Rehabilitation engineering research center on universal access to ICT - the goal of this rerc is to directly impact the lives of people with disabilities by addressing key accessibility gaps that…

Rehabilitation engineering research center on universal access to ICT - the goal of this rerc is to directly impact the lives of people with disabilities by addressing key accessibility gaps that inhibit or prevent their use of existing and emerging information and communication technology. The university of maryland information technology rerc will do this by working together with raising the floor, people with disabilities, advocacy groups, industry, and other stakeholders, using an integrated 5-year program of research, developing new technologies, improving standards, and disseminating knowledge and best practices. The outcome oriented objectives of the program include a) exploring and developing strategies to 'individualize' generative AI systems to make them provide better results tailored to each individual with a disability (starting with AI systems for visual question answering for blind people); b) identifying and more deeply understanding the failures in technology use by people who are older and developing design strategies to allow more seniors to understand products "out of the box" -- especially those technologies that are critical to independent living and engagement; c) developing cross-disability access strategies that can work with new small-form-factor self-service terminals; d) replacing the proprietary and failing photosensitive epilepsy analysis hazard screening tool with an open-source version that can handle new video technologies.; e) creating and improving accessibility standards around public access, safety, and general ICT accessibility. The rerc's expected products include: knowledge, prototypes, proofs of concept, standards and guidelines, open-source mass-disseminable software, new assistive technologies, and user materials in addition to awareness and technical assistance to consumers and other stakeholders. The end outcome objective is people with disabilities who are able to use the technologies they need every day.