@Science Network International Conference: "Making Science Accessible"

We are glad to announce that the @Science Thematic Network conference - "Making science accessible: emerging opportunities for blind and partially sighted" will be held in Milan, Italy, on October 20th, 2008.

Location

Sala Maggiore
Centro Congressi FAST
piazzale Morandi 2
20121 Milano, Italy

How to reach the congress center

Conference Program

8:00 - 9:00 Registration

9:00 Welcome - prof. O. D'Antona, Scientific Director, Biblioteca di Informatica, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano (Italy)

9:15 Introduction: towards accessible science - G. Dalto, Director, Biblioteca di Informatica, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano (Italy); C. Bernareggi, Biblioteca di Informatica, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano (Italy)

Reading Scientific Information

Chair: V. Brigatti, Biblioteca di Informatica, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano (Italy)

9:30 Math Accessibility and MathPlayer - N. Soiffer, Design Science Inc. (USA)

10:00 UMCL: Providing Braille Transcription for Mathematical Applications - D. Archambault, Pierre et Marie Curie Université, Paris (France)

10:20 Coffee break

Producing Accessible Documents

Chair: B. Stoeger, Kepler University, Linz (Austria)

10:40 Multi-lingual Mathematical Document Recognition by InftyReader - M. Suzuki, Kyushu university (Japan)

11:10 Mathematics in DAISY Books - E. Persoon, Dedicon Netherlands (The Netherlands)

11:40 How to produce accessible educational resources - C. Bernareggi, Biblioteca di informatica, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano (Italy); V. Brigatti, Biblioteca di Informatica, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano (Italy)

12:10 Applications of Intelligent Systems to Enhancing Math Accessibility: A New Project - E. Pontelli, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, New Mexico (USA)

12:30 Lunch

Processing Mathematical Expressions

Chair: C. Bernareggi, Università degli Studi di Milano, Italy

13:40 Using AutOMathic Blocks to Teach Math Braille to Children - A. Karshmer, San Francisco University, San Francisco, California (USA)

14:00 LAMBDA system: the Italian experience - E. Bortolazzi, VEIA Srl, Verona (Italy); G. Rossi, Istituto dei Ciechi di Milano (Italy)

14:15 First experiences with using LAMBDA editor in Slovak environment - P. Lecky, Comenius University, Bratislava (Slovakia); M. Hornansky, Comenius University, Bratislava (Slovakia)/National Chiao Tung University (Taiwan)

14:30 BlindMath: A Scientific Editor For Blind Users: Testing Results - A. Pepino, C. Freda, Università Federico II, Napoli (Italy)

14:45 MAWEN: Mathematical Working Environment for Blind Users - B. Stoeger, Kepler university, Linz (Austria)

15:00 Experiences in using computation programs: Mathematica and Matlab - S. Cesaretti, Università di Urbino, Urbino (Italy)

Access to Graphics

Chair: A. Karshmer, San Francisco University, San Francisco, California (USA)

15:15 Toward Multimodal Notation for Mathematics: a first step - L.
Parasiliti, Laboratorio di Semiotica Computazionale, Università degli Studi
di Milano, Milano (Italy), C. Comaschi, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano (Italy); C. Bernareggi, Biblioteca di Informatica, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano (Italy)

15:30 AudioTact: autonomous exploration of mathematical functions for blind
students - T. Barbieri, L. Sbattella, L. Mosca, Politecnico di Milano, Milano (Italy); A. Piovani, F. Sordi, Istituto dei Ciechi di Milano (Italy)

15:45 Coffee break

Accessible Scientific Resources

Chair: N. Soiffer, Design Science Inc., USA

16:10 Accessibility of Online Scientific Resources - C. Strobbe, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven (Belgium)

16:30 Converting arXiv into XHTML+MathML: an opportunity for blind and partially sighted to access scientific papers - M. Kohlhase, Jacobs University, Bremen, (Germany); C. Bernareggi, Biblioteca di Informatica, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milan (Italy)

16:50 How to Use JEM to Educate About Accessible Science - O. Caprotti, University of Helsinki, Department of Mathematics and Statistics/JEM Thematic Network Manager, Helsinki (Finland)

University Support Services

Chair: B. Stoeger, Kepler University, Linz, Austria

17:10 Ufficio Disabilità dell'Università di Milano - O. Neri, Ufficio Disabilità, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano (Italy)

17:30 Academic support for studying with visual impairment at Comenius University in Bratislava and at Moldova State University in Chisinau - E. Mendelova, Comenius University (SK); N. Cuciuc, Moldova State University (MD)

17:45 "Integriert Studieren": supporting students with disabilities at the University of Linz - B. Stoeger, R. Ossmann, Kepler university, Linz (Austria)

18:00-19:00 Final discussion and demo

Simultaneous translation English/Italian and vice versa will be available.

The participation is open and free.