On this episode of Change Makers, we continue to celebrate women who are making waves in the blind and low vision field.
On this episode (In Order of Apperance)
Additional Links:
Reading Material:
Other Coding Tools:
On this episode of Change Makers, we continue to celebrate women who are making waves in the blind and low vision field.
On this episode (In Order of Apperance)
Additional Links:
Reading Material:
Other Coding Tools:
Welcome to Changemakers, a podcast from a p h. We're talking to people from around the world who are creating positive change in the lives of people who are blind or have low vision. Here's your host.
Sara Brown:Hello and welcome to Change Makers. I'm APH's Public Relations Manager, Sara Brown. And on this episode of Change Makers, we're continuing to highlight women making history right here, right now. And on this episode, we're talking to one woman who has created her own app, and another one who has had breakthroughs with students by teaching them coding. Up first, we're talking to Rebecca Rosenberg. She's the founder and CEO of the app called ReBokeh. Hello, Rebecca, and welcome to Change Makers.
Rebecca Rosenberg:Hello. Thank you so much for having me. Super excited today.
Sara Brown:So Rebecca, let me go on and get you just to introduce yourself and let us know who you are.
Rebecca Rosenberg:Yeah, absolutely. Hi everybody. My name is Rebecca Rosenberg. I am the founder and CEO of ReBokeh, and we develop assistive technologies for people with moderate uncorrectable vision impairment. One of those people being myself. Uh, so I have albinism, which if you're familiar, is a rare genetic condition that basically affects the body's ability to produce melanin, which is necessary for the proper development and maintenance of vision. Uh, as a result of that, I have a vision impairment that is not correctable by any means that we currently have available to us, like glasses or LASIK surgery. Um, but also I have a lot of good, uh, functional vision enough that I can actually drive. Um, so I'm not blind, but I fall into this sort of what we call moderate vision impairment at ReBokeh.
Sara Brown:All right. And you just told us a little bit about yourself. Is there anything else you wanna say?
Rebecca Rosenberg:I guess I can share my, my kind of whole story from, from the dawn of time. Uh, and so I, um, as I mentioned, I grew up with a moderate vision impairment as a result of Albinism. And basically I found myself growing up really frustrated with the extent of available assistive technologies. It seemed to me like they had really all been available or, or designed for people who are blind or very near blind. So things like the CCTVs and the digital magnifiers were just too bulky and, and really expensive and just didn't do what I needed them to do to quite justify the price. And so growing up, I found that I really rejected most available assistive technology because I found it so difficult to use. Um, and so when I started ReBokeh, the goal ultimately was to build a technology that is customizable and portable and more affordable. And that fits into the daily lives of people with vision impairments who are really just normal human beings, uh, who don't necessarily want to have an enormous device that they have to carry around with them.
Sara Brown:Ok. And talk about how you got into the world of making apps.
Rebecca Rosenberg:Yeah, absolutely. So, uh, the company started actually as a result of a grant that I received, uh, when I was 21 as an undergrad student. And the goal was for me to spend a summer kind of doing an entrepreneurial project. Uh, so my background is in biomedical engineering. I got my bachelor's degree, uh, from Bucknell, and that was ultimately the school that provided me this grant. And so the goal was, uh, when I received the money that I would spend the summer kind of learning about the assistive technology landscape and coming up with, uh, a solution that could be, uh, brought to market that would address this kind of problem that I had experienced so personally throughout my life. And ultimately, uh, after doing a lot of research and, and talking to other people who had vision impairments, we decided that the best way to move forward would be with a, a smartphone app, because not only is it something that everybody already has with them, but it's also a device with a really incredible camera system, uh, at no extra cost. And so ultimately, um, after about a day of messing around in Xcode, uh, which is Apple's app development, uh, platform, I realized that despite my engineering degree, I was, uh, not going to be the person who would actually go through and, and develop the app. And ultimately, uh, a, a little while into my master's degree, uh, also in biomedical engineering at Johns Hopkins, I met, uh, Jacob, who is now our CTO, who took care, who took care of, um, all of the app development really based on a PowerPoint presentation that I had provided to him.
Sara Brown:And all of this sort of led to the creation of ReBokeh?
Rebecca Rosenberg:Yes. So, so, uh, ReBokeh is my my first app, I guess I would say.
Sara Brown:And talk about how, how, what, how that all led to the creation of ReBokeh, and what you've, what you've learned through that process.
Rebecca Rosenberg:Oh, gosh. Um, I think I have learned everything through this process. Um, everything from, you know, the, the ugly, you know, legal and accounting details associated with having and, and running a company all the way to learning things about myself and the, the type of vision impairment that I have. Um, I think I was, I think I was 22 before I ever really spoke to anybody else who had a vision impairment like me. And I didn't realize how much that was missing from my life until I started connecting with other people. And so when we, when we started ReBokeh that summer on that, that grant that I mentioned, it really launched me into what has since been the, the beginnings of a career in getting to know people who are similar to me, uh, in, in this vision impairment realm. And what I've found is that very specifically people with moderate vision impairments, um, there, there is no place for us to go. Um, a lot of the online forums are, you know, will, will say that they are for blind and low vision. And what you find when you go onto those places is that really the only experience that is discussed is that of blindness. And while that's an incredibly important topic to discuss, um, that lived experience is very, very different from someone like myself who, you know, growing up as a teenager has to deal with the consideration of,"well, I could get my driver's license, but I don't know if I should get my driver's license and, you know, is that safe? How am I gonna deal with that?" And so part of what we are aiming to create at ReBokeh is a place that people with moderate impairments can feel comfortable and safe and supported in in coming to discuss the unique challenges to this population.
Sara Brown:Talk about the importance of having individuals who are low vision work on this app?
Rebecca Rosenberg:Yeah, absolutely. So our technology actually spent about a year, um, from June of 2021 through June of 2022, uh, as a beta release, which meant that it was limited to about a hundred people that we had selected, uh, from all different parts of the vision impairment community. So we had people who had vision impairment themselves. We had parents of children with vision impairment, we had optometrists and ophthalmologists and um, some, some technologists kind of thrown in there, um, but people, low vision technology specialists, people from all the different TVs from all different parts of the low vision kind of care pathway. And our goal with that one year beta test was to optimize for the moderate low vision experience. And so what that meant was making sure that the UI was intuitive and accessible, but also really catered to a population that doesn't necessarily want things reading out loud, you know, in public to them. Um, and so how do we achieve the very specific goals of this population? How do we make sure that the contrast, uh, you know, the, the contrast enhancement ability is exactly where it needs to be or that the UI actually makes sense for a user and that all of the relevant functionality that a person with low vision would want to see is included, while also making sure that the technology we're creating is not sort of this awful clinical feeling device, but is actually a piece of what feels like consumer technology that people are comfortable taking out of their pocket and, and using at the grocery store or in a restaurant or at a sporting event because it's something that everybody else around them, regardless of their vision abilities, are probably doing anyway. Um, especially with the rise in popularity of, uh, videos specifically on social media. Everyone has their phone out at concerts, at events, you know, you're, you're always being recorded by someone, uh, for a TikTok, you just may not know<laugh>.
Sara Brown:So this podcast is celebrating Women's History month part two, and you're a woman in the field doing awesome things and making history right now. So as a woman in your field, have you, have you felt or seen any pushback or had any difficulties just being heard?
Rebecca Rosenberg:Yeah, you know, I, I think that in, in entrepreneurship and in in the startup world, um, you know, there are, there are a lot of challenges and I, I, I grew up with this mentality specifically around my disability, and I think that it has generalized to other parts of my life, but I try to avoid, um, really feeling bad for myself<laugh> in, in really any way, shape or form. And so I, I think that that mindset has really helped me push past any barriers that have maybe attempted to be presented to me because I just don't know that they're there. Um, you know, the same way that when you are growing up with a disability, specifically one that has come from birth, you know, you don't necessarily know the world any different, so you don't know that you are, um, having a harder time seeing the board than the other kids in your class. And I think that I have tried to generalize that mindset also to my experience in startups. You know, are there investors who maybe don't give us money because I'm a woman? It's possible. I like to think that I surround myself with, um, a a really incredible group of people who wouldn't or, and, and don't think that way. Um, but I think by continuing to just push past and through any and all barriers regardless of why they were put up, because everybody has barriers, um, it doesn't necessarily, it, it doesn't matter what your, you know, gender or race or, or ability is. Everybody has barriers put in front of them. And so I think I try to spend less time thinking about why those barriers are there and more of that time and energy just smashing through them.
Sara Brown:All right. I like that. Smashing through them<laugh> now. Thank You. Do you, oh yeah. Now what do you wanna see for your app in the future?
Rebecca Rosenberg:Yeah, so ReBokah is way more than just an app. Um, the app is kind of the first step toward the world that we are trying to build. We want to see the world be a place where people with moderate vision impairments feel like they have a place to go where they feel like they are included and thought of in the accessibility space, um, where they feel like they have a place they can go to be supported on decisions like driving, um, on challenges associated with accessing their home or going to a regular school or having a regular job. Um, and all of those things that are unique to this population. And so what we are trying to build with ReBokeh beyond just this technology that enables people to help themselves is a world where they have a place to, to also come back to, to ask for help, to seek resources. Um, and so ultimately we are looking to really build that community, um, in addition to all of the exciting things that we have coming, uh, down the pipeline, uh, on the technology side.
Sara Brown:Wow, that's really cool. So just more, it's more than an app, it's almost like a lifestyle.
Rebecca Rosenberg:<laugh>. Exactly.
Sara Brown:Now, do you have any other apps in your pipeline?
Rebecca Rosenberg:Um, so, uh, I would say so I wouldn't say we have additional apps necessarily coming. We have a whole lot more technology that we are excited to be, uh, just about ready to start pushing into the ReBokeh app. We also have a really incredibly exciting partnership that's coming up that I can't speak too much to yet. Uh, but keep an eye out for that, um, that announcement hopefully in the next month or so. Uh, I think that people will be really excited about the possibilities, uh, associated with that.
Sara Brown:Oh, how exciting. That's really exciting. And my final question, is there anything else you would like to talk about? It could be whatever you want, the app, the future, whatever?
Rebecca Rosenberg:I, you know, think that. I would just like to say thank you very much for having me. Um, this is such an important topic and I feel like this population of people with moderate impairments really tends to, and totally by accident, get overlooked. And so I appreciate you having me on to discuss the unique challenges of this population and how we can move forward in a, in a world that will include and, and consider those needs as well, because they are unique. Um, so I, I think that's it. Thank you very much for having me. Really appreciate your time.
Sara Brown:All right, Rebecca, thank you so much for coming on and talking to me today on Change Makers.
Rebecca Rosenberg:Absolutely. Thank you for having me.
Sara Brown:Now we're gonna talk to another woman making history, by the way, she teaches students coding. We're talking to Julie Hapeman, she's a certified orientation and mobility specialist in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Hello Julie and welcome to Changemakers.
Julie Hapeman:Hi. It's great to be here.
Sara Brown:So first off, talk to me about what it is that you do in Milwaukee, Wisconsin with the blind and low vision community?
Julie Hapeman:Well, primarily I'm a certified orientation and mobility specialist in Milwaukee. And so most of the time I'm working with kids on their O&M skills, traveling indoors and outdoors and taking the city bus and going places and generally just exploring the city and helping them to become more independent.
Sara Brown:How did you get into coding? I've been hearing really cool things that you've done and that you're doing. And how did you get into it?
Julie Hapeman:Well, interestingly, it was kind of by accident<laugh>. Um, I have a colleague, I am, um, a part of the assistive technology team and my school district and one of our, uh, colleagues in at was exploring the different coding, um, devices that our district has put in the libraries across the district. And he brought in one that he particularly wanted to show us and it was called Cubetto. And um, I looked at it and I thought,"oh, well that looks really cool because it comes with, uh, like maps or mats that are like maps where you can make this little square cube go from place to place. And I thought, well, that seems very O&M. Um, very interesting. One day I'll get to it, I'm really busy right now, have to do it another time." And I actually just was going through my old photos and I found the picture that I took of the day that he was showing us that. And I texted the picture to my colleagues and I said, we need to know this. But then, you know, it just was, it was too much at the time. And then it was summer, it was probably May when he was showing us that. And then it came to the next school year and he said, you and I are sharing a school, I have it for at you have it for O&M, would you like to do something with some of the students? And I said, yeah, let's do a coding club if you're up for. And he said, absolutely, right on. And so we, we started a coding club with one of my students who's totally blind and three, uh, the students in the autism program. And we made a coding club that met once a week and we explored the different things that the district offers, um, in the libraries and the, it was really neat to see all the team building and the camaraderie and the encouraging, uh, between the students, especially the kids who were a little less verbal, you know, it was, it was just neat to see that interaction. So we started our weekly coding club and um, just really started to explore everything that we had and as much as we could, we, uh, tried to make it accessible to my student, but sometimes we couldn't. And then, um, we just finally got to this Cubetto and I really got a chance to look at it and I thought,"oh my gosh, this thing's accessible right out of the box." It's got, um, little coating pieces that you put in a board and they have different shapes and they have a notch to orient them so that you always know, you know, if you put the notch toward you, you can feel the shape and you know which one it is and you can tell it to go forward or turn. And it just was an, a really amazing experience to see that.
Sara Brown:So you've got this coding club going on. Talk to me about how you teach your students coding?
Julie Hapeman:Well, so the very first thing that we really found was, uh, that this Cubetto um, being accessible to my student, we could start, um, just kind of teaching him how to direct it around things. We were, he's really good spatially with things in front of him. His grandpa works with him on putting things together and taking things apart. So if it's in front of him, his spatial skills are really good, but, you know, bigger spatial things are problematic. And so we had this robot and we were talking about how, you know, you have to programing it so that it can go where you want and if you make a mistake, you have to do what's called debugging, which is fixing it. And um, so my, my colleague Eric, um, from at said, let's set up a fence. We had these red solo cups set up as a fence on the table and we asked my student to program the Cubetto to go around the fence and then turn so that it's facing the fence again. And so we were just, it was, it was coming together kind of. Okay, this is a route he's, he's coding, he's putting in these basically, essentially commands for the code for this robot and he's getting this robot to do something that's really can be translated into something bigger spatially. So he did on the very first try get this cubo from one side of the fence facing it around it to the other side of the fence and facing where opposite or mirror image of where it started. And so the, then I said, okay, why don't you try this with you being the Cubetto and we'll set up some chairs and then let's see you do it. And so basically for me, coding became a way of working on spatial planning because then he became the, the actual route doer and he was able to get around and back just like his Cubetto. And I thought, this is something, this is really kind of cool. Um, because he had been struggling so mightily to learn routes in his school, which he had just, he had moved up to a new school. And um, so it was really cool because we had been struggling with spatial concepts in, in his routes. And then, you know, he was even struggling with spatial concepts in his classroom and yet we were just making what came from the table to something that he was doing in his room. So it was like a little bit bigger spatially. And so that's where, you know, it all kind of started was just an accident<laugh>. Um, so, but then when I started kind of looking around, I, I noticed that there were some other people in the field who had said spatial um, mapping and coding are similar because you have to put things in the right order or you won't get the end result that you're looking for.
Sara Brown:That's so true. That is so true. Have you used any APH products? We have, you know, Accessible Code and Go Mouse and Code Jumper. Have those products been helpful when teaching coding?
Julie Hapeman:So I started with the, uh, Code Quest because it was on an iPad, um, iOS app and we had just closed for Covid and my student had his iPad at home so I could, uh, tap into him using that and working on the same sort of skills we were doing with the Cubetto, um, because he was able to follow across each row and find out where things were. And then, you know, he would track back, we would make it, you know, do it like you do your braille, go all the way from left to right, track back, go down next row, et cetera, and find out where everything was. And then he would put it all together and, you know, so we were working on these spatial skills. I mean, and this wasn't a time where I couldn't go to his house, you know, I couldn't do anything with him in person. And then I thought, okay, at least we're working on these spatial skills. Um, so then he had gotten a chance to use the Code Jumper one time and it was right. It honestly, my, my second Code Jumper kit came the day before we closed and then we were closed for, uh, I mean we were on virtual for over a year. So I got the, um, I got the second Cubetto, uh, sorry, the second code jumper and I, I, I had this feeling we were gonna close, so I raced over to my office to get it and have it with me, but we weren't able to take things to students houses for a while either, you know, I just, we didn't know, you know, so I finally, when I was able to get it to him, um, I couldn't load the Code Jumper app on his login on his school computer, cuz you can't, you know, students can't add things. So if I logged in under me, I could add the app. But then, so I had to put together a way for me to tap into his computer from my house, which involved his mom logging in somewhat and then me tapping in and logging myself in and opening up Code Jumper. And then he, he absolutely loved it. I mean, from the very first time he used it before we closed, he took to it so naturally and was able just to go through and understand everything. And, um, so he would just start, we would make up stories and he, you know, that go along with the, the different sound sets and he would, um, tell his story and then align the sounds to match his story and then he would play them. And because you can do Code Jumper in different speeds, we would do the story in every speed, you know, so it was fun and it was, it was funny because one of'em is, um, it involves, uh, oh gosh, I can't think what the name of the sound set is, but it has some, some noises that are, uh, like spooky. And, uh, I said, how loud is your volume? Are the, your neighbors gonna come knocking, you know,
Sara Brown:<laugh> Yeah, Code Jumpers is really cool with all those different sounds. And it's always fun to hear which students, which sounds the students like, like the most talk about coding and how it can help with everyday life. You, you touched on it, um, a second ago where you talked about spatial awareness. Is there any other way coding can help?
Julie Hapeman:Yeah, so actually with the Code Jumper, this is what we've sort of moved to is you can create your own sound sets. So I, um, having my students create their own sound sets that include, um, directional information. And so we, with this, this student that, um, I've been talking about, we coded a route around the block that his school is on, but we, you know, we first went out, we set out to go and, um, find what we might need to include in the sound set. And then he recorded all of the sounds, the turn left, go straight, uh, and then some landmarks that he was passing. And then we put the sound set, we had to actually use two different sound sets. Um, but we, we, we put them in and then he had to code the directions of his route so that he could get all the way around correctly. And then once we did that, um, we double checked it by going out and making sure that he passed things in the correct order. And if he didn't, then he had to debug or change his route. And so that has become something that he really enjoys doing because he can record in his own voice. And his favorite and my favorite of the landmarks that he marked was a little free library that's in front of his school and he named it Little free library. Sh we have to be quiet because it's a library and so you can totally personalize everything and it just really ups the interest from the students when they can make it creative and make it their own.
Sara Brown:It really does when you make it your own and put your own spin on it, I feel like that's for anything and for everybody. You have a, just a little bit more of a vested interest in it. Are there any other ways to teach coding for anyone out there listening that's curious but doesn't know how to get their child into it or wants to get their child into it a little bit more?
Julie Hapeman:Well, I, I like to use some books that I've found that, um, describe how coding is like everyday life and then I'll talk, I'll read a few pages and then we'll talk about, well, how, how does what the book says, how can you relate that to what you are doing every day and how do you relate that to the routes that you're learning? So that's kind of how I start. I am not a computer scientist in the, in the big sense of being able to create huge codes. I am somebody who is interested in coding, who sees a use of for it, um, in what I do and kind of specialize in that. But, um, you know, there are tons of books that I've found and, and APH actually has a, a list that I gave for, um, another presentation of books that I have used that just talk about what happens when you code, how coding is like everyday life. And then there's one that, they're a series of books, uh, called"What Should Danny Do," and"What Should Darla do?" And they're like the old Choose Your Own Adventure books. So it gives you, you know, like a choice if it's, it's like an if else statement. So if Danny chooses not to get ready for school, then he's gonna miss his bus and his mama's gonna be upset. If Danny chooses to get ready for school, he'll catch his bus and then everything will, you know, his day will start off better. So, you know, it it just some ways that you can just reintroduce or continue to reinforce those concepts, um, but in a fun way that the books just make it seem they're written for kids and about kids and, and it really just, they can relate to them I think pretty well.
Sara Brown:And is there anything else you'd like to say about coding or anything overall?
Julie Hapeman:Well, um, I guess I just feel that it is something that's really incredibly, um, interesting to our students and a lot of the programs that they are using in schools are not accessible. Um, code.org is a wonderful, wonderful site, um, but there's not a lot there that is accessible to somebody who's totally blind, at least at this moment. And so just looking for different ways to introduce the same concepts that the site at children are learning is really important. And so looking at the tools from a p h and other places, there are some others out there, um, is really important so that our kids are not missing out on gaining those concepts that are really so key, um, to success nowadays because it just can lead to, you know, a career opportunity or just even enjoyment of different activities if you know how to do these.
Sara Brown:All right. Julie, thank you so much for joining me today on Change Makers.
Julie Hapeman:Thanks for having me.
Sara Brown:Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Change Makers. I have put links to the website for Rebecca Rosenberg's app ReBokah and various reading materials and products that Julie uses when she's teaching coding. I hope you have enjoyed this episode and as always, be sure to look for ways you can be a change maker this week.