them are set up just by their title and what they are, so it’s hard to pick and choose just based on the title. So, for me, I think maybe a little more research on the sessions because some that I didn’t think I would be as engaged in I thought were absolutely great. Then some, I was like, “Well, this isn’t actually what I thought it would be, so I could have maybe visited another session.”

Awesome.

Other than that, it was really great. I loved it. It was a good experience.

Good. Well, we look forward to having you back next year, and I’m glad you got to bring all those great things back to your team and the library and everything else. So, thank you so much for what you do, and thank you so much for coming on the show to tell us about your experience.

Yeah, of course. Thank you for having me.

Listeners, our very last guest is Lisa Becker. Lisa, can you introduce yourself to our listeners?

Sure. My name’s Lisa Becker. I’m the assistive technology trainer on our Mobility and Cognition Clinical Team, and I’m on the Advisory Board for Indiana AgrAbility.

This was not your first time at ATIA, but it was your first time at the new location. Did you have some first impressions or initial thoughts of the new place?

Exactly. I was really glad that I had been before because I had something to compare it to. I went in 2023. Oh, my gosh, this was so much bigger and there were so many sessions to pick from. It was a great week. Yeah.

Did you have a favorite session that you attended?

So it’s hard to pick. I know you wanted us to decide on that. I went to a writing workshop where they talked about inspiration. That was great. I saw a lot of them about eye gaze and AI that were awesome, but there was a presenter for adoption versus abandonment. I think her name was Sayard Bass. She gave a great presentation and had lots of wonderful tips on having a lot of buy-in with the people that you’re working with. I love that. I love the App Smackdown. I didn’t get to go to that one last time, but they invite people up from the audience and they talk about their favorite apps.

A lot of them were not designed for people with disabilities, but they found a way to use them. I just thought that was a great session. Then of course, I always liked the Makerspace. I’m a MacGyver person, so I just love seeing how they make low tech solutions. I talked to a lot of college students in there that were designing AT this year, so I just love that.

Yeah, I love the information sharing and just get to learn what other folks are doing. From all the guests we’ve talked about, that seems to be one of just the coolest parts is just learning what other people are doing. Sharing your knowledge and just growing all as a community is so cool.

Exactly.

With the vendor hall, did you have a coolest piece of tech or person you got to meet in there?

I talked to a lot of different people. It’s a great place to get your questions answered. I had some people that I targeted from the exhibitor list that I wanted to get some answers from and worked with three developers to get some answers, but probably the neatest thing I saw was something from Possibility Neurotechnologies. It wasn’t eye gaze. It was real thought control and it was in the beta testing and just was incredible. So, real interesting to see where that goes, but yeah, that was probably my favorite.

Awesome. What was the best part of the trip for you?

Oh, absolutely, the best part was at the end of the day, just getting together with our team and talking about what everybody saw during the day and just getting their impressions of the new technologies and how they use or were planning to use some of their solutions that they found out about.

Awesome. If you could make any suggestions for improvement or anything that you could do to make the experience better, what would that be?

I’m not sure how you fix this, but there were just too many sessions that I wanted to go to at the same time. We were lucky because we had a big team and we split it up and then shared about it later. I guess I’d probably say I want to a scooter next time, but I don’t know how you improved that conference. It was a great week.

It really and truly was. Well, Lisa, thank you so much for all you do for our team. Thanks for going to ATIA and thanks for coming on to share your thoughts.

Thanks for the opportunity, Josh.

Do you have a question about assistive technology? Do you have a suggestion for someone we should interview on Assistive Technology Update? If so, call our listener line at 317-721-7124. Send us an email at tech@eastersealscrossroads.org or shoot us a note on Twitter, @IndataProject. Our captions and transcripts for the show are sponsored by the Indiana Telephone Relay Access Corporation or InTRAC. You can find out more about InTRAC at relayindiana.com. Special thanks to Nikol Prieto for scheduling our amazing guests and making a mess of my schedule.

Today’s show was produced, edited, hosted, and fraught over by yours truly. The opinions expressed by our guests are their own and may or may not reflect those of the Indata Project Easterseals Crossroads or supporting partners or this host. This was your Assistive Technology Update. I’m Josh Anderson with the Indata Project at Easterseals Crossroads in beautiful Indianapolis, Indiana. We look forward to seeing you next time. Bye-bye.