NAD Continues to Manage Described and Captioned Media
Program
Editor: The Described and Captioned Media Program is, in my opinion,
one of the best uses our government has ever found for our tax dollars.
They provide appropriate media for people with hearing or vision loss at
no charge! It's a wonderful program, and I'm thrilled to see that it
will be around for at least five more years!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
October 2006
The National Association of the Deaf (NAD) announced today it has
entered into a new five-year $7.5 million cooperative agreement with the
U. S. Department of Education (ED) beginning this month for management
of the Described and Captioned Media Program (DCMP). The DCMP will
provide free-loan accessible educational media to students who are deaf
or hard of hearing and also to those who are blind or visually impaired.
Most educational media does not contain necessary accommodations for
students with a sensory loss.
Funded by agreements with the ED that has been in effect since 1991,
the NAD has selected, captioned and distributed open-captioned
educational media in video and DVD format through a nationwide library
system and through Internet streaming. This program of over 4,000
free-loan educational media items has reached an annual audience of over
3 million educators, families, and other registered users. "The
agreement will now be expanded," said Nancy Bloch, CEO of the NAD.
"The DCMP will not only caption educational media for deaf
students, but will also video describe it for blind and visually
impaired students."
Video description refers to an additional narration track for blind
and visually impaired viewers of visual media, including television
programs and movies. The description narrator talks through the
presentation, describing what is happening on the screen during the
natural pauses in the audio (and sometimes during dialogue if deemed
necessary). The American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) will partner
with the NAD, leading an activity to develop and validate guidelines for
creating educational video description. While general guidelines for
entertainment video description exist, there has been little effort to
validate these guidelines for use with school populations or to apply
them to a wide range of digital media now available in today's
classrooms.
Similar guidelines have been created by the NAD for captioning
educational media. These guidelines, titled Captioning Key, have been
distributed internationally and receive over a thousand visits monthly
on the DCMP Web site. "Both captioning and video description are
essential for children with special needs," added Ms. Bloch.
"As educators across the nation hone their instruction ever more
finely to produce the desired end-of-year outcomes, every in-class
minute counts."
While most television networks and many cable channels provide closed
captioning and some video description, very little educational media is
described or captioned. "Only 15% of educational videos, 5% of
educational CD-ROMs, and 1% of Internet content is captioned," said
Bill Stark, director of the DCMP. "Even fewer educational media
contain video description," he added.
In addition, the DCMP will provide a database of accessible media
available for purchase by schools from educational media producers. A
further service will include the provision of a clearinghouse of
information and materials on the subject of accessible media for
consumers, agencies, corporations, businesses, and schools. The
Web-accessible clearinghouse will also allow users to search
informational offerings on the Web sites of major educational and
consumer organizations serving blind and deaf individuals.
For more information call toll-free (800) 237-6213 (V) or (800)
237-6819 (TTY). You can also visit the DCMP Web site at www.dcmp.org, or
e-mail the DCMP at info@dcmp.org.
About the NAD-The NAD (http://www.nad.org) is the nation's oldest and
largest nonprofit organization safeguarding the accessibility and civil
rights of 28 million deaf and hard of hearing Americans and the
administrator of the new DCMP federally funded project. The NAD is a
dynamic federation of 51 state association affiliates (including the
District of Columbia), organizational affiliates, and national members.
Primary areas of focus include grassroots advocacy and empowerment,
policy development and research, legal assistance, captioned media,
information and publications, and youth leadership.
About the DCMP-The DCMP (http://www.dcmp.org) is funded by the U. S.
Department of Education. Educators, students, families, and others who
work with individuals who are blind or deaf are the target audience for
the DCMP free-loan media program. Schools, consumers, media
producers/distributors, captioning agencies, businesses, government
agencies, and others are the target groups for DCMP information,
training, and evaluation activities related to educational media access.
