Computer-Assisted Learning Based on Universal Design, Multimodal Presentation and Textual Linkage

Refining city services is gradually being placed in the hands of the citizens, or, as in the case of IBM’s initiative, “let’s build a planet of smarter cities” ( https://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/35573.wss ), at their fingertips. By reducing cost and gaining control in building smart transportation management systems, IBM provided a grant to the city of Chicago to reinvigorate Chicago’s K-12 schools and city college. Similarly, Catherine Bracy ( https://www.codeforamerica.org/people/catherine-bracy/ ) and her team at Code for America are using technology to “build governments for the people and by the people in the twenty-first century.” It is evident that smart cities should accommodate every citizen, most especially those who may struggle with accessing information through conventional mediums. Specifically, smart cities must ensure that full participation is available to those citizens with communication and learning disabilities and new immigrant populations who experience difficulties understanding the language of their new home county. The biggest challenge for these citizens is using the Internet for learning because of the need to read, view, or listen to content published online. Disabled students enrolled in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses at colleges and universities are at a particular disadvantage since the use of empirical observation is critical in scientific learning and research. In this paper, we propose an intervention using a new software product and workflow for video captioning—a Universal Video Captioning platform (UVC). This platform provides a semi-automatic approach to synchronize the captioning into accessible STEM-related videos. It has the potential to transform learning and teaching for students with disabilities and those whose native language is not English by integrating synchronized captioned educational videos into undergraduate and graduate STEM disciplines. While accessing scientific content can pose unique challenges for disabled students and those who have just started learning a new language, the UVC platform has the potential to provide students with disabilities and recent immigrants the ability to pursue new and deeper learning opportunities.