The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities

Transcription

1 MEETING REPORT The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities YOLANDA COMEDY WINNIE RODRIGUEZ VIRGINIA W. STERN

2 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities MEETING REPORT November 2010 YOLANDA COMEDY WINNIE RODRIGUEZ VIRGINIA W. STERN

3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We gratefully acknowledge the contributions of the following individuals to the Problem Solvers workshop and report: Shirley Malcom, Yolanda George, Daryl Chubin, Cathy Ledec, Laureen Summers, and Cee-Cee Fenwick. We also thank the following individuals for their assistance and support at the workshop: Betty Kain, Jean Morrell, Crystal Addison, Donna Behar, Betty Calinger, Betty Ingram, Jatryce Jones, Micah Krichinsky, Sabira Mohamed, Brittany Taggart, and Richard Weibl. The workshop would not have been possible without the assistance of the AAAS Building Services team, especially Robert Zayas and Dexter Cooper. Photography: Ralph Alswang Design: Ann Williams About AAAS The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is the world s largest general scientific society, and publisher of the journal, Science ( AAAS was founded in 1848 and includes some 262 affiliated societies and academies of science, serving 10 million individuals. Science has the largest paid circulation of any peer-reviewed general science journal in the world, with an estimated total readership of one million. The non-profit AAAS ( is open to all and fulfills its mission to advance science and serve society through initiatives in science policy; international programs; science education; and more. About NSF The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent federal agency created by Congress in 1950 to promote the progress of science; to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare; to secure the national defense With an annual budget of about $6.06 billion, NSF is the funding source for approximately 20 percent of all federally supported basic research conducted by America s colleges and universities. In many fields such as mathematics, computer science and the social sciences, NSF is the major source of federal backing. Disclaimer The workshop is supported by the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the National Science Foundation Directorate for Engineering under Grant No. CBET Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the National Science Foundation, AAAS Board of Directors, AAAS Council, or AAAS membership. Copyright AAAS 2010 ISBN

4 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction 5 Section I: Gaining Insights 7 Keys to Success 7 Problem Solvers and the Human Spirit 14 Focusing On Solutions 20 Section II: Next Steps 25 Recommendations 25 Appendix I: Problem Solvers Workshop Agenda 27 Appendix II: A Survey of Engineers and Scientists with Disabilities 29 Appendix III: The Evolution of the Problem Solvers Workshop 30 Appendix IV: References 32 Appendix V: Photo Descriptions 33 Appendix VI: Participants 35 3

5 People with disabilities are not problems, but problem solvers. This world was not designed for people like us who need to have changes made. So we always in our head are solving problems. That is one of our fortes as problem solvers we bring a unique skill to the table. DINAH COHEN, DIRECTOR, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE COMPUTER/ELECTRONIC ACCOMMODATIONS PROGRAM (CAP)

6 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities INTRODUCTION Engineering is all about problem solving. Those with disabilities have had a lifetime to develop their problem-solving skills. Their input comes from a perspective that most will never know and therefore is quite valuable. ROSS WITHERELL, MECHANICAL ENGINEER, PUGET SOUND NAVAL SHIPYARD The Problem Solvers workshop was convened by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, December 13-15, 2009 as a first of its kind meeting to capture the strategies that have enabled people with disabilities to pursue study and succeed as engineers. The workshop demonstrated that engineers with disabilities have overcome extraordinary obstacles physical, technical, attitudinal, and social barriers to obtain degrees and have successful careers. The workshop, organized by the AAAS Project on Science, Technology, and Disability, was supported with a grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Directorate for Engineering to demonstrate the successes of engineers and engineering students with disabilities, to discuss and provide solutions for the constraints that they face, and to inform the disability community, potential employers, academia, and the society as a whole about the strides that have been made as well as the barriers that still need to be overcome to realize the potential of engineers with disabilities. The meeting, held at AAAS Headquarters in Washington, DC, was fully accessible and barrierfree. AAAS meticulously arranged the meeting, paying special attention to the timing of events and breaks, number of event staff, and meal logistics to ensure that all participants had a seamless and positive meeting experience. A consultant was hired to coordinate the accommodations for engineers with hearing impairments. These included real-time captioning and sign language interpretation, employed at all plenary sessions and provided as needed throughout the workshop. In smaller breakout sessions, participants tackled issues of assistive technology, barriers to success in education and employment, persistence, and career mobility in the context of each engineering discipline, employment sector, and disability category. The workshop laid the groundwork for building on society s understanding and analysis of how people with seemingly insurmountable disabilities become productive, capable engineers. The workshop also gave a large group of successful engineers the opportunity to share their knowl- 5

7 edge about problem-solving in relation to their disability and in their personal lives and careers. The ultimate goal of the workshop was to understand how best to create and use a cadre of engineers whose disabilities serve to enhance rather than limit their potential and contributions to society. The meeting, held at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Headquarters in Washington, DC, was fully accessible and barrier-free. 6

8 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities Section I: Gaining Insights Keys to Success The law lets things happen. It doesn t make things happen. People actually make things happen. SHIRLEY MALCOM, HEAD, EDUCATION AND HUMAN RESOURCES PROGRAMS, AAAS we re kind of the trailblazers as engineers. Growing up, I had great parents, family, teachers, and friends. I never saw engineering as this thing I couldn t obtain, even though I had a visual impairment. JASON GRIEVES, PROGRAM MANAGER, MICROSOFT Shirley Malcom Laws have certainly been critical in changing attitudes and increasing career opportunities for people with disabilities. But the accomplishments made by engineers with disabilities have required a lot more than the passage of a law. What are the keys to success for engineers with disabilities? Success varies person by person, situation by situation, and disability by disability. Certainly each disability requires its own strategies and unique uses of technology, and even within a disability, the range of solutions and assistive devices can vary greatly. The participants from the workshop cited six ingredients that are particularly critical to success: 1) Mentors, Advocates, and Role Models; 2) Self-Reliance; 3) AAAS and ENTRY POINT!; 4) Technology; 5) Time Management; and 6) Networking. 1. Mentors, Advocates, and Role Models According to Problem Solvers participants, having one or more individuals who go the extra mile to help you and provide encouragement is phenomenally important to success. The individuals who made a difference in the lives of these engineers were common yet extraordinary: the people who did the testing for learning disabilities at a university; a professor who helped a student get into graduate school; a manager who supported an employee to realize her potential; and parents who believed in the potential of their children. A mentor was described as somebody who just cares about you. These people and others like them played a role in the success stories of the participants. 7

9 My parents helped to develop the vision that I could succeed. My vocational counselor provided the means and encouragement for me to do my best. My professors would challenge me to find the best solution no matter how impossible it may have seemed. ROBERT VAN ETTEN, OWNER, ADAPTIVE LIVING 8

10 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities Each mentor helped in his or her own way but had in common their high expectations of the person. Anne Gick, a senior engineer at The Aerospace Corporation, was described as a star student by a teacher and this sustained me during many very difficult times. It encouraged me to reach beyond my own limitations and excel. Outstanding mentoring is an essential ingredient in career success. It is particularly important for those pursuing academic careers and making many institutional moves. But misperceptions about mentoring relationships are common. Many do not know what an effective mentormentee relationship looks like and that different people can fulfill different roles in helping you along your career path. Participants noted that mentors and advocates do not necessarily have to be a professor/teacher or manager or even someone in the same field. They are not always just like you nor do they necessarily have the same accomplishments and goals as you. It is important to realize that finding the right mentor, advocate, or role model requires initiative as well as time and dedication to build meaningful and sustainable relationships. 2. Self-Reliance You look at what strengths you can bring to the table. How can you play your disability to your advantage? Because there are real assets to be found in you, and in all the settings I ve been in, that s the thing I try to look at again and again. BETSY PUGEL, PHYSICIST, NATIONAL AERONAUTICS AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION (NASA) I know people with disabilities want the opportunity to prove themselves. JAY MODI, LEAD ENGINEER, LOCKHEED MARTIN What can you learn that you will enjoy and help you stand out so it s not your disability that makes you stand out; it s what you know and what you can do with your skills. IVONNE MOSQUERA, FINANCIAL ANALYST, DOW CHEMICAL Participants believed that their own actions were strongly correlated with their success. Making one s self invaluable to the team can go a long way in dispelling misconceptions and building relationships. From taking the initiative to lead a team or learn a new skill to simply believing in themselves, participants stories illuminated the need for self-motivation, belief, and the sheer audacity to say, I am capable of doing this and willing to work hard to meet my goals. The participants discussed becoming empowered, being bold, and having honest conversations about the limits that their disability does and does not place on them. Overall, it was evident from the discussions of the workshop participants that it is critically important to be your own strongest advocate. 9

11 Since 1975, the AAAS Project on Science, Technology, and Disability has worked with and for engineers and scientists with disabilities. Its flagship program, ENTRY POINT!, has placed more than 500 highly qualified undergraduate and graduate students with disabilities in science, engineering, technology, and mathematics (STEM) internships. The majority of alums have backgrounds in engineering or related fields. 3. Interventions: AAAS and ENTRY POINT! AAAS genuinely believes in my career. VASANA MANEERATANA, NSF INTERNATIONAL RESEARCH POSTDOCTORAL FELLOW ENTRY POINT! gave me that opportunity to go the extra mile. STATIRA PETERSEN, MBA STUDENT the internship allows you to really see what you can do. JERRY ROBINSON, GRADUATE STUDENT, SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY Students have interned at IBM, NASA, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Merck, Google, Lockheed Martin, CVS, NAVAIR, Pfizer, Infosys, Shell, and various university science laboratories. In many cases, students received multiple internships or permanent employment following a successful internship. About 90% of ENTRY POINT! alumni are actively working in STEM fields or pursuing graduate degrees. With new skills and real-world experiences acquired from their internships and an increased sense of self-confidence, ENTRY POINT! interns flourish in careers that otherwise might have been difficult to enter. Many of the workshop participants were recipients of ENTRY POINT! internships and cited AAAS and the dedication of AAAS staff as being key to their success. 4. Assistive Technology When I was 13, I started wearing hearing aids and as my loss got worse, the hearing aids got better. So I have been able to function thanks to that technology for all of my career. VINT CERF, CHIEF INTERNET EVANGELIST, GOOGLE 10

12 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities the assistive technology component allows us to at least level the playing field to some extent TED CONWAY, PROGRAM DIRECTOR, RESEARCH TO AID PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES (RAPD), NSF 11

13 Every time we reinvent something, we create a new world of problems. LARRY LEIFER, DIRECTOR, STANFORD CENTER FOR DESIGN RESEARCH, STANFORD UNIVERSITY Assistive technology was a significant focus of the workshop. Participants said assistive technology played a critical role in helping them be productive in their studies, careers, and personal lives. From using an FM assistive listening device to hear a professor clearly in class to a device that attaches a wheelchair to a handcycle for a trek around New Zealand, technologies can be tools for success. Technology has leveled the playing field for people with disabilities. Yet the workshop participants also discussed the impact of some new technologies where there are concerns about accessibility, including streaming video that does not have captioning and touch screens and animated/dynamic web content, both of which are difficult for people who are blind to use. Representatives from the NSF Directorate for Engineering discussed the agency s commitment to understanding the current state of the art, gaps and insufficiencies, and the next generation those advancements that will best help the disability community overcome barriers to become successful engineers as well as barriers to technology transfer. NSF also values the involvement of people with disabilities in the design and evaluation of assistive technologies that they are funding for development. As scientists and engineers, NSF Program Director Ted Conway posed, what technology will allow us to focus primarily on a desired function, as opposed to trying to adapt to a particular environment? Many products and technologies are developed with accessibility as an afterthought, or emphasis is placed on risk, cost, and performance rather than user need or preference. Retrofitting can be expensive and is usually not the best solution to an individual s problem. Larry Leifer, Director of the Stanford Center for Design Research, reminds us that innovation is technical and social. It s always about people, but the technical world often gets that wrong. Participants were interested in venues to learn from other engineers about technology they could implement in their research, careers, and personal lives. They also want a forum to present their ideas, gain feedback, and find the expertise to bring needed technology to fruition. Workshop participants cited the need for discussions on assistive technology on an annual basis; the creation of a professional society, part of whose mandate would be to set a framework for these types of discussions; and creating an online forum for discussions and reviews of technology by fellow engineers. 12

14 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities 5. Time Management Disability is a thief of time. It takes longer to do things, whether it s getting up from lying down or typing an . NILS HAKANSSON, BIOENGINEERING POSTDOC, UNIVERSITY OF DELAWARE Even if you never hire a person with a disability, if you ve got the same people working for you 10 years from now, I guarantee in writing someone will become disabled. DINAH COHEN, DIRECTOR, US DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE COMPUTER/ELECTRONIC ACCOMMODA- TIONS PROGRAM (CAP) Disabilities come in a wide variety of flavors and can become a reality for anyone at any time, but one certainty that encompasses all disabilities is that the time it takes to accomplish most things is much longer for a person with a disability than for a person without a disability. This is even more apparent for engineers with disabilities, who work in fast-paced and demanding environments. Workshop participants said that during the course of a day, having the energy to do it all is an issue. A disability may significantly hinder a person s ability to carry out the day-to-day tasks associated with having a job and maintaining a reasonable home life. Everyone complains that there are not enough hours in a day to do everything that needs to be done to maintain our 21st century lifestyles, but engineers with disabilities navigate their days with additional problems to solve albeit with no additional hours. Things that are taken for granted such as walking to a meeting, hearing what is being said on a conference call, processing information, giving presentations, and reading or writing lecture notes can take magnitudes of hours longer for a person with a disability. And that is just in the university or at the workplace. In personal lives, tasks like shopping, making dinner, getting the children ready for school, and driving to a party may take more time and effort than the day allows. Do you give up if you have a disability simply because it s harder and will take longer? Finding the work-life balance is challenging, especially when one bad event can easily cause the whole day to spiral out of control because I have zero buffer built in, noted Karl Booksh, chemistry professor at the University of Delaware. There is no doubt that you will need flexibility and tools to do your job, lead your life, and simply make it through the day. Safeguarding your time may require some out-ofthe-box thinking and planning, as well as problem-solving skills of extraordinary measure. Sometimes simple accommodations can be extremely helpful, but people with disabilities are often very shy about talking about requirements needed to get their jobs done. A person doesn t hesitate to ask for benefits like parking spaces or ergonomic equipment or furniture, but people with disabilities often find it very difficult to ask for laboratory retrofitting, flexible hours, or realtime captioning for videoconferences. Even if a funding agency or employer is generous with respect to job accommodations, often the price of costly living accommodations, such as personal care assistants and housing, are not considered. Booksh says, I sunk in easily $100,000 making the house wheelchair-accessible because there are only two-story houses with basements in northern Delaware. My car died 13

15 and because I ve got kids I needed a van. That s $75K right there for a wheelchair accessible van. 6. Networking I am not alone in my journey and challenges knowing that there are others who have challenges like me gave me a new network of people to connect with. BETSY PUGEL, PHYSICIST, NASA Networking is a time-honored tool for sharing information among people with common interests. Workshop participants had a unique opportunity to network at the Problem Solvers workshop, obtaining new sources of support and information. Such a gathering of engineering professionals with disabilities had never happened before. Ric Weibl, Director of the AAAS Center for Careers in Science and Technology, emphasized that everyone in here should be leaving with a business card from everybody else in this room. This is a huge resource that is extraordinarily rare, so take full advantage of it. Participants discussed how the community created at the workshop could continue as a network. Likewise, potential employers, university administrators, and hiring managers would benefit from recruiting from this network and finding useful resources and practices. Information that could be shared includes: what it is like to work for certain companies; what have been the experiences of fellow engineers navigating the career path in academia; what strategies do people use for job-hunting; what kinds of accommodations have been requested and given; and what technologies are available and helpful for people with particular disabilities. Problem Solvers and the Human Spirit The problem of overcoming a disability is engineering. ARDEN L. BEMENT, JR., FORMER DIRECTOR, NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION You are looking at a man who not only believes in miracles but depends on them. VINT CERF, CHIEF INTERNET EVANGELIST, GOOGLE The world of ambiguity is where the creative opportunities lie. LARRY LEIFER, DIRECTOR, STANFORD CENTER FOR DESIGN RESEARCH, STANFORD UNIVERSITY The problem-solving skills that people with disabilities use to overcome barriers to education and employment are the kinds of skills that aca- 14

16 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities demia, industry, government, and nonprofits want in their institutions. People with disabilities are constantly inventing and using unique approaches. They are known to be especially skilled at problem-solving involving creativity and persistence. Further, Leifer points out the importance of diversity in the ability to create solutions and make innovations. Teams of people with different perspectives and unique approaches are critical to solving 21st century problems. For more than three decades, AAAS has worked on issues of inclusion for people with disabilities in STEM fields and has become intimately familiar with the stories of hundreds of successful people in the engineering community. And many of those people were the stars of the Problem Solvers workshop. They shared their stories, weaving together their histories of success and failure, joy and anger, dreams and dreams deferred. They were sometimes learners and often times teachers, solving seemingly daunting problems with a determination and zeal too powerful to ignore. It was a rare opportunity to get a glimpse into the minds and hearts of a community whose members have overcome personal obstacles to make their mark on engineering. The workshop participants discussed both reaching for the stars and knowing the limitations imposed on their lives by their disabilities. Larry Pileggi, Tanoto Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University, made us painfully aware that people with disabilities, cannot be anything they want to be. A disability does place limitations on people, and it is a matter of knowing one s own limits. Dream, know your limitations, find your axis, and never let what you cannot do get in the way of what you can do, Pileggi emphasized. 15

17 The Problem Solvers workshop provided a plethora of success stories. It was illuminating and powerful to hear from so many people who had beaten the odds to become successful engineers. Paths were not easy. Tears and anger were part of many journeys. But sheer determination and persistence were ever-present. If you want to know what a person with a disability can do, simply read the profiles below. They are but samplings from the workshop participants and tiny slices of their lives, but these vignettes demonstrate the ingenuity of the Problem Solvers workshop participants. Whitney Blanchard is working toward her dream of a Ph.D. in civil and environmental engineering, while working at NOAA on issues related to renewable energy in the ocean. Wearing hearing aids has helped her manage her studies and career. Karl Booksh is a chemistry professor at the University of Delaware. His research is in process analytical chemistry, and he works primarily in biomedical sensors and environmental sensors to monitor processes. His goal is always to be so valuable to a team that they forget he is in a wheelchair and just remember his contributions to the group. He received an American Chemical Society graduate fellowship and an NSF postdoctoral fellowship. An interplanetary Internet and interplanetary protocols that will help make every spacecraft interoperable? As if being one of the fathers of the Internet and the Chief Internet Evangelist at Google isn t enough, Vint Cerf has not let his hearing impairment stand in the way of his significant contributions to science and technology. Want to better understand the complexities of weather? Imke Durre has known since she was 12-years-old that she wanted to do something related to weather. She has a Ph.D. in atmospheric science from the University of Washington and a B.S. degree in applied mathematics from Yale University. She works at the NOAA Climatic Data Center. She was born blind. Angela Foreman works on what she describes as a fascinating project. She collaborates with the engineering department on an assistive listening device at the Rochester Institute of Technology, where she is an assistant professor. She is deaf and uses technology a hearing aid and a cochlear implant in addition to speaking and signing. She did her ENTRY POINT! internship at NOAA. Shannon Franks loves the environment and wants to help us all better understand it. He uses remote sensors to collect data about land use changes at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. And when he isn t on the job, he steps out of his wheelchair to scale mountains, go skiing, travel the world, and guide people with disabilities on outdoor adventures. 16

18 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities Jessica Granderson, who has a non-apparent disability, is an ENTRY POINT! alum who worked at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. She received a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and is currently a postdoc at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory in the Environmental Energy Technologies Division. Her research is primarily on making commercial buildings more energy-efficient. Nils Hakansson, a bioengineering postdoc at the University of Delaware, has a form of muscular dystrophy that, for the past 10 years, has left him unable to walk. Muscular dystrophy is also his motivation for his area of study. Hakansson wants to understand humans and their interaction with their environment. He considers himself the embodiment of the phrase disability is a thief of time. Lieutenant Royce James dazzles in his Coast Guard uniform. He studied physics and music at New Mexico State University, did ENTRY POINT! internships at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and NSF, and received his Ph.D. in plasma physics from Columbia University and Stevens Institute of Technology. He is currently an officer teaching at the Coast Guard Academy, his learning disability notwithstanding. Jeremy Johansen always had an interest in how things work. Until the age of 10, he was sighted and was certain that he would one day be an engineer. When he lost his sight, his dream of being an engineer did not change. He received his B.S. degree in mechanical engineering from the University of California, Santa Barbara. His love of robotics and sensors led him to complete his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering, and he now works for a software company. 17

19 Having a hearing impairment has given Larry Leifer an incredible viewpoint of diversity and innovation. Leifer is a professor of mechanical engineering and Director of the Stanford Center for Design Research. His research interests include: 1) development of a collaborative engineering environment for geographically-distributed product development teams; 2) instrumentation of that environment for design knowledge capture, indexing, re-use, and performance assessment; 3) development of tele-assistive robots for physically-limited individuals; and 4) development of pedagogically-informed technology for distributed collaborative learning. In addition to all of these accomplishments, he co-founded the Tolfa Corporation (1989), now LingraphiCARE America, and Independence Works, Inc. to disseminate rehabilitation technology. Vasana Maneeratana deals with numerous health issues. However, her unwavering persistence has afforded her numerous opportunities and successes. She is currently a postdoc who wants to go into academia. She received her Ph.D. at University of Florida in materials science and engineering, did two ENTRY POINT! internships at NASA, and is now doing an NSF postdoc between the Max Planck Institute for Colloids and Interfaces in Potsdam, Germany and the Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris. Her research focuses on developing sustainable technologies, such as batteries and fuel cells, using new design approaches with the chemistry of polymers. Larry Pileggi has received many prestigious awards, including Westinghouse Electric Corporation s highest engineering achievement award, the best CAD transactions paper award for 1991 and 1999, a Presidential Young Investigator award from NSF, Semiconductor Research Corporation s Technical Excellence Award in 1991 and 1999, the inaugural Richard Newton GSRC Industrial Impact Award, the SRC Aristotle award in 2008, and the IEEE Circuits and Systems Society Mac Van Valkenburg Award in He has a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering from Carnegie Mellon University and is the Tanoto Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering there. He is also the Director of the FCRP Center for Circuit and System Solutions (C2S2). He says that as a wheelchair rider, getting around is his biggest challenge and he often needs someone to travel with him; but his success is extraordinary. Betsy Pugel searches for ways to understand the environment. She works at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center building the detectors used in environmental monitoring. Pugel has a bachelor s degree in physics from the University of Michigan and a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Maryland. 18

20 The Problem Solvers: Education and Career Paths of Engineers with Disabilities Jerry Robinson did his undergraduate degree at Morehouse College and was an ENTRY POINT! intern at NASA Headquarters and at JP Morgan Chase Bank in New York. After graduating, he worked for JP Morgan Chase for five years before returning to school to get his Ph.D. in information management at Syracuse University. His cerebral palsy has slowed neither his success nor his ambition. He credits his parents, but his quick mind and charm haven t hurt him either. Brian Ruhe does research in biomechanics. He has had bilateral transdermal amputations and not only uses prosthetic devices to get around, but has also dedicated his research to improving these devices through better understanding of the mechanics and interfaces of the devices. He has a degree in engineering and has returned to school to obtain a clinical degree, hoping to meld the clinical and the engineering knowledge together to improve the field. CP, or charge-parity, is the combination of particle-antiparticle and mirror symmetry. Professor Ian Shipsey, who is completely deaf and has a cochlear implant, wants a deeper understanding of the behavior of elementary particles and the Big Bang origin of the universe. He is a professor at Purdue University, where he is involved in searches for CP violation and studies of parity violation in the weak interactions of elementary particles. He is also involved in the development of microstructure gas detectors for future highenergy physics experiments. And he didn t let his misgivings about teaching with a disability negatively impact him. As a matter of fact, he won a Professor of the Year award. Zelda Wasserman, now retired, has had a successful career as a chemist, working on molecular design of protein and drug molecules in industry for over 40 years. She worked for Bell Laboratories for 16 years and spent the rest of her career at Dupont. Determined to present her research at professional meetings, Wasserman engaged her colleagues to help her overcome the barriers related to her hearing impairment. Being the CEO of your own start-up allows you to have a great boss and turn your vision into a reality. Just ask Jay Wyant, whose hearing loss did not stop him from starting several companies. A serial entrepreneur, his most recent venture, Remotocom, delivers webcasts and events to customers. Performing simulations on Seaborg at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) is only part of his repertoire. P.K. Yeung is hearing impaired. He credits technology for affording him the opportunity to hear his professors at Cornell and advocates for the use of more captioning at conferences and in meetings for the benefit of the hearing and hearing-impaired. He obtained his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Cornell University and is currently a professor of aerospace engineering at Georgia Tech. He has received funding from NSF for some of his research. Sean Young has many goals. He also has Asperger s Syndrome. He is currently a senior at Georgia Tech, majoring in computer science. He plans to obtain a master s degree in engineering. His determination will make his goals a reality. 19