[Trainer-Talk] AT Trainers in Maryland Need Your Support

Curtis Chong chong.curtis at gmail.com
Sun Jun 29 00:12:12 UTC 2025


Greetings all:

Please see below the email I just sent out regarding this issue.

Kind regards,

Curtis Chong

From: Curtis Chong <chong.curtis at gmail.com> 
Sent: Saturday, June 28, 2025 6:11 PM
To: 'David Behar' <David.Behar at maryland.gov>; 'Kevin Steffy' <Kevin.Steffy at maryland.gov>
Cc: 'Carol Beatty' <Carol.Beatty at maryland.gov>; 'Jonathan Mosen' <JMosen at nfb.org>
Subject: End of Talk Text and Train services in Maryland

MEMORANDUM

DATE:        June 28, 2025

FROM:       Curtis Chong
Email: chong.curtis at gmail.com

TO:            David Behar
Executive Director
Technology Access of Maryland
Email: David.Behar at maryland.gov

Kevin Steffy
program manager
Maryland Accessible Telecommunications (MAT)
Email: Kevin.Steffy at maryland.gov

Copies:      Carol Beatty
secretary
Maryland Department of Disabilities
Email: Carol.Beatty at maryland.gov

Jonathan Mosen
Director of for Accessibility Excellence
National Federation of the Blind
Email: JMosen at nfb.org


Subject:     End of Talk Text and Train services in Maryland


Under date of June 21, 2025, MAT Specialist Jane Hager jane.hager at maryland.gov, transmitted an email with the subject "End of Talk Text and Train services" which reads in relevant part:

"MAT/TAM [Maryland Accessible Telecommunications/Telecommunications Access of Maryland] administrators have decided to end independent contracting to provide low vision and blind customers of MAT devices with 1-1 training assistance to learn accessibility for telecommunication and assistive technology as of July 1, 2025. 

"The MAT/TAM administrators are hiring a part-time trainer who will provide limited support in a modified setting to low vision and MAT customers for telecommunication instruction only. I have not been informed when this person will begin however I am told that all current services by independent contractors should end by July 1. …

"If your current customers have not achieved the goal of being able to make and receive a phone call, text, video call or email - as appropriate to their individual telecommunication goals, please send me their name and once the new trainer is secured, they will be contacted to complete services."

The email provides no explanation as to why this seemingly arbitrary decision was made nor why it was necessary to distribute this email on a Saturday and not during normal working hours (although I understand that an announcement was made on Friday, June 20).

I am a totally blind person who has administered programs for the blind in other states and a nationally-recognized expert on the deployment and teaching of nonvisual access technology. For ten years I administered programs of vocational rehabilitation and independent living at the Iowa Department for the Blind, focusing much of my time and effort on technology training programs for newly-blind adults and influencing the promulgation of systems and software that were nonvisually accessible. For five years, I worked at the New Mexico Commission for the Blind, coordinating and managing technology services and training provided to blind or low vision consumers in New Mexico. I must ask why a decision to terminate desperately-needed training services for the blind was made with such short notice and with no explanation. For those of us who cannot see the screen of a smartphone or tablet, making and receiving telephone calls is not as simple a matter as it might seem to the casual observer. If someone who is blind is provided with something like an iPhone and if a screen reader such as VoiceOver is essential to the operation of that iPhone for that person, trainers simply cannot just teach someone how to answer a call and then hang up from the call. The iPhone requires the person to learn a variety of gestures that are not the same gestures used by people who can see. For example, to make a simple phone call, a blind person has to learn how to unlock and lock the iPhone, how to open the Phone app, and how to operate the keypad nonvisually (assuming that there is no need to add people to one's Contact list). Answering a call is a bit simpler because one can answer a phone call while the iPhone is locked (using, by the way, a gesture with which most people are not familiar). However, when it comes time to disconnect the call, many beginning users find that they cannot remember the gesture to do this--a gesture which is not widely known outside of the blind community. I have taught hundreds of people to use the iPhone, and most of them tell me that the first month is the most frustrating because they cannot remember how to answer the call, let alone perform a simple hangup.

The contractors that are being terminated possess the specific knowledge and lived experiences required to provide blind users with the training that is essential if they are to perform even the most basic functions with the smartphones provided to them. The part-time trainer that is supposed to provide "limited support in a modified setting to low vision and MAT customers for telecommunication instruction only" can in no way satisfy the need for training that newly-blind smartphone users require--even if the training is as "simple" as making and receiving basic phone calls. This so-called basic training turns out to be far more complicated, requiring greater expertise and specialized knowledge that is very often hard to come by.

Please reconsider the decision to terminate all of your training contractors in one fell swoop. Your clients, both current and future, will be unnecessarily deprived of critical training if you continue with this misguided effort.

Thank you for your kind attention to this matter.

Cordially,

Curtis Chong
Nonvisual Access Technology Consultant

 



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