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The Future of Closed Captioning in Higher Education

Sean ZdenekAuthor, Reading SoundsAssociate Professor, Texas Tech University

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The future of closed captioning in higher education and beyond

Sean ZdenekTexas Tech University

12 May 2016

sean.zdenek@ttu.edu

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About Sean Zdenek

• PhD, Carnegie Mellon Univ.• Associate professor of technical

communication and rhetoric, Texas Tech Univ.

• Author: Reading Sounds: Closed-Captioned Media and Popular Culture (2015)

• Twitter: @seanzdenek• sean.zdenek@ttu.edu• http://ReadingSounds.net

sean.zdenek@ttu.edu

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What we will cover today…• Expanded definitions of caption quality and a critique of

current assumptions• A promising view of the captioned present and future,

leveraged on universal design, robust interfaces, interactivity, customized mashups, automated workflows, search capabilities, better learning outcomes, and “caption studies”

• Captioning advocacy from a faculty member’s perspective

• A discussion of what departments and institutions can do to shape the future.

sean.zdenek@ttu.edu

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What we won’t cover today…• Legal requirements and lawsuits (508, 504, ADA)

– Harvard and MIT sued over lack of closed captions in online courses (including MOOCs)

– Long list of higher ed lawsuits and settlements– ADA: Accessible tech and proposed rulemaking

• Specific costs or budget issues• Specific technologies or specific third-party vendors• Demographic info on students with disabilities

sean.zdenek@ttu.edu

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What is closed captioning?• Wikipedia: “Closed captioning (CC) and subtitling are both processes

of displaying text on a television, video screen, or other visual display to provide additional or interpretive information.”

• FCC: “Closed captioning displays the audio portion of a television program as text on the TV screen, providing a critical link to news, entertainment and information for individuals who are deaf or hard-of-hearing.”

• WhatIs.com: “Closed captions are a text version of the spoken part of a television, movie, or computer presentation. Closed captioning was developed to aid hearing-impaired people, but it's useful for a variety of situations.

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Definitions may: conflate subtitling and closed captioning, focus on audio only, focus on speech only, assume that all sounds are or can be captioned.

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Closed captioning provides audiovisual access for viewers who are deaf or hard of hearing.

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Putting pressure on our assumptions: A rhetorical approach to captioning

• Closed captioning is not simple transcription – choices need to be made (consider manner of speaking IDs and the debate over edited vs. verbatim captioning).

• Captioning is a skill and an art. Captioners decide which sounds are significant and how to caption them (see nonspeech sounds).

• Captioners don’t caption sounds per se. They convey meanings in specific contexts.

• Captions produce a new text and a different experience of the program (see Speaker IDs).

• Captions enact a number of transformations of meaning in the move from sound to accessible writing (see my seven transformations: contextualize, clarify, formalize, equalize, linearize, time-shift, and distill).

sean.zdenek@ttu.edu

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Image: A frame from The Young Doctor’s Notebook (2012). Daniel Radcliffe is turned towards a sink washing his hands. Because we can’t see him turn off the sink, the caption alerts us when it happens: (TURNS TAP OFF). This nonspeech caption does not describe a sound but an action. As such, the caption is more concerned with the function of sound in a specific context than the specific sonic qualities of the tap or the splashing sound when it is turned off. For more examples, see how captions contextualize.

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“…it isn’t enough to tell us the mere text of what is being said.” – Joe Clark, 2003

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Quality captioning (PACT): More than accuracy

• Accuracy is vital, particularly in education. • Accuracy generates a lot of chatter:

– Caption fail videos – Complaints on Twitter– Criticisms of Google’s autocaptioning tech.

• But let’s not forget other criteria:– PACT: Placement, Accuracy, Completeness, Timing (see

FCC 2015).– See The Captioning Key’s style guidelines.– On placement: “positioning carries meaning.”– Robust interfaces and giving users control over them

sean.zdenek@ttu.edu

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Fallacy: Closed captioning does not require special training. – Josélia Neves, 2008

“The main factor that drives captioning quality is what clients are willing to pay for it.” – professional closed captioner, 2012

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Image: Screenshot of a YouTube video showing all of the options available for customizing the appearance of the closed captions: Font family, font color, font size, background color, background opacity, window color, window opacity, character edge style, and font opacity.

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Image: Screenshot of a Hulu video showing all of the options available for customizing the appearance of the closed captions. The default setting is yellow type, Arial typeface, medium size, thin black stroke, no background color (transparent).

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Building robust interfaces and honoring users’ preferences

• Some captioning interfaces allow users to customize the appearance of captions in a number of ways.

• But we can push interface design further by considering whether: – Users can easily access the customization options (and remember

that users will be accessing course content through many devices). – The customization options are robust– Users can carry their preferences with them like personal style

sheets.– The interface supports placement options (problem: bottom-

centered alignment is usually the only option).– Transcripts are also available (for customized reading and

expanding your audience)

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From making accommodations to “baking in” captions

• Interactive transcripts (3Play Media, TED.com, YouTube…)• Search engine optimization (SEO): reach more people• Fully searchable environment of lectures and public-facing videos.• Multiple caption streams

– Subtitles in different languages– Alternative caption tracks (for K-12: easy reading track)– Captioning as learning tool

• Personalized video streams and course study tools– Media clipping, archive searching, annotating, bookmarking

• Device-independent support for captioning• Automated workflows

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Lecture capture meets captioning• Hearing students seem to love lecture capture, even when the

prof’s videos are presumably not captioned.• Check out the student testimonials at CSUN.• Now imagine giving students the power to:

– Search all the lectures by keyword– Create mashups based on search queries.– Interact with the transcript– Use the transcript as a study guide– Add their own caption tracks, video annotations– Search the university’s entire archive of lectures– See what segments are most popular (heat maps)

• And giving professors more data about: What students are searching for, how they are using the transcripts, etc.

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Image: A heat map from Hulu.com showing the popularity of each segment of an episode of Glee. Viewer popularity spikes about three-fourths into the episode. According to Hulu, the “mesa in the graph represents one of the musical numbers for which the show has become so beloved, in this case a performance of “Defying Gravity.” In short, more people are searching for and watching the musical numbers in Glee. Searching and heat mapping is made possible because of closed captioning.

Heat maps are also interactive – click anywhere on a map to be transported to that moment in the video.

Now imagine applying heat mapping to lecture videos. Students studying for an exam can see which segments have been most popular among their peers and use this information as a collaborative learning and studying tool. Profs have this data too.

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A few pedagogical trends(with a focus on trends that captioning advocates should watch)

• Flipped classrooms• Online learning (video and audio conferencing)• Embedded video (PowerPoint, Adobe PDFs)• Mobile learning• Expanded notions of literacy (e.g. multimodal, digital literacy)• Social media/YouTube/live streaming• Open access course materials (including MOOCs)• Gamification and augmented reality systems• EdTech (e.g. Blackboard)• Active learning/flexible pedagogies (pace, place, mode)• Just-in-time teaching and learning• Intercultural/global focus (multilingual)• Changing student demographics and expectations• Nontraditional and international students• From traditionally-bounded courses to “post-course era” (Bass 2012)

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So how do we get there?

sean.zdenek@ttu.edu

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Faculty responses to new captioning mandates

• Why now? • Who is responsible for captioning?• What content is covered? • What is the goal? For whom?• What support is available to instructors?

Some confusion and resistance among faculty and administrators over who is responsible for captioning, why/when captioning is needed, how it will be paid for, what content is covered, the lack of an infrastructure to support training and labor, etc.

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Universal Design: One way forward

sean.zdenek@ttu.edu

• Problem: Inflexible pedagogies, one size fits all, focused on the “imaginary average student”

• UDL: Universal design for learning focuses on designing for all users regardless of ability1. Provide multiple means of representation2. Provide multiple means of action and expression3. Provide multiple means of engagement

Closed captioning helps to enacts UDL: as an alternative to audio, by providing a different modality, by offering a second/native language (subtitles), by providing transcripts that can be customized in appearance.

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Rhetorically Widening the Audience: Literacy studies

• Mantra: Captions benefits everyone.• Promote research on the positive role of captions in literacy

and learning (1980s-present, K-12 focus mainly):– Improved comprehension, retention, note taking, incidental word

recognition, listening, grades, reading speed, focus/attention.– Same language subtitling (origin: India)

• Recognize that captions help diverse populations of students– Students with learning disabilities – Students on the autistic spectrum– Non-native speakers – Older, returning students

• Bibliography of research on literacy and captioning

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Captions clarify, contextualize, distill, and formalize sounds. These functions can promote learning, literacy, understanding.

In Twitter terms: Let me turn on the closed captions so I don’t miss anything!

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Widening the higher ed contextsin which captions are valued

• Student learning a second language• Non-native speaker/writer• Student with cognitive disability who benefits from

access to a second info stream• Student/prof reviewing and searching lectures

prior to an exam• Student studying late at night or in a quiet area

(library)• Student studying in a noisy area (rec center, bus)

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Cultivating “Caption Studies”• A program of research and development at the intersection

of reading, writing, sound studies, and accessibility.• Possible research areas

– Literacy studies, especially in higher ed.– Big data studies (do sirens always wail is a start.)– Rhetorical/textual/film studies (e.g. Analyzing BB-8 captions)– Experiments with animated and new forms of captioning– Pedagogy/training/online education– Usability and User Experience studies– Institutional studies/critiques– Surveys, interviews, case studies– Assessments and recommendations– Software and hardware application and development

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Creating a departmental culture of accessibility

• Problem: Faculty may feel like they don’t have the time or resources to adhere to a new captioning mandate imposed on them.

• Some departmental solutions:– Provide regular support and training to faculty (team-based)– Arrange for outside speakers (e.g. director of student disability services)– Hold accessibility workshops through the dept’s IT or media lab– Publish DIY tutorials (but provide other means of support too)– Designate an accessibility liaison and clear lines of communication – Manage expectations and explain requirements/laws– Integrate accessibility into courses (including service learning)– Publicize and reward accessible teaching– Rhetorically widen the audience and reasons for captioning– Make needs assessment, track student data– Do user testing, surveys of majors– Take incremental steps = increasingly accessible pedagogies

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One size doesn’t fit all

• Diversity among the D/deaf and HOH population• Diversity in class formats (online = live captioning;

large lecture = automated capture)• Diversity in faculty needs/preferences• Diversity in file types and lengths to be captioned• Diversity in copyright permissions (instructor-

produced vs. third-party vids)• Diversity in distribution channels (DVD vs. YouTube)

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A case study in diversity, hybridity, and complexity

• Pilot to practice: Developing a successful campus captioning service (UC Boulder)

• Nine scenarios suggest a number of “big ideas”– Complexities– Institutional policy (to help prioritize needs)– Hybridity (both local and vendor solutions)– Time and expense (including turnaround time)– Copyright and legality– Partnerships across campus– Resistance (pushing faculty > change how they teach)– Technical challenges

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Creating an institutional culture of accessibility

• Flexible, responsive, agile• Prioritizing needs: Students with

accommodation letters, public-facing videos, more permanent videos

• Permissions/legal: Copyright• Multiplicity: Multiple vendor

contracts (case: Stanford)• Hybridity: Outside and in-house

solutions (Reviewers, Cap Lab, DIY)• Training and quality• Support: Clear request and

consultation procedures • Communication: Department liaison,

university accessibility coordinator• Complexity: not one size fits all

• Simplicity: DIY tools • Automation: Seamless workflows

that leverage automation• Developing Policies• Piloting/Assessment• Technical challenges• Planning/budgeting• Managing expectations: Turnaround

times, costs, labor• Communicating responsibilities • Audit/Benchmarks• Feedback: Surveying students• Collaborate: Team-based model and

work with peer institutions• Rhetorical widening: UDL

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What do you think the future holds for closed captioning in higher education? What do you want the future to look like and how can we get there together?

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Additional reading

• Digital Does Not Mean Accessible: Building Accessible Institutional Infrastructures (3Play Media)

• 2016 Roadmap to Web Accessibility in Higher Education (3Play Media)

• Third-party captioning and copyright (Reid 2014)

• Principles: Universal design for learning (UDL Center)

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Presenters

Sean ZdenekAuthor, Reading SoundsAssociate Professor, Texas Tech University

Lily Bond3Play MediaDirector of Marketinglily@3playmedia.com

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