Mexican University holds Internet course for blind students
Translated from www.accesouniversal.net
The Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM - Technological and Higher Studies Institute of Monterrey), in Mexico, is developing an Internet course for sight-impaired students so as to allow them to study in those programs the university offers on-line.
According to Alejandro Cristerna, TESM's Navegación por Internet para Invidentes (Internet Navigating for the Sight-impaired) Project Director, this is the first time a university "offers a course of such characteristics in Mexico, and perhaps in Latin America."
Only 25 people have enrolled in the course at the moment, but Cristerna believes that "once the news spreads throughout, thousands of people will enroll both in Mexico and Latin America".
Cristerna explained to the local media that what sight impaired people need to do to enroll in this course is to get hold of a screen reader. This equipment runs for about US$700 to 1200, and "enables the computer to speak, i.e., to pronounce out loud everything on the screen."
The course costs about US$140 and lasts eight hours. Its Director asked "public institutions to support the blind by giving them computers so as to offer them tools for their participation in economically productive life and allow them to reach their professional and self-accomplishment goals."
Once the sight-impaired people are prepared to "navigate" the Internet, they might study the on-line programs offered by ITESM.
According to social organizations in Mexico, at least 2% of the population totaling about two million people have some form of disability and, among them, 200 thousand are sight impaired.
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