Engineering to enhance human mobility, play, and exploration
AccessEngineering and Dr. Steele’s recent work on creating guidelines for making makerspaces accessible was featured in the School Library Journal. It is a great resource, featuring different DIY and makerspace movements that support individuals with disabilities around the US. In particular, check out some of the
great work on how toys can be easily hacked for individuals with disabilities from John Schimmel and Holly Cohen, cofounders of DIYAbility, .
You can read the full article here:
Seattle Children’s Hospital hosted the Perry Initiative this weekend to inspire women to pursue careers in engineering and orthopaedic surgery. Dr. Jacquelin Perry was one of the first ten women orthopaedic surgeons in the country and has been a mentor to countless women and men throughout her career. She is known for her work quantifying human movement using tools such as motion analysis, electromyography, and ultrasound. She developed new surgical procedures including methods to straighten spines and inventing the ‘halo’ to immobilize the spine, neck, and head.
This weekend, 25 women from local high schools, joined surgeons and engineers at Seattle Children’s to learn about common medical tasks and cutting-edge medical technology. They tried their hand at casting, suturing, external/internal bone
fixation, and rotator cuff repair.
From the Perry Initiative: “Engineers and orthopaedic surgeons work hand-in-hand to develop safe and effective implants for repairing broken bones, torn ligaments, and worn-out joints. Strong partnerships between surgeons and engineers are essential for improving the performance of orthopaedic implants and creating solutions to unmet clinical needs.”
We agree! Here’s to many future collaborations with diverse teams of engineers and surgeons.
The proceedings from AccessEngineering’s first Capacity Building Institute have been published on-line.
This institute focused on bringing together faculty, staff, and students from engineering departments around the country to discuss how to support individuals with disabilities in pursuing careers in engineering.
There were many wonderful presentations and discussions. In particular check out:
These discussions helped to inform several new resources from AccessEngineering including:
The Capacity Building Institute was hosted at the University of Washington-Seattle April 7-9, 2015. Please let us know if you are interested in participating next year!
We were privileged to have Jamala Henderson from KUOW Public Radio join in during our brainstorms and activities for creating accessible makerspaces.
She has put together a wonderful news story about our project and included some great quotes from the students about why we should create accessible makerspaces:
“The cool thing about engineering spaces is a lot of people use engineering spaces to help solve other problems for people with disabilities, and I think it would be cool if people with disabilities were more involved with solving their own problems.” – Kayla Wheeler
Listen to the full story here: KUOW 94.9 FM
Check out KING 5 News at around 5:30pm this evening. They will be featuring a short piece on AccessEngineering‘s guidelines for creating accessible makerspaces.
You can view the final video and story here.
Hannah, one of the UW DO-IT Scholars who helped to create the guidelines, did a great job in the hot seat! She helped to share her experiences as an individual with visual impairments for making a welcoming and accessible space. She contributed key observations such as remembering how important mental maps are for individuals with visual impairments. Having flexible workspaces (furniture on wheels, etc) is great in makerspaces, but having key equipment organized and in fixed locations helps her build a mental map of the space. Hannah will be a freshman at UW in the fall and is considering majoring in physics or engineering. I’m sure she will have many creative things to build in the makerspace as a new student.
Go Hannah!