Classroom Captioning for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students

Abstract

AbstractThe objective of this paper is to introduce the engineering community to classroom captioning for deaf and hard of hearing students. This technology enables an in‐class stenographer to transcribe instantaneously classroom discussions into full‐length text using an electronic stenowriter, a laptop computer, and real‐time captioning software. Four years of personal experience has demonstrated that classroom captioning enables students to grasp effectively both verbal and visual modes of a lecture near‐simultaneously. This capability can position deaf and hard of hearing students on a near‐equal playing field with hearing students in the classroom. The ongoing success of classroom captioning can be demonstrated by the phenomenal growth of this program at Purdue University, which started in Fall of 1992 with a single deaf engineering graduate student and stenographer for one course. Over the past three years, Purdue has provided services for an average of 10–20 deaf and hard of hearing students per year utilizing two stenographers in 45–55 courses each year.