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Getting the Word Out: Assistive Technology Outcomes and Benefits
Tags:Case Studies, Collaboration, Innovators
Assistive Technology Outcomes and Benefits (ATOB) is a peer-reviewed, cross-disability, transdisciplinary journal. It’s edited and published by two organizations: ATIA, the well-known Assistive Technology Industry Association, and The SEAT Center, the Special Education Assistive Technology Center founded in 2001 at Illinois State University. ATOB’s Editor is Phil Parette of SEAT; the journal’s Associate Editor is David Dikter of ATIA. SEAT’s Brian Wojcik manages web accessibility and design.
ATOB is the only journal that focuses entirely on the hard evidence of what works: outcomes and benefits of AT across the lifespan. It is also unique because of its dual focus—the perspective of industry and the perspective of those who use AT themselves (or whose family members do) or those who work in the AT field (including AT Specialists and AT consultants). The purpose of the journal is to foster communication between those two groups, especially in order to exchange views on effective AT practices and to help practitioners, consumers, and family members advocate for effective AT practices.
While collaboration is at the heart of this operation, ATOB clearly distinguishes the two perspectives. Articles are categorized either as Voices from the Field, written by AT service delivery professionals, family members, and/or consumers with disabilities, or as Voices from the Industry, pieces from professionals who develop and market AT devices and services.
The eight-person editorial review board “has a broad base,” says Parette, “vendor, academic, researcher. That multidisciplinary mix demonstrates to others that we are committed to cross-discipline collaboration.” This strong and diverse review board can confidently assess the merits of material from either side of the vendor/practitioner-consumer fence.
Early response has been strong. The journal’s first issue was published on-line in fall 2004—and parts or all of it have been downloaded from ATIA’s website over seven thousand times. It is also featured on SEAT’s website, and was included in a CD of resources given to the many attendees of ATIA’s Spring 2005 conference, attended by over 1,200 participants.
Manuscript Submission Guidelines for Assistive Technology Outcomes and Benefits
ATOB’s Voices from the Field and Voices from the Industry articles are required to describe outcomes and benefits and emphasize work with quantifiable results.
For those interested in submitting articles, the magazine considers:
- Findings of original scientific research, including group studies and single subject designs.
- Marketing research conducted relevant to specific devices having broad interest across disciplines and disabilities.
- Technical notes regarding AT product development findings.
- Qualitative studies, such as focus group and structured interview findings with consumers and their families regarding AT service delivery and associated outcomes and benefits.
- Project and program descriptions in which AT outcomes and benefits have been documented.
To learn more, see the Call for Papers and Manuscript Preparation Guidelines in the magazine at www.atia.org, or contact hpparet@ilstu.edu
The Pressing Need for More Information on Outcomes
The journal’s focus is timely—and felt by both vendors (Dikter’s constituency) and researchers (Parette’s constituency). Computer-based tools used to create AT have multiplied exponentially. Need for AT has increased as well, thanks to greater integration of people with disabilities in the so-called mainstream, and especially in the mandates of No Child Left Behind, the AT Act of 2004, and IDEA 2004.
Because both supply and demand have grown, it is more important than ever to know what works and what does not. As David Dikter comments, great product has been developed—so, especially as need increases, why waste time and money on things that don’t work well? A lot of great product is developed locally, says Dikter, and because of funding patterns, too often that’s where it stays.
“Products are created to support local need, funding streams support products for a state and won’t commit resources to distribution outside the state. Given the limited amount of money for research, it is more critical than ever to not reinvent the wheel, not start from zero every time, for every local need. If someone has something that’s working, we should all know about it. People can modify it for their own communities, certainly, but if you need to get to one hundred, don’t start at zero, start at fifty. Start with what’s already been done that has been proven to work.”
The missing link in this picture is the dissemination of solid information about outcomes and benefits. That is what readers will find in Assistive Technology Outcomes and Benefits.
How ATOB Began
ATIA represents vendors—but from the start David Dikter’s vision of the journal was larger than that. Earlier in his career, he had been a special educator; in that job he needed documented evidence to support purchase requests and found there was little or none. When he came to ATIA, he saw that the needs of practitioners for outcomes and benefits evidence meshed with his new organization’s industry-driven mission to disseminate information on best practices and, in particular, on strong outcomes.
Dikter recognized that “a vendor-only thing” could be vulnerable to charges of favoritism and product promotion. In addition, if one of the big problems was dissemination, all sides of the AT world had to be part of the team from the very start.
He approached the SEAT Center. It was new, university-based, and Director Phil Parette had just the skills ATOB needed: distinguished experience as a teacher, researcher, university professor, writer, and editor. When Dikter made the call it was clear that he and Parette were on the same wave length.
“When I learned ATIA was interested in creating a journal, we were already considering putting out one like this. It seemed like a match,” Parette recalls, adding, “We have an obligation as part of our mission to engage in research on outcome-based best practices and disseminate that knowledge, so this is an excellent mechanism for us to show a high level of commitment to coordinate a scholarly process recognized around the country.”
Both partners had imagined the need for the project before it had even begun. It fit with the mission and strategy of their respective organizations.
Benefits to Both
In addition, the project delivers a range of evident benefits to both partners.
ATIA members benefit from ATOB’s insights—and in a larger sense, by the journal’s encouragement and advancement of a strategy that foregrounds outcomes and benefits—essential to vendors.
The SEAT Center receives a range of organizational benefits:
- The journal benefits SEAT as it instructs preservice and practicing professionals, engages actively in outcomes-driven research, and presents best practices regularly at conferences and meetings.
- Collaborations with ATIA Awareness Committee members, primary decision-makers representing vendor organizations, have kept Parette current on trends and best practices among vendor groups.
- SEAT gets a pipeline to the latest innovative materials and approaches created by vendors. In the spirit of not re-creating the wheel, SEAT then adapts many of these to create high quality, multimedia-based professional development materials.
- The collaboration provides the SEAT Center with national visibility and a reputation with legislators and foundations as a source of cost effective innovation and business-driven models.
Overcoming Snags
Problems? They’d like to see a print version of the journal, despite the fact that the seven thousand downloads suggest it is being read widely, but right now they don’t have the funding for that format. They want to market more aggressively, and both imagine opportunities they haven’t yet been able to connect to—having a symposium at the ATIA conference where ATOB contributors discuss outcomes and benefits, drawing attention to the issue itself, and the journal as well.
They want voices from all parts of the AT community, and they haven’t met this goal. They want to include consumers. They hope to drive more research in outcomes and benefits. But they realize that it takes time to do something new.
To encourage writing on the subject, the editorial board gets involved with authors. “We’ve had papers that were not clearly stated, that did not deal sufficiently with outcomes and benefits, and were not reviewed favorably,” Parette explains. “But part of the review is identifying strengths and weakness, and the reviewers give lots of recommendations, in some cases pages of recommendations. The writers are encouraged to engage with the review board, and we’ve had some good developmental conversations, one to one.” They can take that kind of time; because ATOB is new and is not overwhelmed with submissions.
“With the first issue,” adds Parette, “we got respect from readers. We expect that as we see more submissions, and people become more familiar with what we’re looking for, we’ll see even more rigor in the pieces.”
They have their differences. One wants to see advertising in the journal; the other, not. But because their relationship is based on respect and well-defined roles, they are able to come to a working agreement that for now, they will hold off on that, but will revisit it later as a part of a larger business analysis.
One of the reasons they can have these differences is because the journal isn’t just run by the two of them, but is overseen by an ATIA member committee.
Mediating Organizational Structure: ATIA’s Awareness Committee
“The last thing we wanted was for this to be the Dave and Phil journal,” says David Dikter. In addition to recruiting an editorial board with some of the most respected names in research and in the vendor fields, the magazine is overseen by ATIA’s Awareness Committee, a group of CEOs of major vendor organizations who have responsibility for this and other ATIA projects. All major decisions are discussed and reviewed by the Awareness Committee. Parette not only sits in on the committee as the editor of ATOB but is a voting member, ensuring that the research side has a strong presence in this part of the process.
The Committee provides a wealth of knowledge and skills and gives Dikter and Parette a place to bring up issues, to have differences over issues, without locking horns on issues.
“I come in with recommendations and ideas from the bottom up, since I’m more involved with the day to day operations and the editorial process,” says Parette. “Dave comes to the issues from the top down. The Awareness Committee includes incredible resources, in terms of management and marketing experience and knowledge about the field. They serve as a kind of mediating structure between the two of us.”
Ease, Respect, and Well-Defined Roles
For both Dikter and Parette, it is still early days with ATOB. They share a sense of openness towards the future, watching the project develop. “In the best collaborations the relationship evolves,” says Dikter. “We’re not static. This is a new year. We ask each other, How are we doing? We talk less than we did while we were putting together the first issue, to a degree out of necessity because of time constraints.”
The fact that both Dikter and Parette are busy, and the journal has taken much more time than either of them expected, paradoxically may also contribute to ease with which they collaborate. They are both too busy to take the time and energy required to force a decision. They focus on what needs to be done.
Roles are well-defined. “Phil takes the lead on all the editorial process,” Dikter explains, adding, “I get involved with review towards the end, and with marketing. Phil is involved with the Awareness Committee, and I integrate the journal into the conference. Phil and I are in contact, but not daily, nor would we want to be. For me it has been a delight to do this work. Phil’s managed it so that it all feels like a breeze.”
“The feeling’s mutual,” says Parette.
It helps, also, that both believe passionately in the same thing. “We share a goal that we need a more collaborative environment in the field by stakeholders. And I mean all the stakeholders. We all need to put our energies towards that goal, that bottom line, which is the same for all of us: to improve the lives of people who need AT.”
Phil Parette says, “I couldn’t have put it better.”
Why This Collaboration Works
The project satisfies missions on both sides, and strategic organizational needs for both organizations.
The project delivers a range of evident benefits to both partners.
The project itself is timely, and fills a need named by both vendors and researchers.
Partners focus on what needs to be done , delivering their separate and well-defined tasks.
Partners share passionate belief in a larger mission. It is not just about “outcomes” but improving the lives of people who need AT.
Partners share an openness about the future, and a willingness to let the project evolve, and to reflect together on that evolution.
Each of the two partners imagined this separately, making them ready for the collaboration when the opportunity arose. The project has creative roots on both sides.
A mediating presence —the forum of the ATIA Awareness Committee—gives the partners a safe place to raise issues, to air differences, and not to lock horns.
Cameos of Our Featured Collaborators
David Dikter Executive Director of the Assistive Technology Industry Association (ATIA). Dikter manages the overall mission of ATIA to bring assistive technology to people with disabilities. He is responsible for all aspects of the ATIA annual conference, public awareness, government education and work on national policy issues as it relates to assistive and accessible technologies. Dikter sits on the W3C-Web Accessibility Initiative Steering Council and works with diverse groups to promote AT and the needs of individuals with disabilities. Prior to joining ATIA, he worked in technology start-ups and spent 15 years working in school districts as a teacher of students with disabilities and technology leader, training and promoting educational and assistive technologies.
Phil Parette, Ed.D., is Kara Peters Endowed Chair in Assistive Technology at Illinois State University, and Director of the Special Education Assistive Technology (SEAT) Center. He is the current Editor of Assistive Technology Outcomes and Benefits, serves on the ATIA Awareness Committee, and has published extensively regarding assistive technology applications with children with disabilities and their families. Dr. Parette’s current interests focus on assistive technology (AT) systems change and outcomes-focused AT service delivery, and he is the President Elect of the Division on Developmental Disabilities of the Council for Exceptional Children.
