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  Friday, September 22, 2000



  25 Universities Pledge to Increase Research in Computing for
  the Disabled

  By FLORENCE OLSEN



  The White House announced Thursday that the presidents of 25
  research universities have pledged to take substantial new
  steps to expand research and educational opportunities in the
  field of computer accessibility for people with disabilities.

  President Clinton mentioned a letter including the pledge on a
  trip to Flint, Mich., where he visited Mott Community College
  to speak about closing the "digital divide" for the disabled.

  In the letter, the administrators pledged to offer programs in
  which computer scientists and engineers would learn how to
  make information technology accessible. The presidents also
  said they would hire more faculty members to do research on
  accessibility, and would guarantee that their institutions'
  online resources and information were accessible to people
  with disabilities.

  The White House did not immediately release a copy of the
  letter, but Mr. Clinton said that the universities had pledged
  to create tenure-track positions for research in the area.
  "That's a big deal, think about it -- major universities
  giving people tenure to teach how to provide equal access to
  all Americans without regard to disabilities, to have
  information-age technology," he said.

  The College of Engineering at the University of Wisconsin at
  Madison, one of the institutions named in the letter, is
  planning to hire tenure-track faculty members for a new
  program that teaches students how to design accessible
  information technology, according to a White House statement.
  The presidents of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  and the Universities of California and Michigan were among
  those who signed the letter.

  The White House also announced related programs, among them a
  $2.5-million grant from the Education Department's National
  Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research to the
  World Wide Web Consortium's Web Accessibility Initiative.  The
  program is writing guidelines for Web developers to ensure
  that Web content is accessible. The Web consortium is run by
  M.I.T.; the National Institute for Research in Computer
  Science and Control, in France; and Keio University, in Japan.

  The Education Department will also provide $1.8-million under
  its Learning Anytime Anywhere Partnerships to create
  accessible online-learning environments for students of all
  ages. Another grant, $7.5-million to the Georgia Institute of
  Technology, will enable the university to provide
  accessibility design training and technical assistance to
  information-technology product designers and manufacturers,
  the White House said.


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Copyright 2000 by The Chronicle of Higher Education