@2016

First Workshop onAstronomy Beyond the Common Senses

for Accessibility and Inclusion

Cartagena de Indias, ColombiaOctober 8, 2016

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PROGRAM

• 8:00- 8:05 Welcome (Wanda Dıaz )

• 8:05 - 8:25 iDATA Innvators Developing Accesible Tools for Astronomy (Timothy Spuck)

• 8:25 - 8:45 Sharing japanese resources of universal design for astronomy (Kumiko Usuda-Sato)

• 8:45 -9:05 Reaching the stars: UDP inclusive astronomy outreach experience (Erika FabiolaLabbe Waghorn)

• 9:05-9:25 Astronomy for the Deaf/HOH and DHH (Constance Gartner)

• 9:25 - 9:45 Multimodal discussions around a cup of coffee

• 9:45 - 10:05 Astronomıa en tu escuela (Hamilton David Galvis Rodrıguez )

• 10:05 - 10:40 Break

• 10:40 - 11:00 Astronomy labs for the visually Impaired (Allyson Bieryla)

• 11:00 - 11:20 Web Accessibility and the Astrophysics Data System (Alexandra Holachek)

• 11:20 - 11:40 Small Steps and Giant Leaps - Astronomy Education and Data Accessibility forBlind and Visually Impaired Students (Kate Meredith)

• 11:40 - 12:20 Round table

• 12:20 - 14:00 Lunch

• 14:00 - 14:20 Astronomers with kids with disabilities (Nancy S. Brickhouse)

• 14:20 - 14:40 3D resources to teach Astronomy: an interdisciplinary approach (Beatriz Garcıa)

• 14:40 - 15:00 Using 3D prints to teach astronomy to the visually impaired (Thomas Madura)

• 15:00 - 15:20 On aural modalities within astronomy education (Jamie Ferguson)

• 15:20 - 15:40 Multimodal discussions around a cup of coffee

• 15:40 - 16:00 Changing perceptions around inclusion (Ram Venugopal)

• 16:00 - 16:20 Break

• 16:20-16:40 iChair intelligent power wheelchair (Jesse Leaman)

• 16:40-17:00 Tocando el cielo (Gerardo Cleofas Domınguez )

• 17:00-17:20 Teaching high standard disabled, planetary scientists and astronomers: developingteaching strategies for inclusive space science (Cassandra Runyon and Cyndi Hall)

• 17:20-18:00 Break

• 18:00 - 19:00 Discussion (outcomes of the UD symposium, Angela Perez ), final conclusions,future developments and plans

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Innovators Developing Accessible Tools in AstronomyTimothy Spuckl

STEM Education Development Officer, U.S.A.tspuck@aui.edu

IDATA is a collaboration among Associated Universities Inc., the University of North Carolina atChapel Hill, the University of Chicago Yerkes Observatory, TERC and the University of Nevada at LasVegas. The project creates opportunities to deepen teacher and learner understanding of the role ofcomputation in astronomy and the societal value of computational tools for increasing access for all.IDATA engages blind and visually impaired (BVI) and sighted students, teachers, graduate students,and professional astronomers and software developers in the design, development and use of fully acces-sible astronomical software for image acquisition, processing, and analysis, and provides role models forbroader participation in STEM+C (STEM + Computational Thinking). A key product that will resultfrom IDATA is an online accessible astronomy image/data analysis software that will work to make theuniverse more accessible to all.

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Sharing Japanese Resources of ”Universal Design for Astronomy”Kumiko Usuda-Sato

National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ), Japankumiko.usuda@nao.ac.jp

In Japan, we call astronomy activities sharing with people with minority people, including those withdisability ”Universal Design for Astronomy”. In 2006 the ”Universal Design Working Group (UDWG)”lead by Dr. Shin Mineshige (Kyoto University) was established at the Japanese Society of Educationand Popularization of Astronomy (JSEPA). We, the UDWG members, developed astronomy textbooks(authored by Shin Mineshige and Jun Takahashi) at three different levels. We also held the conferenceson Universal Design for Astronomy Education at National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ)headquarters in 2010 and 2013. After the conferences, we published the proceedings online and developedthe voice browser-friendly website.On September 24-26, 2016, we held the 3rd conference at NAOJ again. This time, we focused on hands-onapproaches with many workshops. We invited ”ambassadors” from Asian countries and discussed howto disseminate the activities to our neighboring countries. In addition, we, NAOJ staff members starteda new project to develop tactile models with a 3D printer. NAOJ headquarters is partially open to thepublic every day and more than 30,000 people visit the Visitors? Area a year. However, people cannottouch the large refractor or models of the cutting edge telescopes in overseas such as the Subaru Telescopeand ALMA. We are developing tactile models of the NAOJ-related telescopes and celestial bodies with a3D printer. The goal of this project is to develop a tactile 3D model that people with and without visioncan understand by touching.In our talk, we will report highlights of the 3rd conference and the current status of the tactile modelproject of NAOJ.

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Reaching the stars: UDP inclusive astronomy outreach experienceErika Fabiola Labbe Waghorn

Astronomy Nucleus, Universidad Diego Portales, Chileelabbew@gmail.com

For the Chilean Astronomy Day 2016, the members of the Astronomy Nucleus of the University DiegoPortales faced a new challenge in their active outreach project: to present astronomy to visually impairedpeople. With low budget and no experience, we looked for a topic suitable for creating simple tactilemodels. After a research work and help from several persons with visual impairment, we presented a talkabout star and planet formation to a group of visually impaired children and adults, positively surprisingthe audience, and ourselves, with the results. This first experience marked the beginning of a series oftalks that we started to deliver across Chile, as well as new collaboration plans. In this presentationwe will share the experience of starting from the scratch, talk about the entire process, including theproblems and learning, and will also talk about our future plans for inclusive astronomy.

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Overcoming Barriers to Participation in Astronomy for Deaf StudentsConstance Gartner

Wisconsin School for the Deaf, USAjfl0132@gmail.com

Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) students have long been an underserved and underrepresentedpopulation within STEM fields, including astronomy. Two main barriers include: (1) limited curricularmaterials available in American Sign Language (ASL), and (2) Interpreters and/or DHH education pro-fessionals who lack astronomy backgrounds. DHH students may come to an astronomy lesson lackingthe basic ?incidental learning? that is often taken for granted with hearing peers (for example, fromastronomy in the media). We found that accessible hands-on activities coupled with interaction withtrained professionals are critical for enhancing the background experiences of DHH youth in order tobuild basic understandings of concepts and terms.

For our research, we followed a group of six DHH youth over two semesters as they interacted withthe Skynet Junior Scholars (SJS) tools and curriculum to understand how they assimilated astronomyexperiences and benefitted from access to telescopes both directly (on school campus and at Yerkes Ob-servatory) and through Skynet?s robotic telescope network (optical and radio telescopes, inquiry-basedmodules, data analysis tools, and professional astronomers). We report on our first findings of resourcesand best practices for engaging DHH youth in astronomy in the future.

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Astronomıa en tu escuela: una estrategia para la ensenanza de la astronomıa enpoblaciones escolares vulnerables

Hamilton David Galvis RodrıguezUniversidad Tecnologica de Pereira, Colombia

hdgalvis@utp.edu.co

La Astronomıa en Colombia no esta incluida dentro del Plan Nacional de Educacin, por lo cual laspersonas del comn, en particular los estudiantes de la educacion bsica y media, deben dirigirse a obser-vatorios o planetarios para acceder a esta. En la ciudad de Pereira, no toda la poblacin cuenta con losrecursos necesarios para acceder al Planetario u Observatorio Astronmico de la Universidad Tecnologicade Pereira (OAUTP), dado que habitan en zonas de alta vulnerabilidad y de bajos recursos de la ciudad.En vista de lo anterior, el Grupo de Investigacin en Astroingenierıa (GIA) Alfa Orin del OAUTP, de-sarrollo una estrategia llamada ”Astronomıa en tu Escuela” que busca llevar la astronomıa de maneradidactica y pedaggica a la poblacion vulnerable de los sectores marginales de la ciudad de Pereira y dezonas rurales con dificultad de acceso, despertando as su curiosidad por esta fascinante ciencia. En elmarco de la ejecucin del proyecto, en el 2015 se visitaron 6 instituciones educativas ubicadas en zonasurbanas de bajos recursos y en el 2016 contempla visitar 20 instituciones que cumplan con estas condi-ciones de vulnerabilidad, de las cuales 6 han sido visitadas entre los meses de febrero y abril.El desarrollo de esta estrategia consiste en subdividir las actividades de acuerdo a los rangos de edades yel nivel educativo de los estudiantes beneficiados, clasificndose en actividades bsicas, medias y avanzadassistematizadas en una cartilla, de tal forma que cada actividad se ajuste a las realidades o condiciones delpublico objetivo. Ademas, las actividades incluyen experimentos de fsica utilizando elementos de bajocosto (en su mayora reciclables), por lo tanto son de fcil consecucin para el grupo que lo aplica como paralas personas que participan en el.Con el fin de evaluar el impacto generado por esta estrategia el equipo de trabajo desarrollo una her-ramienta que permite establecer el progreso de los estudiantes beneficiados en cuanto a los conocimientosde astronoma, la cual consiste en 2 formatos de encuesta por institucion: el primero diseado para losestudiantes antes y despus de cada visita, el cual permite evaluar los conceptos entorno a la astronomıaadquiridos en las actividades. El segundo se realiza a los docentes o directivos en una visita posterior,para evaluar la continuidad de los procesos acadmicos que surgen despus de la ejecucin del proyecto,como clubes de astronomıa, semanas de la ciencia y de la astronomıa, o la inclusin de esta rea dentro deldesarrollo de las asignaturas. La ejecucion del proyecto y la retroalimentacin a traves de la evaluacin delimpacto, han permitido perfeccionar las actividades de tal modo que se ajusten mejor a las condiciones deesta poblacin afectada dentro de la ciudad de Pereira, ademas permitira expandir la estrategia de la zonarural del rea metropolitana a los municipios del departamento de Risaralda-Colombia, dando a conocerla astronoma y la importancia de las ciencias que en ella confluyen, aportando al mejoramiento del niveleducativo y en la calidad de vida de los estudiantes.

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Astronomy Labs for the Visually ImpairedAllyson Bieryla

Astronomy Lab and Telescope Manager, Harvard University, USAabieryla@cfa.harvard.edu

Astronomy education and observational astronomy labs, in particular, have been lacking resources toaccommodate students with visual impairments. It is not that these resources do not exist but ratherthat the astronomy community is widely unaware of them or how to put them to use. We have begunto adapt our observational astronomy labs at Harvard University to accommodate students with visualimpairments. We do daytime observations of the sun using a heliostat and other tools, as well as night-time labs using a 0.4 meter DFM telescope. Using sound and thermoform printing technologies, we havestarted to adapt our labs so that students with visual impairments can now participate and analyze dataat the same time as other students enrolled in the class. An important part of the learning process ishaving a student interact with other students and for the student to be able to take and analyze data ingroups. Our goal is to make sure that every student, no matter the disability, can participate in the labsoffered.

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Web Accessibility and the Astrophysics Data SystemAlexandra Holachek, Alberto AccomazziNASA Astrophysics Data System, USA

email@email

As the main portal into the world of astronomy literature, the NASA Astrophysics Data System(ADS) has long served the community by providing a search system which can quickly be used to locatepapers by author, topic, astronomical objects, or any combination of the above. When ADS startedre-engineering its 20-year-old website, there was no question that basic accessibility was a fundamentalgoal. The true question was: how to make sure that a small developer team with no experience withaccessibility could create a half-decent accessible site? While our efforts are still ongoing, we have foundthat basic attention to HTML semantics, combined with the wealth of accessibility auditing tools and awillingness to fire up a screen reader when all else fails, has brought us closer to our ideal of a fully acces-sible site. This talk will feature a basic overview of web accessibility best practices before delving into theunique challenges that ADS has faced (and continues to face) in building an accessible, JavaScript-heavyfront end.

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Small Steps and Giant Leaps ? Astronomy Education and Data Accessibility forBlind and Visually Impaired Students

Kate MeredithDirector of Education Outreach, University of Chicago Yerkes Observatory, USA

email@email

For almost two decades the Sloan Digital Sky Survey has been a leader in data visualization inastronomy. The SkyServer tools have been the centerpiece of lessons that allow students with visualimpairments to use the SDSS database to explore astronomy concepts such as color, galaxy morphology,and the expansion of the universe. With the launch of the Voyages website, efforts have begun to makelessons more accessible to even more diverse classrooms and learners. The smaller steps in this processinvolves making website navigation and images more accessible to screen readers for students who are blindor visually impaired. Developing lessons that begin to scaffold hard-to-access concepts such as distancein space and providing tactile images offer another level of accessibility, but much more is possible. Bigleaps are predicted as we utilize the new SciServer tools that allow for the data retrieval using Pythonand partner with emerging efforts to sonify astronomical data. The SDSS EPO group looks forward toproviding an update our current efforts and receiving feedback from attendees about needs, trends, andcollaboration opportunities.

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Beyond the Three-Body ProblemNancy S. Brickhouse

Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambrige, USAnbrickhouse@cfa.harvard.edu

To solve the two-body career problem, each partner in a relationship finds a meaningful career, hope-fully not too distant from each other. A child adds a third body to challenge the work-life balance. Butwhen that child has a disability, parents really have to go beyond the standard model and create theirown unique solutions. The system they face is a complex maze in which medical, educational, and legalexpertise becomes critical for optimal outcomes.

In this presentation, I bring a perspective not only as the mother of a 26-year-old with an ”intellectualimpairment,” but also as a past member and chair of the Parent Advisory Council (PAC) for SpecialEducation in my local school district. PACs are mandated under state law in Massachusetts to adviseeach school board on issues facing special needs children. As a leader in the PAC I was often the firstperson struggling parents came to. I will describe some of the issues that parents face when trying tomanage the complex societal systems. Then I will give my thoughts on how to talk about ”disability”: dowe need the ”dis” how is the best way to obtain accommodations? when and how and to whom shouldone disclose? Finally, I want to acknowledge cultural differences in thinking about disability, and howthese might affect an international professional society moving forward. I will close with some tentativerecommendations.

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3D resources to teach Astronomy: an interdisciplinary approachBeatriz Garcıa

ITeDA - UTN Faculty Mendoza / IAU CC1, Argentinabeatriz.garcia@iteda.cnea.gov.ar

We present recent developments for teaching astronomy at all levels from modeling using 3D printing.The challenge is to be at the same time innovative and effective in transmitting knowledge. Part of thedescribed activity is related to mega exhibitions that allow an approach to various public which act asfocus groups to study impact of the proposal. The activity involves astronomers, designers and engineerswho work at the FabLab of the Institute, and develop projects based in the detection of areas of vacancyof tools and resources for education, thinking mainly in blind audiences.

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Using 3D prints to teach astronomy to the visually impairedThomas Madura

San Jose State University / NASA, USAtmadura@udel.edu

I will discuss recent progress towards developing a program to use 3D prints to help teach astronomyand astrophysics to blind and visually impaired students. The goal is to eventually develop a long termand sustainable solution for teaching astronomy to the visually impaired, motivating these students topursue Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) careers. This is accomplished bycreating Stereolithography files and curricula, at various grade levels, that can be delivered online andintegrated into school lesson plans. Work is performed in collaboration with NASA scientists, engineers,professional educators of visually impaired students, and blind consumers. In collaboration with andfunding from the South Carolina Commission for the Blind, we are preparing an initial science careersbased curriculum that will be delivered over a 3 to 4 day period during a 2 week program in June 2017.The initial 3 to 4 days will focus on hands-on career exploration in STEM careers through the completionof several activities designed to introduce students to the study of nebulae, stars, galaxies, planets, theorigin of the Universe, and the sonification of astronomy data. Students will be exposed to several NASAaffiliated ”Science Mentors” who will help the students learn about educational and career opportunitiesin STEM fields. Studies assessing the effectiveness of the 3D models and educational activities will beperformed and published. Our team consists of a blind NASA engineer and patent attorney (Mr. KennethSilberman), a blind astronomer (Dr. Wanda Diaz-Merced), and two professional astrophysicists at theforefront of using 3D printing for astronomy outreach and education (Drs. Thomas Madura and CarolChristian).

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On aural modalities within astronomy educationJamie Ferguson

University of Glasgow, Scotland, UKjfergusoncompsi@gmail.com

Astronomy has historically been a predominantly visual science, with almost all methods of edu-cating, communicating and researching the field relying exclusively on visually-centered resources andtools. Unfortunately, the visual modality is not fully accessible to all of those who wish to engage withastronomy and continued, ubiquitous reliance upon it is not only making the science inaccessible to alarge demographic of interested people, but it is also causing those who can fully experience visual mediato miss out on an engaging modality of interacting with and experiencing astronomy. Learners with avisual impairment (and those with certain reading disorders such as dyslexia) are currently at a severedisadvantage when beginning to learn about astronomy. Most schools begin discussions about basic as-tronomy from an early age and most sighted people continue to have the opportunity to be exposed torecent astronomy discoveries via communication in the media. Almost all teaching resources used arebased in the visual modality, therefore those who are visually impaired or have a reading impairmentcannot experience this fundamental introduction to astronomy and therefore cannot continue exploringthe science. However, the rapid increase of research into multimodal computer interaction technologiessuch as sonification (the use of sound to convert data) and haptic interaction (touch-based interactions)means that visual media is no longer the only option for interacting with astronomy. The ubiquity andlow cost of computing devices means that astronomy can now be accessed by more people than everbefore, therefore utilizing the opportunity to investigate how this technology may be used to increaseaccessibility to astronomy is essential. Furthermore, recent successful examples of audio based modalitiesin communicating astronomy news in the media such as the LIGO experiment?s detection of gravitationalwaves (*) and the Rosetta mission?s approach to comet 67P (**), have proved that audio has a placewithin astronomy education and communication and is a powerful learning resource. This talk will discussaudio based computer interaction technologies being developed which can be applied within astronomyeducation and communication to allow individuals with visual or reading impairments the availabilityto access the fundamental ideas of astronomy and moving forward, an equal quality and quantity ofastronomy resources.(*) https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/video/ligo20160211v2(**) https://blogs.esa.int/rosetta/2014/11/11/the-singing-comet

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Changing perceptions around inclusionRam Venugopal

IAU Office of Astronomy for Development, South Africakg@astro4dev.org

Very often the culture associated with issues of inclusion is one of ?doing someone a favour?. Eventhe word ?inclusion? seems to imply that by considering such issues one is doing a service to a partic-ular ?disadvantaged? group. At the IAU Office of Astronomy for Development we are trying to pusha di?erent approach to inclusion and accessibility. We are trying to encourage people and organisationsto acknowledge and appreciate the valuable contributions that diverse groups of people can make to anyorganisation, project or field. In other words, having greater gender representation in an organisation forexample, is not just about being kind to women, but recognising that such inclusion will actually benefitthe organisation technically through the diverse perspectives and opinions that are made available. Forpeople with disabilities for example, it is about realising that although someone may not be able to usesome senses, they could contribute much more to a particluar scientific field through their unique abilitiesin other areas. Not including diverse people should thus be seen as a disadvantage to that particularorganisation or field of science.

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iChair intelligent power wheelchairJesse Leaman

Gryphon Industries, USAjfl0132@gmail.com

The intelligent power wheelchair (iChair) is designed to assist people with mobility, sensory, andcognitive impairment lead a higher quality, more independent lifestyle. The iChair includes a powerwheelchair (PW), laptop computer, laptop mount, assistive technology, environmental sensors, software,and a custom plastic enclosure made with a 3D printer. Our solution will serve a wide variety of disabilitytypes by incorporating the best input methods into a multi-modal platform, mountable on almost anyPW. The HD camera and 3D scanner have been mounted in such a way that will provide reliable datawith the precision necessary to the detect obstacles, build 3D maps, follow guides, anticipate events, andprovide navigational assistance. We evaluate the human factors in the current prototype to ensure thatthe technology will be accepted by those it is designed to serve, and propose a wheelchair skills test forfuture trial participants.

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Tocando el CieloGerardo Cleofas Domınguez

Comite Nacional Noche de las Estrellas, Mexicogerardoc@ciencias.unam.mx

Tocando el Cielo es una propuesta de divulgacion de la Astronomıa que permite a personas con dis-capacidad ejercer su derecho a conocer su entorno, conocer temas especializados de la ciencia que porfalta de inters y recursos didcticos resulta difcil comprender. Inicialmente Tocando el Cielo surge como untaller de reconocimiento de constelaciones, hasta convertirse en un concepto que reune distintos tallerespara explicar diversos temas de Astronomıa; todos con la misma idea de ser totalmente accesibles parapersonas con discapacidad. Esta propuesta ha detonado en Mexico el interes de la atencion de las personascon discapacidad en el area de ciencias. Me gustarıa aportar al encuentro la experiencia y los materialesque he desarrollado para la enseanza de la Astronoma, esto podrıa ser mediante el taller Tocando el Cielo;el cual consiste en reconocer mediante el tacto algunas de las constelaciones representativas del hemisferionorte, las cuales son: Orion, Leo y Osa menor.La actividad se desarrolla con los ojos vendados. Aunque el taller est diseado para personas con dis-capacidad visual, el taller lo pueden tomar personas normo visuales. Se puede atender grupos de 10personas, dura un tiempo aproximado de 30 minutos como mnimo. El taller se desarrolla de la siguientemanera:Cubrimos los ojos de los participantes y se realiza un recorrido del espacio donde se estara trabajando;esto con la finalidad de sensibilizar a los participantes sobre la condicin de discapacidad (en Mexico esmuy importante esta dinamica ya que se necesita realizar este tipo de actividades para crear concienciadel tema). Posteriormente se les invita a tomar asiento y sobre una mesa nos apoyamos para poderutilizar un cuadernillo en escritura en Braille , donde se encontraran las constelaciones en relieve, tal ycomo los griegos las imaginaban sobre la boveda celeste. A la par de reconocer las constelaciones se vanarrando a los participantes las mitologıas de cada una de las constelaciones sobre el cuadernillo ası comolas caracterısticas mas importantes de las estrellas que las componen (intensidad luminosa, distancia,composicin de las estrellas etc.) Sin duda este taller podrıa aportar al encuentro elementos y materialesya probados que funcionan en la atencion de personas con discapacidad para la enseanza y aprendizajede la Astronomıa.

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Teaching high-standard disabled, planetary scientist and astronomers: developingteaching strategies for inclusive space science

Cassandra Runyon, Cyndi HallCollege of Charleston, U.S.A.

cass@cofc.edu

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