ATU176 – Able Flight – Pilots with disabilities, FREE AT webinars from AT Coalition, Microsoft Accessibility Support Desk, Audrey Busch’s Legislative Updates

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Your weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist people with disabilities and special needs.

Show notes:

Able Flight with Bernie Wulle and Wesley Pilot | www.AbleFlight.com | wulleb@purdue.edu | 765-494-9973

ATCoalition News – Free Webinars http://buff.ly/1rXlBGU

Microsoft Support http://buff.ly/1vQZ5SB

“Exploring Transition Service Plan Technology Supports : A Unique Perspective” http://buff.ly/1vQWOaa

On the Hill with Audrey Busch www.ataporg.org

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——-transcript follows ——

 

BERNIE WULLE: This is Bernie Wulle, and I am an associate professor at Purdue University.

WESLEY MAJOR: Hi, this is Wesley Major, and I am the volunteer program coordinator of Able Fligh Purdue, and this is your assistive technology update.

WADE WINGLER: Hi, this is Wade Wingler with the INDATA Project at Easter Seals Crossroads in Indiana with your Assistive Technology Update, a weekly dose of information that keeps you up-to-date on the latest developments in the field of technology, designed to assist people with disabilities and special needs. Welcome to episode 176 of assistive technology update. It’s scheduled to be released on October 10 of 2014.

I’m excited today. We’re going to have a gentleman named Bernie Wulle and another one named Wesley Major who are both pilots. They work with Purdue University’s Able Fligh program. It’s a program that helps people with disabilities fly airplanes.

We’ve got a bunch of information on some webinars, what about transitional service planning for students with disabilities who are transitioning out of high school, another grouping of assistive technology related webinars brought to us by the AT coalition, and interesting information about free technical support from Microsoft if you’re a user of assistive technology. Also, our monthly installment up on the Hill with Audrey tells us what’s happening in Washington DC with legislation impacting assistive technology.

We hope you’ll check out her website at www.eastersealstech.com, shoot us a note on Twitter at INDATA Project, or call our listener line. Give us some feedback. That number is 317-721-7124.

Have you heard of the new E-bot video magnifier from Hims Technology that’s very portable and connect your computer and does some pretty cool stuff when it comes to video magnifiers? Or have you heard of an app called MY Script Calculator that let you draw equations on your screen and have them converted into something that can automatically calculate. Or have you ever wondered what it would be like to have a standing/sitting workstation in your paperless office where you can stand or sit or switch it up throughout the day? Well, if you’re watching our YouTube videos every Monday, do you know that stuff. But if you didn’t know that stuff, chances are you might not be watching our YouTube videos. Every Monday, the INDATA Project at Easter Seals crossroads produces a YouTube video. They are usually between two and five minutes long and they always produce some sort of cool, interesting information that you might not have known about before when it comes to assistive technology. If you want to check out these videos, you can check for us on YouTube at INDATA Project or just head on over to our website at www.eastersealstech.com/YouTube and you’ll go right there. Check out our videos. It’s not just the audio stuff we do, folks, there’s some pretty cool videos every week too. I’ll pop a link in the show notes so you can check it out.

I’m going to assume if you’re interested in listening to the show, you’re also interested in assistive technology webinars. The accessible technology coalition has a bunch of webinars coming up in the next few weeks, everything from advocacy to AT and the common core, to Google Chrome as assistive technology. I’m going to pop a link in the show notes over to a listing where you can find all of these free webinars to learn more about accessibility in technology. Check our show notes.

Are you a user of assistive technology? Are you a user of Microsoft’s products? Did you know that they have a disability and successfully can get for your assistance for anything related to Microsoft products and assistive technology? If you have questions about accessibility features like screen readers, magnifiers, or speech recognition commands, you can get help every day of the week, 5 AM to 9 PM Pacific Time during the week and 6 AM through 3 PM Pacific time on the weekends. You can either call the 800 number at 1-800-936-5900, or head on over to Microsoft.com/enable and click on the accessibility technical support link right there will take you to a place where you can get that phone number as well as do a live chat with a desk agent. Great free service by Microsoft. And in a couple of weeks, we’re going to interview Dan Hubble from Microsoft to talk about more the interesting things that they are doing over there at Microsoft for folks with disabilities.

Are you a teacher or do you have students with disabilities in your life? Our friends over at Georgia Tech, the tools for life program, are going to do a webinar. It’s going to be on October 23 at 3 PM Eastern time. It’s going to focus on how to write transition service plans for students with disabilities. It’s going to be a combination of teaching people how to write these transition plans as well as talking to experts who have helped people with disabilities through this transition process. There’s no cost to attend the webinar. It’s going to be presented Carson Cochran and Sally Kemp of Georgia’s project for assistive technology or You can get .1 CEU, or credit units, if you’re interested I’m going to pop a link in the show notes and you can check out this October 23 webinar and a pop a link in the show was where you can learn about transition services for young people with disabilities.

It’s time for on the Hill with Audrey. Audrey Busch is the director of policy and advocacy for the Association of assistive technology act programs in her update, she lets us know how the power of politics is impacting people with disabilities and their use of assistive technology. Learn more about Audrey and her work ataporg.org.

>> This is Audrey Bush come a policy director for the Association of assistive technology act programs, coming to you with your monthly Washington update. In our last update, Congress blew through Washington almost as quickly as it came back in session from the month-long August recess, hoping to cut the 12 legislative days schedule in September to at least eight in order to jettison back to the campaign trail and focus on the November elections. Upon returning to Washington, the House addressed the one last piece of legislation for the September session, a bill addressing how the federal government would be funded at the end of fiscal year 2014 which is effective September 30.

The house introduced a short-term continuing resolution that will fund the federal government in fiscal year 2014 levels through December 11 of 2014. Bar Congress wanted to pass the CR quickly and breezily exit Washington afterwards, the sticky situation brewing in the Middle East put a bump in such a swift package in this funding bill. After some political games and trickery, finally enough numbers were corralled to pass funding measures, giving a finish to a total of seven days Congress spent in Washington in September before returning back to the campaign trail.

Given the passage of this short-term funding bill, the federal government will be funded until December 11 which only gives Congress 13 legislative days to determine a final funding solution to fiscal year 2015 when they return from November elections on November 12. The belief from Hill staffers, however, is set upon Congress’ return, and Omnibus, which is a violation of multiple appropriation bills rolled into one large bill, will be assembled for consideration.

The spending bill that funds most programs pertain to people disabilities and specifically the assistive technology act is the labor health and human services appropriations bill, which frankly is usually quite controversial because it also funds the affordable care act. Therefore, in years past, it is not been included in the omnibus. This year might be different however depending on how the elections go and if Congress is determined to pass an FY 2015 budget for all 12 appropriations bills. So in the meantime, it is mighty quiet on Capitol Hill as all the commotion is taking place in your hometowns as you watch the elections play out on television ads and testy debates. Look for to my next update in November when the anticipated elections are determined and political pundits begin to forecast what this means for Congress’ next steps.

WADE WINGLER: Here in the US, we’re getting into the fall where the fall leaves are beautiful, the skies are clear, and if you look up you’re probably going to see an airplane. I live in central Indiana. I’m not too far from pretty University, and when I look up I don’t think about pilots who have disabilities might be flying over my house. But I’m learning today as I get to know our guests a little bit that that may be the case. Today I’m joined by Bernie Wulle who is an associate professor in the pretty University Department of aviation technology and also Wesley Major who is a pilot with a disability and a student at Purdue University. These guys are both involved in an effort called Able Fligh Purdue. Ernie and Wesley, thank you so much for being on our show today.

BERNIE WULLE: You’re welcome.

WESLEY MAJOR: Thanks for having us.

WADE WINGLER: Guys, I know that you guys would probably rather than being behind a microphone would rather be in the cockpit somewhere flying around. I thought we might start off by asking you guys to introduce yourselves a little bit and tell me how you became interested in Able Fligh. Then we’ll kind of get into what it does. Us to some introductions here.

BERNIE WULLE: As mentioned earlier, I’m associate professor here at Purdue University. I’ve been here since about 1991. I teach classes, do some research in aviation educational areas. Basically Able Flighs, I was approached by a friend of mine who knew a gentleman named Charles Stites who was executive director of Able Fligh. They wanted to do some expansion on the program. The program was designed for people disabilities to allow them to obtain their light sport pilot certificate. I mentioned it to the people here at Purdue and they got very excited so we decided to pursue it. Since that time, we been doing this for about six years now and it’s been extremely rewarding and successful. So far we’ve got 100% success rate of people with disabilities come into the program and obtaining either their light sport pilot certificate or their private pilot certificate. Wesley is one of our people that have done it and I let him explain his interest to

WESLEY MAJOR: As Bernie introduced me, I’m Wes. My mentor, through physical rehabilitation in Philadelphia, really turned me onto the program and put the bug in my ear. Through that, he let me know the application process and about three years ago I applied and got accepted to the scholarship and came out here and got my pilot certificate, which I originally thought would never be possible with somebody with a spinal cord injury. Three years later here I am, still at Purdue, furthering my education.

WADE WINGLER: Cool. Wesley, do you mind telling us a little bit about your spinal cord injury just to give us a feel for what your functional capacities are?

WESLEY MAJOR: No problem. I was in a motorcycle accident six years ago when I was 20 that left me with a T7 complete injury, so I’m pretty functional above my chest but I have no balance or abdominal control.

WADE WINGLER: That helps us understand a little bit. Guys, tell us a little bit about Able Fligh. How did it start and what does it do and how do people get involved?

BERNIE WULLE: As a University, we joined in a partnership with Able Fligh which is a nonprofit organization. What we do here at Purdue is we provide the facility. We work with some individuals who have aircraft that do have adaptive controls. Then we basically provide the program. We do all the ground school, all technical training. We provide the flight instructors and the facility. The Purdue University Airport is an air traffic control facility so it has provided some unique situations and challenges. As a matter fact, we read two of the Able Fligh students who are deaf and still able to operate out of a radio control environment.

The fun part of it is we’ve allowed people like Wesley here to maybe obtain something they didn’t think was possible. Through that, it’s helped us provide better situations and experiences for our CFI’s, certified flight instructors. They became far more interested in how to provide education whether like the technical aspect of flying. It’s opened the windows maybe for people to see that aviation can be a career path for people with disabilities. It certainly has opened the eyes of the University of the capabilities of these individuals as well as industry in general.

One of our graduates just left Friday for a new job. He’s not in Washington DC working with the Federal Aviation Administration. We feel very happy about the success rate and its absolutely been one of the fun things we’ve done as a department and as individuals.

WADE WINGLER: As somebody who flies on a fairly regular basis, I think about people disabilities and employment all the time because that sort of my job. But I never really thought about people with disabilities in the field of aviation but what you’re telling me is there are a lot more opportunities than I thought about.

BERNIE WULLE: Absolutely. We always think of aviation as a pilot centered position, but all the support that has to happen to make a flight happen. Like if you’re going to fly on the airlines, all the individuals that you really don’t see at front, the dispatchers, whether people, managers, technicians providing the work on the aircraft itself, air-traffic control, flight planners. For every pilot in the cockpit, there’s probably 50 people doing one form or another of support of getting that flight up in the air safely and get it to its destination.

WADE WINGLER: While. So as we consider the qualifications, if somebody is interested in becoming a participant in Able Fligh, what are the qualifications?

WESLEY MAJOR: When I applied for the Able Fligh scholarship, we just want to Able Fligh website, ableflight.org, and filled out their application process. It was a little, I don’t want to say intensive, but you had to do a little bit, write a paper, get a letter recommendation, a doctor’s note proving that you are disabled, and you submit it and hopefully your selected.

WADE WINGLER: So this is one of those areas in life where a disability is a requirement to become part of a program. That’s interesting. So talking about the particular kinds of disabilities, what works well in this environment? What kinds of disabilities can be accommodated and maybe talk to me a little bit about the kinds of disabilities that can’t be accommodated for Able Fligh?

BERNIE WULLE: That is a good question. Obviously Wesley here for example has good use of his upper body. He was one of the easy ones to work with. We have a method where we can change the controls of the airplane. Because you’re operating an aircraft on three axes, so you’ve got pitch, role, and yaw. The yaw is controlled normally by the feet, by the use of rudder pedals. Obviously in Wesley’s case, we can do that. So there is an adaptive method on a particular airplane that we use that allows the hands to be the controlling force on the rudder rather than the feet. But we’ve had students come through, applicants that are typically considered quadriplegic, but they still have to have some motion of their arms. We can kind of work around limited motion of the hands, but we do have to be able to manipulate the arms. Obviously you have to be able to turn your head one direction or the other watching for traffic, etc.

The two deaf students we had, that provided a unique situation for the structures and student and the fact that they have to learn a way to communicate. We do not use instructors that no sign language. So they have to develop their own method of communicating with the student and the student with the instructor. So that’s provided some interesting method, shall we say, of being able to handle that.

As long as there’s motion in the arms, as long as they can do a certain amount of grip and they have good vision, we haven’t had any issues to this point.

WADE WINGLER: So is it fair for me to assume then that if there’s a vision impairment or some kind of a cognitive challenge that prevents a person from understanding the nature of flight and the controls and instrumentation and some of the protocols, those are the deal breakers, right?

BERNIE WULLE: Pretty much so. Like I said, you don’t have to have 20/20 vision but it has to be correctable. That’s pretty much a requirement. You have to have average ability intellectually or better to be able to understand the technical aspect. There is a written examination you must take. The FAA has a test bank of questions. They’re given two hours to answer those questions and they had to get a 70% or higher over that material. As part of the job we do here is to give them the background, the technical information to be able to pass that test. Then they have to pass only call a practical test, in which the examiner, like myself, who has a Pilot Examiner Certificate from the FAA, we asked them questions, they have to be able to answer the technical areas of those questions and then perform the maneuvers, landings, takeoffs that are required for the particular certificate.

To be perfectly honest, a person with a disability has to be at the same, if not higher, standard than someone who would be considered, for lack of a better term, normal.

WADE WINGLER: Sure. So I’d like to hear some of the nuts and bolts. We talked a little bit about moving the yaw controls to the hand. Talk to me about some of the other assistive technology accommodations that occur with the aircraft.

WESLEY MAJOR: As you alluded and Professor Wulley alluded, the rudder or yaw is controlled with foot pedals, so in the adaptive aircraft that I flew, the Sky Arrow L600, and moved up to the hand and it was pretty simple. If you can drive a car, it’s pretty much the same type of deal. Forward is left rudder and pull towards you is right rudder. Other than that, there wasn’t any adaptive equipment different in that aircraft. We’ve had the CT come through a light support aircraft and that was adaptive with breaks in the hand controls. Can you think of anything else, Bernie?

BERNIE WULLE: Well, we’ve done a little bit of modification on a couple of students that had limited ability to grip, because they still have to grab the yoke and be able to do a roll and pitch. Then they have to be able to manipulate the throttle and stuff. But really they were pretty simple adaptive things. It’s one of those things where we had some excellent technicians and they look and see what they can and cannot do and then provide suggestions and stuff.

It can be simple. I remember one student we had that they had an issue switching the fuel tanks and one airplane. We gave that individual a claw hammer and they were able to use the claw hammer to get on the bottom be able to pull up one direction or push of the other direction to switch banks. To say that there is a set way of doing something would be misleading. The aircraft itself, though, has to be adaptive so we can use hand controls. That has to be in the manufacturing of the aircraft. It does kind of limit us on what kind of aircraft we can use.

WESLEY MAJOR: Yeah, this summer, we had to modify just a little bit by going to Home Depot and getting some rope and twist ties to make it work for a student. So it’s very spitball.

WADE WINGLER: I was sure you’re going to say duct tape. So Wesley in particular, how does this impact folks with disabilities? We all want to fly but how does this impact people with disabilities in particular?

WESLEY MAJOR: As he mentioned earlier, I never thought it was possible when somebody said you could be a pilot. What? I can get a certificate to fly on my own? So I can’t express the confidence boost that I gained from going through this program and knowing that, even though I do have a disability, anything is possible. It’s not limited to just being on the ground. Like I said, because of this program, I am now at Purdue going through the Masters program and possibly a PhD afterwards. Without this program, that would not have been possible.

WADE WINGLER: Excellent. Bernie, tell me how Able Fligh is funded and the people are interested in learning more about Able Fligh or even applying, what should they do?

BERNIE WULLE: The funding issue, we survive off of donations for the most part. Begotten funding from two or three different organizations and some individuals. And all honesty, we’re always looking for additional funding. We would really, in a perfect world, if we had the funding, we would probably run this program so once a year and not just during the summer. We would like to make it available really to anybody who’s interested and has the capabilities. One of the areas we’d like to start moving more into is the high school age students to give them the idea that they are capable of doing some fantastic things and to open their eyes. Wes and I both absolutely love aviation, and we live, breathed, and smell it all the time. We would like to see more people get involved in it. We think it’s a fantastic career path and has a lot of unique rewards.

As we said earlier, historically people with disabilities and never even thought of aviation as a career path. So the funding issue, like I said, we live off pretty much donations and whatever we can pick up. The university itself has been very generous in helping us provide assistance to students when it was needed. As far as how to get involved, if you’re interested in getting the application for the scholarship, you do that through ableflight.com. If you want additional information, career information, things we can do, you can always contact me at my email, wulleb@purdue.edu. We be glad to provide information, and I’m sure Wes would to. I’ll have him provide his information so if anybody really wants to get an idea of what it’s like.

WESLEY MAJOR: If anybody would like to contact me and my expenses to the program and campus life here at Purdue University, please contact me at wmajor@purdue.edu.

WADE WINGLER: Bernie Wulle is an associate professor at Purdue University Department of aviation technology. Wesley Major is a student and pilot with a disability at Purdue, both involved in the Able Fligh Purdue program. Gentleman, thanks so much for being on our show today.

BERNIE WULLE: You’re welcome.

WESLEY MAJOR: Thanks for having us.

WADE WINGLER: Do you have a question about assistive technology? Do you have a suggestion for someone we should interview on Assistive Technology Update? Call our listener line at 317-721-7124. Looking for show notes from today’s show? Head on over to EasterSealstech.com. Shoot us a note on Twitter @INDATAProject, or check us out on Facebook. That was your Assistance Technology Update. I’m Wade Wingler with the INDATA Project at Easter Seals Crossroads in Indiana.

 

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