Written By: Vilissa Thompson, LMSW, Creator of Ramp Your Voice! As someone who is proudly disabled as a wheelchair user, little woman, and who is hard of hearing (HoH), assistive technology (AT) allows me to exist and be a part of my community with fewer barriers. To not have the AT I depend on means…
Written By: Patrick Cokley, Administrator, the Lead On Update In addition to a repository of cat photos, the Internet is often a resource for telling about products and services that we cannot live without. Though many of this information goes toward keeping Amazon and Pinterest afloat, there are often times where this advice is…
Every year millions of Americans make a New Year’s Resolution to start exercising regularly or to become more active. For people who are wheelchair users this can be an even more difficult resolution to obtain. Luckily, the Apple watch Series 3 is a watch that considers all the different ways people move. This device encourages wheelchair…
Written by: Megan Cowdell, Program Coordinator, CFILC Here at Ability Tools and our parent organization, The California Foundation for Independent Living Centers (CFILC), we have used and worked with our fair share of assistive technology. In this second annual blog you will find testimonials from some of our staff on their favorite AT devices this…
Written by: Kevin Hansen, Voice Options Program Manager During the time that the Voice Options Pilot Project has been running we have seen a significant impact in the lives of the participants that have received services from this program. This pilot project was funded by the California Public Utilities Commission and officially started on January…
An eye-opening app produced by a non-profit startup in Copenhagen hopes to change life for people who are visually impaired. Hans Jørgen Wiberg, who is visually impaired himself, came up with the idea for the application. Through his work at “The Danish Association of the Blind” he recognized, that visually impaired often need help to cope…
Submitted by: LoganTech LoganTech was founded in 2004 by parents who struggled to find an acceptable AT (assistive technology) solution for their son Logan, who has autism and is nonverbal. Logan’s father, our company president, Glen Dobbs, used his engineering background fueled by the desire to better communicate with his son to create the Logan®…
Ability Tools has had the pleasure of partnering with the California Public Utilities Commission to launch Voice Options Pilot Project. The program launched January 11th 2017. Voice Options is a pilot program of the California Public Utilities Commission administered by the California Foundation for Independent Living Centers.Voice Options connects Californians with speech language disabilities to…
Submitted by: Talk To Me Technologies Joe lost his ability to speak after being diagnosed with ALS. He now uses a camera attached to his speech-generating device to track his eye movements. Speech is produced when his eyes pause to ‘select’ what he wants to say. Prior to losing the ability to speak, Joe and…
We are excited to announce the launch of a statewide pilot program called Voice Options, California Speech Technology Program. Voice Options offers iPads with speech applications to people with disabilities for demonstration, short and long-term loan via 10 demonstration centers throughout the state. The project is funded by the California Public Utilities Commission and administered by the…