Today's Date: April 24, 2024
First Annual Cultural Celebration Day in Lansing, Illinois Calls For Participants   •   Capitol Ridge at Providence Assisted Living Community Named One of the Country's Best by U.S. News & World Report for Third   •   MONAT Global Announces The Growth Alliance with Eric Worre   •   Santiago, Chile Will Host the 2027 Special Olympics World Games   •   Carriage Green at Milford Assisted Living Community Named One of the Country's Best by U.S. News & World Report for Third St   •   Benchmark at Stamford Assisted Living Community Named One of the Country's Best by U.S. News & World Report for Second Strai   •   The Fresh Market Elevates the Food Scene in Lakewood Ranch with Newest Store   •   Bay Square at Yarmouth Assisted Living Community Named One of the Country's Best by U.S. News & World Report for Third Strai   •   The Village at Willow Crossings Assisted Living Community Named One of the Country's Best by U.S. News & World Report for Th   •   Benchmark Senior Living at Hamden Assisted Living Community Named One of the Country's Best by U.S. News & World Report   •   Arbor Day Foundation’s ‘Canopy Report’ Examines How America Sees Trees   •   On the Road Lending Announces Expansion into North Carolina   •   AVI Systems and Technology Partners Team to Contribute More Than $110,000 to the AVIXA Foundation’s Brad Sousa Impact Fund   •   The Birches at Concord Assisted Living Community Named One of the Country's Best by U.S. News & World Report for Third Strai   •   ERI’s John Shegerian Calls the Recycling of Electronics “the Most Urgently Needed Environmental Solution of Our Gene   •   Local Students From Orange Mound, Collierville, Whitehaven, Hickory Hill, Frayser, and South Memphis Gather at Ruth's Chris to L   •   Talking Math: WPI Researcher Neil Heffernan Leads Effort To Develop AI Math Tutor   •   Blue Bird to Report Fiscal 2024 Second Quarter Results on May 8, 2024   •   Middlebrook Farms at Trumbull Assisted Living Community Named One of the Country's Best by U.S. News & World Report for Thir   •   Ohmium Partners with Tata Projects to Advance Green Hydrogen Initiatives in India
Bookmark and Share

NWEA Announces New Effort Using AI to Identify and Remove Barriers Within Math Assessments for Students with Visual Disabilities

NWEA Announces New Effort Using AI to Identify and Remove Barriers Within Math Assessments for Students with Visual Disabilities

The project was awarded an AI in Accessibility grant from Microsoft.

PR Newswire

PORTLAND, Ore., Oct. 14, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Today is World Sight Day bringing attention to vision and eye care as well as awareness of visual disabilities. According to the World Health Organization, an estimated 2.2 billion people around the world have some form of visual disability or blindness, including over 540,000 children in the US. For students, math instruction and assessment, especially online, can pose additional access barriers. More specifically, there is not a good, two-way method for getting math and science information, like charts, graphs, tables, or code for equations, to and from a refreshable braille display on a screen, which poses a challenge for online assessment.

Thanks to innovation, research, and advancements in technology, some of these challenges are being addressed. NWEA — a not-for-profit, research and educational services provider serving K-12 students — announced today a new effort, in collaboration with Perkins Access Digital Accessibility Consulting, the Governor Morehead School, and Sonja Steinbach, a local expert math educator who works with students with visual disabilities, to make middle school mathematics assessments more accessible for students with visual disabilities using Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology. NWEA accessibility research manager, Dr. Elizabeth Barker, was awarded a generous AI for Accessibility grant from Microsoft to help further these efforts.

"Creating online math that is accessible for students using assistive technology is a challenge. We are tackling math because we want to do more than just improve assessments; we want to expand access for online mathematics, period," Barker said of the goal of the work.

The AI for Accessibility grant-funded project will use math assessment data from students with visual disabilities and AI data analysis to identify patterns in online math test questions that can create barriers or support successes. With these data, NWEA will then create prototype math questions that address the barriers within the design of the questions that showed to be most challenging to students with visual disabilities. In sum, this project aims to offer more educational opportunities and address unmet accommodation needs that can currently exclude students with disabilities from higher-level mathematics as well as paths to advanced degrees and Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM)-related careers.

"For math students with visual disabilities, completing an online quiz to prove their aptitude can be impossible if the assessment doesn't present questions that are accessible. By optimizing the accessibility of math assessment prototypes, this project will eliminate such barriers and ensure that all students have equal access to the questions in order to demonstrate their learning," said Geoff Freed, Director of Perkins Access, who is a collaborator on the project.

For more information about the AI for Accessibility grant program, visit the AI for Accessibility website, and for more information about NWEA research, visit: nwea.org/research.

About NWEA

NWEA® (formerly known as Northwest Evaluation Association) is a mission-driven, not-for-profit organization that supports students and educators in more than 146 countries through research, assessment solutions, policy and advocacy services, professional learning and school improvement services that fight for equity, drive classroom impact and push for systemic change in our educational communities. Visit NWEA.org to learn more about how we're partnering with educators to help all kids learn.

Contact: Simona Beattie, Sr. Manager, Public Relations, simona.beattie@nwea.org or 971.361.9526

Cision View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/nwea-announces-new-effort-using-ai-to-identify-and-remove-barriers-within-math-assessments-for-students-with-visual-disabilities-301399864.html

SOURCE NWEA



Back to top
| Back to home page
Video

White House Live Stream
LIVE VIDEO EVERY SATURDAY
alsharpton Rev. Al Sharpton
9 to 11 am EST
jjackson Rev. Jesse Jackson
10 to noon CST


Video

LIVE BROADCASTS
Sounds Make the News ®
WAOK-Urban
Atlanta - WAOK-Urban
KPFA-Progressive
Berkley / San Francisco - KPFA-Progressive
WVON-Urban
Chicago - WVON-Urban
KJLH - Urban
Los Angeles - KJLH - Urban
WKDM-Mandarin Chinese
New York - WKDM-Mandarin Chinese
WADO-Spanish
New York - WADO-Spanish
WBAI - Progressive
New York - WBAI - Progressive
WOL-Urban
Washington - WOL-Urban

Listen to United Natiosns News