Making Circuit Design and Prototyping Accessible for Blind or Low Vision People

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

I propose to create an accessible circuit design and prototyping environment suitable to be used at home, school, or work for blind or low vision (BLV) people to practice entry-level electronics and circuits. The proposed environment will be composed of hardware and software tools that can be used without vision. They will make major STEM fields, such as electrical engineering, computer science, computer engineering, and physics, more accessible and inclusive to the BLV community. This research is important because members of the BLV community have been historically excluded from studying or working in electronics-related STEM fields. This is because the established methods key to the process of designing and communicating design ideas (e.g., using circuit diagrams) and quickly converting design ideas into functional circuits (e.g., using prototyping tools like breadboards) rely heavily on visual information that is barely accessible to the BLV community. To execute this research, I will follow standard HCI practices for iterative design, development, and evaluation of accessible solutions. In particular, I will investigate new accessible interfaces, sensors, hardware tools, and software tools to overcome the accessibility barriers in the key phases of circuit design and prototyping workflows, ranging from sketching design ideas to constructing and debugging breadboard circuits. To achieve my goal, I propose a three-aim approach: (1) Advancing the understanding of BLV-related accessibility barriers in circuit design and prototyping workflows. This knowledge will guide the development of the next two objectives; (2) Designing and creating accessible and scalable tools to allow BLV people to easily sketch, edit, and share circuit diagrams; and (3) Inventing accessible solutions and devices to allow BLV people to easily construct, test, and debug functional breadboard circuits. The proposed work is a critical step toward my long-term goal, which aims to create well-designed accessible educational and professional tools to enable equal opportunities for BLV people to study and work in STEM fields requiring electronics skills. The outcome of this research, if successful, will benefit millions of children and adults in the BLV community and beyond. The knowledge gained from this research will also serve as a foundation to make all STEM fields accessible to people of all abilities. This will make Canada an international leader in the field, allowing the country to be better prepared for the future of STEM education and career development for people of all abilities, which ultimately leads to technology to improve the current educational and working infrastructure.