ASSISTIVE TECHNOLOGY CENTER
The Society’s Technology Center has a wide range of technology for demonstration and training. We have technology services in the following areas: computer software, cell phones, tablets, landlines, and wearable devices.
Computers
ZoomText is a program that allows the user to magnify the screen to their preferred settings, enhance color, and will read information on the screen to promote optimal computer use for low vision.
JAWS is a program for individuals who are blind that helps them independently navigate the computer. It is done through using keyboard strokes and listening to the screen reader to do computer related tasks.
Cell Phones & Tablets
We provide services to enhance your current cell phone or tablet use through the adjustment of accessibility settings. If even after that adjustment it isn’t accessible, we are providers for a state program called MO TAP-W in which qualifying individuals can get a more accessible phone or tablet.
Landlines
The Society offers large button and high contrast phones in our Aids and Appliances store for increased accessibility. We are also providers for Missouri TAP-T a program that can help fund an accessible landline phone.
Wearable Technology
- Orcam is a device that can be used to read text to you, identify faces, identify currency, tell time/date. Orcam MyEye 2.0 has all of these features and attaches to the side of your glasses. (Note, it does not enhance vision.) Orcam Read reads the printed or electronic text in front of you.
- Iris Vision is a set of virtual reality goggles that can be used to watch TV, read, and see the world around you. This device uses magnification, color filters, and RP mode in which the entire image is moved to the central vision.
Most individuals are eligible for funding from a state program for training in the Assistive Technology Center. For others, small fees are charged on a sliding scale based on income and expenses. Thanks to the generosity of Society donors, no one is denied technology services if unable to afford the minimal fees.
Tech Talk Tuesday Newsletter
In this day and age, technology is constantly evolving and changing.
Here at the Society, we aim to help our clients navigate and use this ever-changing technology with confidence and ease. In doing so, we present Tech Talk Tuesdays, a forum where we highlight different technologies, their functions, and their uses. This is an educational-based idea, that will help to keep our clients informed and cultivated to the different technological capabilities they have at their fingertips.
The forum will be delivered via email to all recipients on the Society’s email list; and will contain helpful tech tips on technology use, as well as an audible podcast with an overview of information. Archives of the tech talks will live here, within the Assistive Technology section of our website.
Familiarity, poise, and confidence are needed to use technology effectively; especially for individuals who are blind or visually impaired.
We aim to help our clients achieve these attributes through our Tech Talk Tuesdays.
