Dyslexia - Day in the Life with James Rose

Dyslexia is often misunderstood as simply a reading or spelling issue, but James Rose helps make clear that it affects comprehension, writing, communication, confidence, and the everyday problem-solving required to move through school, work, family life, and technology. In this episode, James shares how dyslexia shaped his early learning experiences, how it still affects his work as a senior web developer, and why formatting, white space, captions, AI, and thoughtful communication can make such a meaningful difference.

James Rose works at the University of Michigan in the Office of Development, supporting digital tools including event management systems and the university’s giving website. In this conversation, James talks openly with Taylor about growing up without a clear dyslexia diagnosis, the frustration of written instructions, the challenge of note-taking, and the ways dyslexia can compound under stress. He also shares how he uses captions, audiobooks, AI, and visual problem-solving to support how he reads, writes, works, and communicates.

This episode is warm, practical, and refreshingly honest. James and Taylor find common ground across different disabilities, from the mental work of processing information to the importance of accessible design, flexible tools, and being able to laugh through the moments that do not go smoothly.

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Taylor: 00:01

Welcome to the Day in the Life series on the Accessible Community Podcast, where we explore disability and accessibility in everyday life. Each podcast episode is a new lens to broaden our understanding and drive inclusion. For show notes, go to accessiblecommunity.org slash podcasts. Let's make accessibility part of every day. Welcome, everyone, to a new episode of Day in the Life. In this episode, we're going to be talking about dyslexia, which I found really interesting when I was researching it to better understand the topic before the interview. I learned that it's classified as a learning disability, among other things, which I found very interesting. For so long, I assumed it would be a visual impairment because it has to do with eyes and perceiving, but we'll get more into that. I'm looking forward to the conversation. As usual, my name is Taylor Dorward, and I'm your host for this series. I'm a Caucasian male with short brown hair, a white T-shirt, and a red, white, blue, and tan plaid flannel layered over top. I also have a short brown beard. That's it about me for now, but I'd love to turn it over to James, who's going to introduce himself, and then we'll get into it.

James: 01:35

Thank you, Taylor. My name is James Rose. I work at the University of Michigan in the Office of Development. My role is senior web developer in product management. I'm a Caucasian male wearing a light blue plaid flannel shirt. I'm told that it's light blue. I do have a little bit of colorblindness as well, so my wife and I argue about browns and greens all the time.

Taylor: 02:12

Nice. Well, we match with the plaid flannels. Thank you for that, James. I look forward to diving deeper into what you do, you as a person, and all that kind of stuff. Just to clarify, you said James Rose, like the flower?

James: 02:37

Absolutely, yes.

James: 02:44

Sure. I work for the Office of Development, which is the fundraising and giving side of the University of Michigan. Our team is the IT department for the Office of Development, so we support any computer needs or digital needs the office has. Specifically, I support a couple of platforms, including Cvent, which is our event management platform, and our giving site, which is giving.umich.edu. I help with any needs around those platforms.

Taylor: 03:32

Awesome. That's pretty cool. What kind of initiatives do they do there? Is it student life, giving back to students, the community, or both?

James: 03:45

All of the above. We are responsible for any gifts, whether that's five dollars or ten million dollars. It is all processed through the Office of Development. Some of it is on campus, and some of it is donated on a website like giving.umich.edu.

Taylor: 04:19

Nice. Well, as you know, and as anyone listening knows by now, today's topic is dyslexia. To start, I'd love to know: when did you find out you had dyslexia, and what was that process like?

James: 04:37

I didn't really understand it until I was much older, probably in my teens. Learning to read and write in elementary school was really difficult. I remember the first time picking up a book in first grade and having the teacher assistant listen to me read. Reading out loud was so difficult. Reading the words and comprehending what I read was very difficult, and my grades showed it as well. But I wasn't diagnosed with dyslexia. It was more, “He's just poor at reading and writing. He just needs a lot more of it. Let's keep piling it up until he gets it.”

Taylor: 05:47

Yeah, unfortunately, that's something I've heard from pretty much everyone I've spoken with about dyslexia, whether it was on this podcast or not. Earlier on, especially in elementary school and early schooling, dyslexia often gets labeled as a learning impairment, and people say, “Oh, well, they're just a little slower.” I think part of that is a lack of awareness, but I would imagine that was a very difficult thing to deal with. Definitely.

James: 06:21

When someone like the teacher handed out a paper to complete and it had instructions on it, I found that a lot of other students were very quick at completing it and turning in their work, whereas I was just struggling to understand what the written instructions were. It was hard to read the words and comprehend what was meant. With dyslexia, you may read the word incorrectly, so your idea of what was being asked is incorrect. Writing is very difficult, too. Trying to write something down and getting stuck on a word, even though you've written it a thousand times, can stop you. The word “receive,” for example. I have no idea if I comes before E or E comes before I. Even if I can write it the right way, I might write it the wrong way when I think I've written it correctly.

Taylor: 07:51

Yeah, I don't have dyslexia, and I still mess up “perceive.” I always mess it up.

James: 07:59

Yeah. I can't even spell the word dyslexia. When I look at it, I spell it the way it sounds to me. Thank goodness for autocorrect. Sometimes autocorrect says, “What are you trying to say?” It's that bad.

Taylor: 08:21

Or it'll think you meant something completely different. Absolutely. That's been a really fun part for me doing a lot of these interviews, whether I've been talking about dyslexia, autism, or ADHD. I have cortical blindness, but I've been able to find so many parallels in how we perceive things, how we get around barriers, and how they affected us when they first started becoming more apparent as disabilities. I find it really fascinating. I've had a lot of fun connecting with people, even though they have different impairments. It's just amazing how similar they can still be in some ways.

James: 09:14

Absolutely. I find it more of a mental struggle to go through and try to solve the problem of reading and writing. It's not simply seeing something incorrectly; it's your brain that sees it incorrectly, right? Trying to get what you see into your mind, then trying to say that out loud, is a barrier for me. As you may notice, there's a lot of stuttering and pauses. My brain has to comprehend what was said or what was written, then I have to digest that, see those words in my mind, and try to organize it.

Taylor: 10:22

Interesting. That reminds me of something I struggle with called visual discrimination. We have these visual processing factors, and the one most people have heard of is acuity, like 20/20 vision. I actually have 20/20 vision, but it's in a small pinhole of my vision. I can read, but it takes a long time. It's almost like looking through a microscope at one letter at a time. I slowly scan the page. With visual discrimination, I can see the objects around me, but my brain has a hard time understanding what they are. For example, I may walk up to a table and see there is a yellow object in the center. I can see clear, defined edges, but I just can't understand what it is. Is that similar to how dyslexia works? Can you see it, but just not perceive it in some way?

James: 11:40

Absolutely. I don't have the best vision either without glasses. It wasn't until first or second grade that someone said, “Hey, maybe he needs glasses. Maybe that's why he can't read.” But I still have dyslexia, so it was like compound issues, right? Certain font styles, how words look, and how they're laid out really do help. I love large words and larger fonts because I read really slowly. That gives me a chance to look at something and organize it in my mind. Along those lines, with note-taking, if I'm in a meeting or a lecture, I'm a terrible note-taker. I can leave a meeting that was amazing and full of information, and I have three words written down because one of the words I'm trying to write is a blocker. I can't spell that word, and with dyslexia, it stops me in my tracks. Meanwhile, the conversation keeps going, and then I'm thinking, “Wait a second, what did you say? Where am I? What's going on?” That's what's happening in my mind, and I'm already so far behind. So it's amazing to watch people take notes. Yeah, I agree.

Taylor: 14:01

Yeah, that's another similarity. I wish I could take notes. It would be so helpful, especially during meetings. People will be talking, and I'll think, “Oh, I have an idea on that. I want to comment on that.” I'm trying to hold it all in my brain, and I've gotten good at that, but then I realize I'm no longer listening to what they're saying. I'm focusing on keeping that in my brain so I don't forget it. Going back to what you were just saying, I'm really interested to know: are there certain commonly used words that are most difficult for you? We talked about “receive,” but are there any words that are commonly used that are especially hard, or vice versa, that might be a little easier?

James: 14:53

I wouldn't say anything in particular. It could be any word at any time. Even writing my introduction and what I wanted to say, I could misspell my name. Well, that one I kind of know, but with words in general, it's hard to explain. A word like “management” may have too many E's, or maybe not enough. I don't know. Certain words will look correct to me and still stop me.

Taylor: 15:53

Does your stress level affect how much dyslexia affects you?

James: 16:03

Oh, absolutely. Here's a great example. This past week, I had to install a toilet. I've done it before, but I wanted to get it done, and I was under time pressure because we had other things to do. I had to read those instructions longer than it actually took me to install the toilet because I kept thinking, “What does that mean? You are not making sense. What are those words saying to me?” There are always pictures, so that's my go-to. Videos and pictures are good for me, but a couple of their pictures just didn't make sense. Like, who drew that? That's true.

Taylor: 17:10

Yeah, and the picture only makes sense if you understand all the text. Absolutely. Everything can't just be “bolt A,” right?

James: 17:25

When you have four different bolts, right? They're different sizes. Yeah.

Taylor: 17:37

Going back to your job a little bit, how does dyslexia affect you day to day, with any of the daily tasks you need to do, and how do you get around those?

James: 17:49

A lot of my tasks are answering emails, texts, Google chats, or whatever comes up. Someone may have a problem in the event management system, and I have to read what they're asking, visualize what the ask is, log in, and visually run through where the issue is. I need to see what their issue is before I can give them an answer. Then I can write down the answer, like, “Here's how you fix your problem,” and double-check that what I've written makes sense and is easy for them to comprehend. A simple task could be, “Turn this thing on,” “Turn that off,” or “Read that setting.” For most people, that simple reply might take five minutes. For me, it may take 25 to 30 minutes to understand what they're asking, solve it, and visually look at it before I can give the written answer. That slows down the process a lot.

Taylor: 19:45

Yeah, I get that. Digital communication can be a challenge as well. I'd love to know, do you use a screen reader for some things?

James: 19:57

Actually, on YouTube videos I watch, and in some movies, I use closed captions. Not a screen reader—closed captions. Over the years, listening while watching the words has helped me organize reading.

Taylor: 20:35

Oh yeah, that's another really cool thing, because I'm the same way. If I hear the word, my brain can piece it together: “Oh, that is what it is.” For me, like I said, it's like looking through a pinhole one letter at a time, but once my brain knows the word, it kind of illuminates the whole word. That's another really interesting similarity in how we perceive things.

James: 21:06

When you asked me if my last name was Rose, R-O-S-E, the way I pronounce it, I think I say “Rose,” but everybody's like, “Is it Rhodes with a D? Like R-H-O-A-D-S?” And I'm like, “No, that's not it.”

Taylor: 21:27

When you said it, it sounded like Rhodes, but I knew it was Rose, so I wanted to make sure our listeners knew as well.

James: 21:40

To go back to your question about screen readers, our team is responsible for a lot of accessibility work. There are experts on our team, and I know it because I've learned it as part of web design. I've used screen readers, and sometimes they can be painfully bad when it comes to websites. Or it may not be the screen reader itself—it may be whoever built the website and didn't make it accessible. After a while, it gets tedious. You're like, “I just can't hear that voice anymore.”

Taylor: 22:45

Yeah, I get that. When I'm working, I always have my earbud in, and my screen reader is going crazy. For the most part, I have it turned off during calls because it's way too distracting. I have it at about 175% speed, so it's just raining in my ear, and I'm like, “Oh, shut up.” With screen readers, I've heard some people with dyslexia use them to make reading digitally a little quicker. But depending on which screen reading software you're using, there can be a fairly steep learning curve.

James: 23:28

I can see how it can be intimidating and almost feel like it's not worth the trouble, because it can be a lot. Along those lines, I love audiobooks. Listening to audiobooks compared to reading a book is so much easier for me. It is difficult for me to read a book. I did read the first three Dune books when I was younger, and a lot of those words are difficult anyway—new words, planets, and all of that. But it's one of my favorite books, and it's a big, chunky book. It may have taken me a year just to get through book one, but I loved it.

Taylor: 24:29

So then reading it more and more, you kind of get into a rhythm. You're almost memorizing more than reading. Yeah, I get that. Again, it's very similar for me. If my brain knows what to expect, it can take a lot less time to get that reading done because it can fill in those gaps quicker. It's almost like my brain has autocorrect—not exactly, but like when you're typing on an iPhone and it suggests words. My brain is doing that. It'll think, “You're reading this word,” when I'm only three letters in. Sometimes it gets it wrong, which can be like, “Wait, no, that doesn't make sense. Let's try that again.” I go back, and then, all right, I was a little off there. It's not flawless, but it helps me read a little quicker.

James: 25:39

I love watching people skim through a document and understand it. I'm skimming through and getting, “A, A, A.” That's about what I get out of it.

Taylor: 25:52

Like, “I could tell there were seven steps. I saw seven numbers.” Whenever it comes to reading physical documents, it's very challenging.

James: 26:06

What is the difference for you between reading digital text versus physical text? For me, with digital text, I use a similar approach to pointing to words like you used to do as a kid while reading across the page. I kind of do that with my mouse digitally. That way, I can highlight the words as I'm going through and trying to understand them. With emails, someone may say four words, and to me, the meaning of those four words doesn't make any sense until I have more context. Then I realize, “Oh, have a wonderful weekend. Thanks.” Before that, I might think, “What am I swimming this weekend?”

Taylor: 27:17

I have no idea what you're asking, right? So what advice would you have for anyone emailing someone they know has dyslexia? Are there strategies that make it easier to read?

James: 28:05

I find that breaking up the idea helps. Everybody likes to write in paragraphs, but I understand better in sentences, almost like bullet points. Bringing it to a bullet-point idea in the email is the way I look at it and understand it. That's how I try to break something down. If someone is sending me an email or an invitation, I'll go back to our event platform. All our event planners love center-aligned text. When it's a date, a place, or a time, those can be centered. But when you're giving information in a paragraph, it should be left aligned. It drives me insane, but it's also good accessibility. My example is: have you ever read a book that was center aligned? There's a reason books are left aligned. That's how our brains read. I also love white space. Breaking up ideas gives my brain a second to pause. If someone writes, “Hey, we have to fix this and do that because of this, and this person ordered that,” I'm like, “What?” I have to copy that text, space it out, and give it breathing room for my brain. I can't comprehend a lot of information quickly.

Taylor: 29:57

Interesting. I get that as well. The alignment of text can be very effective. Anything I create, like PowerPoints or emails, is usually left aligned. I don't read manually that much, but when I do, it's so hard to read when the text isn't left aligned. Often, I'll read one line, backtrack on the same line, go down to line two, read all the way across, backtrack on line two, and then drop down again. Having that left alignment can really help. One thing I hate seeing is justified text alignment. I'm like, “What in the world is this?” It looks so crazy.

James: 30:58

It has inconsistent spacing. With email, I'm part of support, so that's basically what I'm doing: supporting anyone who needs help. Personally, I feel like I need to solve that problem immediately, so that adds to it. I'm hurrying through what I'm reading instead of taking the time to slowly digest what is being asked.

Taylor: 31:35

So that's not necessarily a dyslexia issue, but it adds on to it as well. It's always an added challenge when things compound and make it even more difficult. I want to take a moment to move away from dyslexia for a little bit and learn more about you as a person. What are some things you like to do outside of your job at the university, like hobbies or spending time with family and friends?

James: 32:18

I started doing taekwondo about five years ago. Both my boys started when they were four. I have a 22-year-old now and a 16-year-old. We got our oldest into taekwondo, and he still does it. He teaches at the school as well, and he's going for his fifth-degree black belt in November, so he'll be considered a master at that point. My youngest is getting his third degree, also in November, because that's when our promotion is. I'm going for a second degree at the moment. That's basically two times a week for us, a couple hours at the dojo. My oldest, who teaches, has working shifts as well as his training shifts, so that takes up a lot of our time. As far as hobbies, my wife and I, when we have the time, try to go find a dance somewhere. We just went line dancing last night. That was my first time doing country line dancing, but she has gone several times. Normally, she would go on Wednesday nights, and Wednesday night is one of the nights we do karate.

Taylor: 34:14

So she's been going alone, and last night they moved it to Thursday, so she asked, “Are you going to come along?” So we did that. And music—I love going to concerts and seeing shows.

James: 34:31

It ranges. I grew up loving Genesis, Peter Gabriel, and Phil Collins, and then moved into the heavier side, like grunge. I love Stone Temple Pilots, Alice in Chains, and Soundgarden. Those are some of my biggest favorites. My youngest son loves music as well, and he's gotten me into someone like Tyler, the Creator, who we went to see last year or the year before. It was an amazing show. I was blown away by his creativity—hence his name. I also love older music. I was going to say Gary Numan. I love watching Gary Numan. I don't know if you know who he is; he did “Cars,” which was a big hit way back when. Depeche Mode, too. My brother and I used to own a record store in Detroit for a few years, and that was basically techno and house music. We used to promote a lot of the early rave scenes in Detroit and worked those events. Pretty much every abandoned building in Detroit, we either threw a party there or our friends did.

James: 39:19

Absolutely. Yes, it's great. He always said that if he didn't run his dojo, he would be a teacher, so he loves teaching. That changed his philosophy at one point. He grew up in the '70s with that “punch, punch, hit, hit” kind of karate—blood, blood, more blood, the better. When he saw his own children being put through that, he thought, “That's not how I raise my kids at home. Why am I doing it at my school?” So he changed how the school does everything. For a long time, he had students and masters teaching at the dojo, and in the last four or five years he said, “Well, I'm the teacher. Why am I not teaching?” So he's more on the floor now again, not just running the business, but doing what he loves to do.

Taylor: 40:36

So and again not not not just teaching forms but teaching the values in life that in community yeah and uh any chance I get I like to always talk about that kind of stuff because martial arts can get like a bad rap um from like misrepresentation and media and stuff like that. And like a lot of people say why do I why should I put my kids in there I don't want them to become bullies but there's actually a lot of studies that prove the opposite that if kids learn martial arts they learn how to control their emotions and know it's okay to be able to win a fight but know that it's more important to avoid one. Absolutely learn learning how to defuse a situation yeah yeah absolutely like and that's one of the many great things that they will teach the kids and I think it's just an amazing lesson for a a lot of a lot of young kids to learn. And um similar to you I also love music and Mark and I shared that as well we like we talked about our mutual like singing and doing that kind of stuff. I had the great pleasure actually you know last year Mark and I did um a session on accessibility at Cvent Connect that was 2025 and Cvent asked him back again this year so he also presented again um on accessibility and on a personal note uh was able to spend time with him and his wife out at a show the songwriter's show in Nashville this year so that was just a few weeks ago so love Mark Miller without it oh nice yeah I'm looking forward like I haven't known for too long but I've really enjoyed talking to him and getting to know him and I'm looking forward to meeting him in person because I'll be at M Enabling Summit this year in Virginia and he'll be there be there so I'm looking forward to to meeting him and chatting with him more yeah he's a fun guy he's a great guy yeah um so when you're doing uh the taekwondo uh like for me it's a really nice stress relief and getting gets me out of my head and it's something that I can do well at and grow at where I don't feel like my visual impairment affects me nearly as much and in certain situations I feel like it's a benefit not being able to see what's going on and more used to understanding body movements and the feel. So I'm curious for you with dyslexia does doing taekwondo or any other of your hobbies allow you to not focus on that and just get out of your head and or does it affect it in certain ways?

James: 43:56

It definitely gets you out of your head because you're so focused on your body and trying to control it a certain way. I'm 57, and my body doesn't always move the way I think it should. My kicks have decreased in height over the years, whereas I see my kids getting much higher. So now I'm learning to perfect the kick at a much lower height. I could kick high with good form before; now I have to kick low with good form. That's the struggle—making sure the stances are right. Every once in a while, I'll know, “All right, my square stance isn't quite square. You're not quite low enough. Your butt is sticking out. Your stomach is sticking out.” That's with age, so now you have to adjust everything. You're thinking about alignment and what you're doing. Some classes might have five people, depending on the day and time, and some might have 30. But when you're doing your form, it's a class of one. You are just focused on yourself, so that definitely takes you out of it. And there is very minimal reading in taekwondo.

Taylor: 47:16

In my mind, I've written down all the words I'm thinking, but what I've actually written might have missing words or missing letters. So I have to pause and reread everything before I move on, if that makes sense.

James: 48:41

My question to you is which screen readers do you like to use that's a very good question.

Taylor: 48:52

That's a good question, and unfortunately it's not the simplest answer. It can vary depending on the person you're speaking to, because blindness is its own spectrum. I have a decent amount of functional vision; some people have very little or none. You tend to choose which screen reader you use depending on your level of sight, and then you can configure that screen reader to better suit you. That's what I meant when I said there can be a steep learning curve. From what I've heard, people with very little usable vision often like to use JAWS. I use JAWS too—I think it stands for Job Access With Speech, though I could be a little off on that. I also use NVDA as my primary screen reader, and I have it set up so I can easily toggle it on and off because I can read a little bit and don't like having it constantly announcing everything in my ear. It's also good to have backups, because some websites work well with one screen reader but not another. If a website isn't working well with NVDA, I might try JAWS or the screen reader built into the browser. Primarily, though, I use NVDA, and it works well for me. I can adjust the preferences to meet exactly what I need. I don't need anything too overkill, so I'm able to configure NVDA to be just what I need. It also feels more user-friendly to me and has a little less of a learning curve. Now we can also use AI to help us understand these tools. Every now and then, I'll ask ChatGPT or Copilot, “Hey, I want my screen reader to do this. Can I do this, and if so, can you tell me how?” Researching is not the easiest thing for me, so using AI in those situations can be very helpful.

James: 51:31

Yeah, I love using AI. I can take my thoughts, dump what I've written into AI, and have it organize things slightly better. Then I can fine-tune it because it might give me a suggestion or clean it up, but it may use a word I personally would never use, so I can replace that. But I'm like, “That is the idea I wanted.” I also use AI the way you mentioned: “How do I solve this problem? I've searched through all these settings, and I don't know where it is.” I love when AI says, “Did you click this one, this one, and this one?”

Taylor: 52:27

I'm like, “Man, that's great. I did not do that.” I understand both sides of it. Some people, especially people with disabilities, hate AI, some people love it, and some are in the middle. When it first started getting more popular, I was more on the side of, “I don't know if I really care for that,” because it felt like one more thing for me to learn. But now that I've grown to understand it and use it more, I truly think it is one of the most powerful assistive technologies ever created. If we take the time to teach people how to use it and how it can help them, its impact is going to be hard to measure. Like you said, being able to do a brain dump and have it organize your thoughts is so helpful. If I put something in a Word document, I can use Microsoft Copilot in Word to organize my thoughts. That might have taken me two hours over a couple of days, but with that, I can tell it very specifically what I want, give it parameters, and within a few minutes it can do everything, sometimes even better. It's very exciting.

James: 54:08

And each tool has its pros and cons. I was thinking about a request someone made years ago with our platform. They asked, “How come it doesn't do that?” And the answer was, “Because that was not the ask, and that's not what it was built for.” Just last month, I was thinking about it because that group may be coming back into our fold. I asked AI, “Could you create a mobile app that does this, this, and this?” It said, “Absolutely.” It took about six minutes and said, “Before I write the Swift code or Android code, here's the web version. Take a look and see what you think of the app.” I was like, “Holy Moses. That's even better than I expected.” There was a login and everything. It did exactly what I asked. All I would have to do is brand it, skin it, and make minor adjustments, but 90% of it was done in six minutes.

Taylor: 55:46

Right. Yeah, that's incredible. It's exciting, but also a little frustrating for me because I come from app development, and that learning curve was so difficult to overcome. It used to take me weeks just to get a proof of concept together, and then you had to go back, add all the flair, and make it look nice. Now you can do it with the snap of a finger. I'm like, “Oh, I wish that was there six years ago.”

James: 56:19

Absolutely. My oldest was thinking of going into game design, so he took a lot of game design courses in college, and he was learning the Unity engine. I was like, “Well, I'm going to learn it as well because I'm interested a little bit, and I'll give it a go.” It is a difficult learning curve, that platform. There's also Unreal Engine, which I would say is used more, and they've done some great things. It really frustrated him learning the programming side of it, and I understood the frustration. But now those programs have a lot of AI built in. It's like, just give it the ask, and it will write it for you.

Taylor: 57:30

I wish I had that earlier when we were excited about learning it. We could be making games by now. It's insane how quickly it's evolving, even how good it is now. Just thinking a year from now, or even six months from now, what it will be able to do for us. Obviously, I'm not one of those individuals who thinks, “Oh, it's going to take over the world,” but I do think we need to police it in certain areas so it doesn't take over too much of what we want it to take over. It can learn from itself for certain models, depending on which AI model is being used. I would imagine, maybe even starting now, they may already have it where they teach the ethical use of AI in high school. I think that's really important, especially for kids in the schooling process. We don't want kids, when they should be learning valuable knowledge, to only put something into AI and have it spit out a report. They should actually learn these things and learn how to use AI. That's definitely going to be important. We don't want to teach kids, “Don't use AI; it'll make you dumb,” because they still should know it and know how to use it, but there should be a good balance. I'm interested to see how we handle that.

James: 59:08

Right. Understanding the tool, how to use it, and when to use it. Yeah, exactly. We're still in the early days of it at the moment.

Taylor: 59:23

Oh yeah, it doesn't seem like it with where it is now, but think about five years ago, if that. What was AI, aside from sci-fi movies? Moving to a fairly different topic, you talked a bit about your two boys. I'm very close with my niece, who's seven now, and she's gotten to understand what I can and can't see. There have been instances where she'll make assumptions about what I can and can't do, and how that affects me, because I feel like I can't help her in certain ways. She probably won't come ask me to help with homework and stuff like that. So I'm curious: when you were raising your boys, did that ever affect you?

James: 01:04:03

Definitely. Both my boys would go to my wife first for help with their schoolwork. Luckily, my boys are not dyslexic and their learning went really well. My youngest is 16 and becoming a junior, but they definitely got their learning habits from their mom. They're both really good at taking notes, understanding the subject, and asking questions. I feel like I'm more the general teacher, the street-smarts teacher. That's what I can teach. The stuff I don't have to read, like teaching them how to drive. That was my thing. I'll show you how to do it. You'll have to learn that stop is S-T-O-P on your own. To me, it's that red sign with some letters on it that I got used to seeing over and over again.

Taylor: 01:04:20

Yeah, I think it's a really interesting topic. I'm not a parent, but I spend a lot of time with my niece, and I watch her and spend time with her. I just think it's interesting to talk to parents about how they parent while having a certain impairment. For me, my niece learned that I was blind, and then she kind of equated that to me not being able to do certain things, because there were some things I couldn't do. But she's starting to realize how I learn and how I can help. It's helped for me to tell her, “Hey, I can't read that very well, but if you tell me the problem, I can work it out in my head.” It might be challenging for me to see two plus two on a paper quickly enough for her to be okay with me helping, but if she says two plus two, I obviously know what that is right away. For me, it's been about helping her understand how I can best help, and I think that will get easier as she gets older. I love talking to parents and hearing what their experience has been like.

James: 01:06:41

Yeah. I do have a question for you with your disability. When you were buckling your niece into the car, was she driving, even though she's six or seven, or are you driving? Are you able to drive?

Taylor: 01:06:59

No, I was not driving. Technically, I think I could drive, but for the sake of everyone else's safety in the car and outside the car, I don't.

James: 01:07:10

Okay.

Taylor: 01:07:10

So she was just kidding. But it's funny you mentioned that because I will often start the car after I get her in there. I'll get the air going, get the car warmed up, and that kind of stuff. We have a bit that we always do. She'll say, “Taylor, are you driving?” And I'll say, “Yeah, of course.” Then she'll say, “You can't drive.” And I'm like, “Yeah, you're right.” Then I'll get out and get in the passenger seat. But when I didn't do that, she said, “No, Taylor, you're supposed to say you can.” I was like, “Oh, I get it.” So that's our new tradition when we get in the car.

James: 01:07:57

How do you feel about rideshare and self-driving vehicles? The concept relates to accessibility.

Taylor: 01:08:09

Yeah, the concept of automated self-driving cars is very exciting. My dad used to have a Tesla about a year ago, and while I wouldn't drive it, he would have me sit in the passenger seat and we would test it out. He'd say, “All right, I'm going to put it in self-drive mode and we'll see how far we can get.” I think the technology is almost there, but there is also the legislative side.

James: 01:08:42

Yeah.

Taylor: 01:08:43

Because technically, as I said, I have 20/20 vision, so I could get a license because they only test for acuity. But again, it wouldn't be safe or responsible for me to drive, so I do not. I don't want to alarm anyone. But yeah, the concept is very exciting, and rideshare is great when it's available.

James: 01:09:09

Absolutely. I'm a big fan of supervised full self-driving. I've tried it out multiple times.

Taylor: 01:09:18

I'm like, “Wow, it's getting better each time.” Yeah, and they seem to come out with an update every week.

James: 01:09:25

Yeah. I did ride in a Waymo when I was in Nashville because I thought, “That's my opportunity.” It did a really good job, other than dropping me off not exactly where I wanted to be. There was no way to say, “Hey, where I really want to be is three blocks up there. Can you go there?”

Taylor: 01:09:57

Yeah.

James: 01:09:58

But yeah, I don't have an issue riding in those vehicles at this point. I've driven for so long, and there is so much human error out there, that I don't think self-driving vehicles are much worse than human drivers at this point.

Taylor: 01:10:20

Yeah, the Tesla is not going to be looking at its phone. That was one concern I had, but after my dad had the Tesla for a couple of years, I rode in it quite a bit. At first, I was a little nervous about the car thinking on its own and not knowing exactly what it was going to do. Obviously, as the pilot or driver, you can take over control at any moment. But over time, I started to realize, “All right, this is really good.” There were a couple of instances where it almost got in an accident, but that was because of another driver, and it avoided it. So it is exciting. Again, it's probably going to take a bit, especially here in the Southeast, for the legislative side to catch up. Maybe a larger city like Charlotte, North Carolina, might get it sooner than us here in South Carolina. We usually get things a few months after North Carolina, or maybe even a few years. Ridesharing is also really good for me. The only problem is that I live in a rural area, so there isn't as much demand. When there isn't much demand, there isn't much supply. If I order an Uber, it might be 45 minutes away. Then I have to time it out: “All right, I have to be ready in 45 minutes.” Then I'm ready, and they cancel because they were too far away. So there is a challenge there, but that's more on me for where I live. I could live closer, and I do eventually think I'll move closer to the city so I have easier access to transportation.

James: 01:12:24

I found the pricing in Nashville for Uber and Lyft was not too expensive, which was surprising. When I took the Waymo, that was four times as expensive. I was like, “That's crazy.” Here in Michigan, the pricing is way more expensive for an Uber ride—almost double what Nashville was. We need more options.

Taylor: 01:13:02

Yeah. When I lived in Columbia, South Carolina, I had the inverse problem. Here, the issue is that an Uber is too far away. In Columbia, I would hit order, and it would say the driver was two minutes away. I'm like, “Oh, I'm not ready.” They were also fairly decently priced. What's nice about living in a smaller city like Columbia is that even though it's the capital, it's not a massive city, so a lot of the places you're going aren't too far away. An Uber might only cost five to ten dollars. That part is nice. I think I might move back to the city so I have easier access to transportation and make that a little easier.

James: 01:13:54

I'm going to change the subject a little bit here. Something you said way back about public talking and speaking—you've done it, and I'm sure you've given lots of presentations. Do you have notes? Do you have a slide deck? With your vision impairment, do you just remember everything you need to say for that 45 minutes to an hour, or whatever the session is?

Taylor: 01:14:26

Yeah, that's a good question, and it has changed over the years. I've been doing public speaking for about eight years now. Some of it has been in person at conferences, and some of it has been virtual. When it's virtual, I usually have a little more flexibility with using my screen reader because people can't tell if I'm typing or looking at the screen and have a slide deck with my notes on it. In the beginning, it was definitely a lot of memorization. Even now, a lot of what I do is practice like crazy until the content, flow, and presentation are almost muscle memory. Then I can get out there with a microphone and just talk. In some ways, I think that helps me be a more effective communicator because I'm not just reading off my slides. I try to keep it more organic—not casual necessarily, but less like, “All right, here's point one, point two, point three. Next slide.” I have started experimenting a bit with using a screen reader more when I present, but then you deal with accessibility barriers. No matter how accessible I make my slide deck for myself, there are still things you can never fully account for, like a poor connection, a battery dying, or a bad connection. It always seems to be something. That's why I prefer in-person events, because they usually have IT people on call at the back of the room to help. When I'm presenting remotely, if there's a problem during something like this interview, we're in trouble. It might take me 10 minutes to figure out what the problem is. So it can be very challenging, but I do love public speaking. I get a little adrenaline rush from it, especially when it goes well. I love teaching and training people and being an advocate for disability and inclusion. It can be challenging, but it's worth it. I just try to limit the notes as much as possible.

James: 01:17:12

I enjoy public speaking, though I'm not great at it yet. I'm still trying to perfect it. I used to be terrified. The first time I was doing public speaking with my notes in front of a large crowd, I totally forgot what my title was. I knew my name, and that was about it. The rest just went blank.

Taylor: 01:17:51

“Hey everyone, James here. We're here to talk about something.”

James: 01:17:56

Something. I'm like, “I don't know why—what am I doing here? These lights are too bright. What's going on? What's that weird echo of my voice bouncing off the room?” You have to get used to it.

Taylor: 01:18:11

Yeah, it can take a while. Like you said, when I first presented, I was terrified. I think I blacked out for the first 15 minutes of my presentation.

James: 01:18:24

Absolutely.

Taylor: 01:18:26

I don't know what I said. It was probably awful. I also help people who are getting into public speaking. I'm working on a public speaking training, and that's one thing I'm going to make sure I reiterate constantly: it's okay not to be perfect, especially right away. I was not. I'm sure my first handful of sessions had people thinking, “What the heck was that?”

James: 01:18:53

Absolutely. I think you mentioned it: you want to make it conversational as well, because you want people's engagement. You don't want to just say A, B, C, bullet point one, two, three. Those are your notes, but you're expanding on them.

Taylor: 01:19:20

Yeah, and from what you said about how you read best, I feel like we might be similar in that way for quick notes during a presentation. I thrive on bullet points, and when I mean bullet points, I mean two or three words so I can quickly look at them and read them as fast as I can. Those three words still might take me five seconds to read, but I can read them quickly enough for them to trigger what I want to talk about. Then I can expand on it, and it at least keeps me in order. Are you similar in that way, where you like a very quick and concise bullet point?

James: 01:20:07

I do, because I can easily get distracted and go completely off topic really quickly. Then I look down and see the notes, and I'm like, “Oh my gosh, this is an important thing I totally forgot to talk about.” That's what's going on in my mind. Then I'm stressed, because I realize, “Oh, that timer says I only have 10 minutes left.” But you have to stay calm about it, which is a lot easier said than done when you're in a room full of people. One thing I've learned when I'm doing support, trainings, and things like that is that people are there because you have something to say. They want to learn from you. They're there for you. They're supporting you. They're not there to watch you mess up. And if you do mess up, sometimes you should just laugh it off.

Taylor: 01:21:36

That's the mental side, right? The mental side of presenting is so important. It's okay to mess up. It's okay to take pauses. No one expects you to be constantly talking. If anything, that makes it harder to follow along. You want to have those pauses so people have time to process what you said, and so you have time to collect your thoughts for the next point. The mental side is almost as important as the content. It's okay not to be perfect. There are so many people in the audience who would not be doing what you're doing by presenting. You're already being vulnerable. When is the last time you were in the audience judging the presenter, thinking, “That was bad”?

James: 01:22:30

Right.

James: 01:22:30

I always think, “I don't know anything. I have to look it up and search it.” But people are coming to me because I am the expert in that subject. Even though I may not know everything, I know a little more than they do.

Taylor: 01:22:52

Yeah, they want to learn from you. With accessibility, that's what I do a lot of my public speaking on. It's a very broad topic, but what works well for me is finding my niche within that broad topic and becoming an expert in that. I don't need to be an expert in all of accessibility. I want to know as much as I can, but if I pick one niche and become an expert in it, then I can communicate that effectively because I know that topic deeply. I think that's similar with a lot of other things, not just accessibility. I come from app development, and there are so many different pieces there: coding, design, testing, troubleshooting, and all these different things. But if you can focus on one narrow topic inside that broader topic, becoming an expert in your own presentation has been very effective for me.

James: 01:24:06

With coding, I came into it because I used to work at a newspaper and did a lot of graphics and pagination work. Then, when the newspapers closed, I thought, “All right, what do I do with my life?” I liked computers and had learned basic HTML years earlier, so I got into coding Java and JavaScript. It was so difficult to write the code because being dyslexic—dyslexic, I can't even say the word at the moment—missing a colon, a semicolon, or something small makes it fail. The error codes are never helpful, and you're staring at the code forever thinking, “Come on, what is going on?”

Taylor: 01:25:18

Yeah. I only figured this out about six months ago, and I wish I had known it way back then, but with my screen reader, I can turn on a setting where I start at the beginning of a line of code and hit the right arrow, and it announces every character as I pass it. I can analyze it very precisely through that lens. I wish I had known that five years ago because it would have saved me some time. I know I'm missing a closed parenthesis or a comma somewhere, or I put a period instead of a comma. It has to be flawless, or it's not going to work.

James: 01:26:04

Absolutely. That's weird, right? With the English language, you can have lots of mistakes, but when you're coding, there can be no mistakes.

Taylor: 01:26:16

Yeah, and unfortunately, coding doesn't autocorrect. That would be helpful. All right, I think we're at a great spot. We've gone a little over time, but I do not care whatsoever. We can edit it down and use the extra stuff for social media clips and things like that, so no problem there at all. It's been great to chat with you, James. Is there anything you want to reiterate or emphasize, or any last words before we head out?

James: 01:26:58

I would say, if you know or understand your issue, remember that other people are dealing with it as well. Don't hide from it. Be open about it, and use the tools that are out there to help you improve as you go. I love talking about different accessibility issues with people because I gain a better understanding from those conversations. One of my old coworkers saw mostly gray, so when we were testing a website, we would have that person test it. When an error came up or they missed something, we might ask, “Did you notice that red line?” And they would say, “What red line?” That showed us, okay, you need the text in there. You need to make sure what you're doing is accessible to everyone.

Taylor: 01:28:43

Making the effort to help even a smaller number of people participate in whatever you're working on is always worth the time.

James: 01:28:55

Right. Yep. Being in charge of our event management platform, the idea is that you want as many people coming to your event as possible. We always say to ask the question: do you have accessibility needs, dietary concerns, or anything else we should know about? Because if you do, we can address it beforehand. We want you to come. We want your business.

Taylor: 01:29:30

Yeah, that's awesome, and that's great that you all do that. Well, thank you, James, so much. It's been great chatting with you and getting to know you. I really appreciate you sharing what it's like for you living day to day, working, and raising a family with dyslexia. It was really interesting, and again, I loved hearing all the similarities we have.

James: 01:29:52

Thank you, Taylor. That was great. It was a great conversation. Thanks for having me.

Taylor: 01:29:59

Yeah, of course. All right, thank you all so much for listening. See you next time. Hey there, and thank you for joining us for this episode of Day in the Life on the Accessible Community Podcast. We hope you enjoyed this conversation, and if you did, make sure you're following this show wherever you get your podcasts. That way, you'll get notified each week when we release a new episode. At the bottom of each episode's show notes, there is a link to our podcast feedback form. We would love to hear your thoughts on this episode, the Day in the Life series, or the Accessible Community Podcast as a whole. Your feedback helps us continue creating conversations that are meaningful and valuable to you. Thanks again for joining us, and we'll see you in the next episode.