CCAC Invites Your Own Blogpost Re Captioning – To Spread the Words (Not for this CCAC Blog). A New CCAC CAP

NEW CCAC CAP!

IN our CCAC membership forum online, a most active community for captioning advocacy, we do not publish blog posts by members. They publish those themselves.

AND there are some members, and others, who publish great posts on their own blogs about captioning advocacy, captioning news. captioning services, and captioning products (we use the word captioning for all sorts of speech to text services and products, internationally).

SO – here’s an idea for a new CCAC CAP (captioning advocacy project) and to continue the collaborative culture of the CCAC as a “hub” to share information to push the CCAC agenda forward:

IF you publish a new blogpost about captioning, send the URL to CCAC Member Raj: bsr368@gmail.com
Please make a note of that email address

Raj will create a monthly list of the URL’s, and then the CAC will do some distribution of those posts, to all hundreds of CCAC members, on social media, and perhaps in the CCAC newsletters also.

Spread the news above! Let’s do this new sort of networking to work together in a new way. We all want inclusion of quality captioning (subtitling) in all the important places (the CCAC ten categories of life).

ls/ccac
If you are interested in joining the CCAC, we’ll welcome you. To share your blogposts re captioning, membership is not a requirement. Yet why not join and belong, it’s free. Go to the CCAC web, http://ccacaptioning.org and click on the join page.

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Fun Facts for CCAC

Since going live in the middle of March 2012 with the new CCAC website, South Dakota is the only state in the USA from which no one has visited the site. Anyone have a friend in South Dakota?

Visitors have come from 79 countries, which is about 40% of all of the countries in the world. Let’s make that 80% soon, or more! Anyone have a friend at the United Nations?

Join the CCAC if you support the mission of advocacy for inclusion of quality captioning universally. You belong with us. Free membership. Numbers count! Go to http://ccacaptioning.org, fill out the short form for “consumer” or “provider” and we’ll welcome you.

Captioning for Literacy!

An important reminder about the importance of captioning inclusion for learning to read. This is a Guest Blog (see authors and organization below) edited for inclusion here, with a photo selected from CCAC files.

Free TV Captions for Learning to Read — Who do you know who needs help learning to read?

– A three year old who needs print aware­ness to start kindergarten?

– A 4th grader in the bottom half of the class who can’t yet read at a basic level?

– An underprivileged youth thinking of dropping out of high school?

– A newly arrived immigrant family who needs to learn to read English?

Free TV Captions help millions in other countries. In a brief video, former President Bill Clinton, at his Clinton Global Initiative, praises using television’s same language subtitles to teach 150 million in India to read. See the Clinton video that comes up as you open http://www.captionsforliteracy.org along with a short video of a young boy learning to read and write with free TV captions.

Free TV Captions help learning to read. Free TV captions create an unrivaled opportunity for learners of any age to connect the sound of the spoken word with the sight of the printed word in the context of the action unfolding on the screen to explain and reinforce the meaning. When the average child watches television 4 to 7 hours a day in any event, turning on free TV captions provides thousands of hours a year to extend their classroom lessons by practicing reading at home.

What You Can Do Now — We ask you to tell all your trainees, staff, teachers, families and children about free TV captions. Include TV captions as a resource in your website and publications. Teach them all how to turn on TV captions by using the set’s menu.

Don’t forget that without requiring further expenditures in computers or Internet subscriptions, free TV captions are available in 97% of American households because they already have television sets.

Federal legislation is in place, and the research has been done. Since January 2006, phased federal mandates, enforced by the FCC (initially for the deaf), require free TV captions to be available 20 out of 24 hours a day on virtually all programs on almost all stations including cable. Though legislation makes TV captions free for viewers, they’re expensive for the producers providing the captions. It seems scandalous to squander the price producers pay to provide TV captions free to viewers but not to let viewers know of their availability and their educational power.

Distributed by C A P T I O N S F O R L I T E R A C Y, a 501(c)(3) charitable trust, John Yeatman Taggart, Trustee and Director and Laura Lou Meadows, Trustee and Executive Director. Email: C A P T I O N S L I T E R A C Y @ H O T M A I L . C O M
W E B S I T E: W W W. C A P T I O N S F O R L I T E R A C Y . O R G

Follow Up on New Captioning Advocacy Project

Here’s some added information to our prior blog, now with list of companies many members in CCAC have contacted, and vigoruosly and regularly, in earlier months also. The new ingredient here is a call for one day of social media action, to focus attention on this on 6th June.

We’ve invited the folks organizing this to join the CCAC with hundreds of members who may want to participate with a word or two of encouragement directly from the organizers.

Important to keep in mind that captioning is not only for “hearing people” who don’t know signing. Captioning inclusion is vital for the world! Captioning is the language of mega- millions of deaf, deafened, and people with hearing loss who speak and do not use signing, and captioning is used by millions of others for other good reasons, e.g. language and learning needs.

Go to blog of Deaf Politics: http://blog.deafpolitics.org/2012/05/captionthis-social-media-movement.html
to read more.

Welcome to new Captioning Advocacy Project!

Let’s help make this go viral, and the day a big success! And we invite them into the CCAC of course!

Combining energies, supporting all the many good groups and teams and individuals working toward access via captioning for all is a good thing to do. We hope to learn more about this project as it develops. Cheers for them!

Join the CCAC from our web – Free Membership – bring along a crowd. If we combine numbers, imagine what we can accomplish. CCAC already doing a large number of captioning advocacy projects, every day! The newsletter and the film are two major larger ccac caps (captioning advocacy projects). Join us, we’ll welcome all who support the CCAC mission. Go to http://ccacaptioning.org

AARP Heard CCAC Advocacy – Now Access Online with Captioning

APPLAUSE for AARP! Their educational webinars online, and some of the videos online too, are now accessible with inclusion of quality captioning!

Check out this beautiful video for an example, click on the “CC” box to start the text. Enjoy:

http://www.aarp.org/all_videos/

About a year ago, two active advocates in CCAC (also members of AARP) initiated some advocacy. None of the AARP webinars were captioned, and it was now possible to include captioning with new technologies, offered by many companies worldwide. After a “test” with our feedback last May, AARP began designing webinars with captioning for all.

How great is this?! We say it’s hugely important due to so many members in AARP, and many millions in the USA and other places too, who are vulnerable to hearing loss and acquired deafness. Older age often comes along with hearing issues (not always), yet hearing loss is common also in younger ages! For example, the adult children of older citizens who want to learn online too.

Captioning also allows people whose first language may not be English to follow much more of what is taught and discussed online.
We hope AARP sees our applause! Hears it 🙂 also.
Cheers,
ls/ccac

Join the CCAC and participate in advocacy going on all the time, in smaller and larger ways. We want your membership! (free). Bring along a few friends with you, all the better for the CCAC to continue and grow. Join from the web: http://Ccacaptioning.org, click on “become a member.” Thanks!

Only 280 Certified CART Providers in USA?

HEAR THIS:

In CCAC member discussions today, it’s said, “According to the RID online database, there are 9,611 certified interpreters in the United States. According to the NCRA online database, there are 280 certified CART providers in the United States.”

What? We know there are more providers of CART and similar services than are certified and in NCRA (who sets the standard of excellence). Yet even if twice as many? Three times the small number above? – Come on into the CCAC and add your voice to increase these numbers. Shall we do as much as volunteer advocates can do? Are you with us?

Join here: http://ccacaptining.org
Comments welcome. Lots already in CCAC on facebook pages. Check it out there too.
Prefer a private email? Ccacaptioning@gmail.com

P.S. These numbers may seem huge to other countries with us. Think about it however- the USA is a huge country. 50 States. Reportedly with 46 million citizens with hearing loss or deafness now.

CART for Jury Duty – It’s Required for Effective Communication

IF YOU need real time captioning (CART) to serve on a Jury (in the USA), ask for it and obtain it. If the request meets any confusion, contact the ADA person for the Court.

Need more information? Join and read the great discussion in CCAC membership this month with specific information, encouragement, and support from others who understand.

http://Ccacaptioning.org is the place.

If you communicate effectively and fully with other resources, good for you. If you know CART will give you verbatim full speech to text for participation in this important public service, ask for it.

Good News on Real Time Captioning from Asia-Pacific

Some very good news about real time captioning development in the Asia – Pacific region of our world. Special thanks to CCAC member SkyAngela for our chat online today and sending us this newsletter. See page six in the link for the story and photo too.

Go to: http://www.apcdfoundation.org/?q=content%2Fnewsletter-volume-38

Readers – please join us in the CCAC – add your name to official membership today. Easy to do from our web. http://ccacaptioning.org
Why? Inclusion of quality captioning is not an easy task. There are so many who do not understand our needs, in so many places across the USA and many other countries. It takes many voices together to teach and advocate. The CCAC is the place. One long time member and very active advocate on the East Coast of the USA said today in membership discussions online, “We sound like some very savvy advocates – and I think that we spur each other along comparing notes like this!” -Exactly :-).

Barnard College Confirms Graduation Captioning Online: Yes! President of USA is Speaker.

We are told that Commencement May 14 – soon! – will be shown live online and with access via captioning. Good news! Spread the words – http://barnard.edu/commencement

Check your system to watch with many here: http://barnard.edu/commencement/webcast

Thanks to at least one “pesky person” who is a graduate of Barnard College, the event on Monday, May 14th will be captioned online! Access is vital for many of us.

You know who the speaker is? The President of the USA. Proud of the College for doing this. After emails and using social media, captioning for the streamed video was confirmed the other day. Special thanks to Frances :-).

Join the CCAC – your interest in Communication Access for all is vital. Add your name – free membership. Go to http://ccacaptioning.org