ENSC27 Braille Refresh
Team Members: Joseph Wilson, Caitlin Croskrey,
Ingrid Stansberry, Mark Rawson
Faculty Advisor: Bob Conley
Sponsors: Gonzaga University's Center for Engineering Design & Entrepreneurship and the KEEN Foundation
Liaisons: Jason Varnadow, Emily Stevenson
Project Overview: Persons with disabilities are often overlooked when planning new technology. This project is aimed at helping visually impaired students who often have limited access to written course material and digital media. Motivated by the Jesuit values of social justice and community service, this student proposed project will work to help the population that has been excluded from the exponential grown in the technology sector.
Summary Statement of Project Goal: The goal of the project is to design and build a full page of refreshable braille display.
Project Deliverables: The end product will be a table styled electronic device that will be configured to convey information through the medium of the braille langue.
Management & Communication Expectations: Weekly meetings during the semester.
Timeline: First-half of Fall Semester: Basic conceptual design complete and business plan complete.
Second-half of Fall: first software and hardware prototype complete
First-half of Spring Semester: Design refinement, generation of a fully functioning product.
Second-half of Spring Semester: Product documentation, marketing strategies, and product promotion.
Research Expectations: Currently the only available refreshable braille display costs approximately $3,000 and contains just 18-80 cells of braille displayed as a single line. The only method of displaying large amounts of text and tactile graphics is to print the information out on paper which is extremely expensive and requires a lot of space. The braille display that this group intends to build will allow the display of tactile graphics and multiple lines of reference as well as being both portable and affordable.