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________________________
Marc Maurer, President
200 East Wells Street at Jernigan Place
Baltimore, MD 21230
Phone 410 659 9314 Fax 410 685 5653
www.nfb.org
Sent via first class mail and e-mail
March 11, 2013
Betsy Landers, President
Eric Hargis, Executive Director
National Parent Teacher Association
1250 North Pitt Street
Alexandria, VA 22314
blanders/@/pta.org
ehargis/@/pta.org
RE: Amazon s
Sponsorship of the National PTA s Family Reading Experience Program
Dear Ms. Landers and Mr. Hargis:
It has come to my attention that your organization has
selected Amazon as the exclusive sponsor of your new Family Reading Experience
program. While the aspirations of this program are noble, you should know that
the use of Kindle e-books will seriously compromise the education of children
who are blind or have other print disabilities.
This is so because, unlike other e-books, Kindle e-books do not afford
children with print disabilities the same reading and learning experience as
their fellow students. As a result, local PTAs that accept donations of Kindle
devices or encourage the use of Kindle e-books in their schools will, as detailed
in this letter, be helping to put those schools in violation of federal law.
In today s world, equal opportunity requires equal access to
information. Unlike print, digital information is not inherently visual; it can
be made available visually, aurally, and tactilely all at the same time and
from the same original digital source. Thus, digital information can be the
great equalizer, offering mainstream access to all, without regard to whether
the reader has a sensory disability. For
decades, the blind have used a variety of technologies to make e-books
accessible. To read electronic texts, blind students use either text-to-speech
software that vocalizes the words, letters, and characters on a page or a refreshable
Braille display that renders the words, letters, and characters into Braille.
Fortunately, a number of technology developers and content providers have
designed their products and services to put sighted and blind users on an equal
footing. With the advent of commercial e-books, some developers, including
Apple iBooks and Blio books, have made their e-books and reading applications
accessible, so that everyone including blind students and others with print
disabilities can read and use them effectively.
Unfortunately, Amazon is not such a company. It has made a
conscious decision to exclude the blind from reading and studying with its
Kindle e-books. Among other barriers, blind students using Kindle e-books
cannot (1) read character by character and thus learn to spell, punctuate and
distinguish homophones; (2) navigate usefully through the text of a Kindle
e-book to keep up with the rest of the class; (3) interact with the Kindle
e-book s content through the dictionary, highlighting, search, or note-taking
features; or (4) access any content in Braille through their refreshable
Braille displays. In sum, blind students
attempting to use Kindle e-books are effectively precluded from developing
phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, comprehension, or vocabulary, which
are the stated goals of your Family Reading Experience program.
To better illustrate the barriers Kindle e-books create, I
have attached a chart to this letter showing the various functions that Kindle
e-books offer sighted students and deny blind students. The chart reflects the
best access Amazon offers, using a Kindle Keyboard (also called Kindle 3G) or
using the Kindle for PC with Accessibility Plugin to read Kindle e-books. All
other devices and platforms for reading Kindles are completely inaccessible. By
way of comparison, the attached chart also shows other reading platforms, such
as iBooks, that offer blind students all of the functions that Amazon reserves
for the sighted. For your convenience, we have also tied those features to the
Common Core State Standards to demonstrate specifically how the access barriers
of Kindle e-books inhibit blind students educational opportunities. In short, although blind readers do have some rudimentary access to Kindle e-books
when using platforms that permit that rudimentary access, it is not nearly enough [access] to use the
books for anything but the most casual reading, much less the intense,
challenging reading that characterizes the academic environment.
Hence, the implementation of Kindle e-books proposed by the
Family Reading Experience program will relegate students with print disabilities
to second class status and unnecessarily exclude them from benefiting from the
program s goals and objectives. Moreover, the limitations of Kindle e-books
will inhibit print-disabled children from developing those grade-appropriate reading
skills that are set forth by the Common Core State Standards and that are
vigorously advocated for by your organization.
Not only does
the use of Kindle e-books in the public school classroom inhibit the
educational development of print-disabled students, it is also a violation of
federal law. This is so because use of Kindle e-books discriminates against
students with print disabilities by denying them equal access to educational
programs. Under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504
of the Rehabilitation Act, public schools must not deny students with
disabilities the benefits of their programs and activities. Therefore, public
schools that choose to use Kindle e-books will be violating federal law, and
PTA organizations that encourage the use of Kindle e-books in their local
schools will be assisting those schools in that violation.
In 2009 and 2010, the U.S. Departments of Justice and
Education resolved complaints against five post-secondary schools that used the
inaccessible Kindle DX e-reader device in their classrooms with agreements that
required these schools not to purchase any e- reader device for their
classrooms or require use of any device unless or until such electronic book
reader is fully accessible to individuals with visual impairments . . . . An electronic book reader is only fully
accessible if all uses of the device
that are available to individuals without disabilities are available to
individuals with visual impairments in a manner which ensures that its use in
the university setting is equally as effective for individuals with visual
impairments as it is for others. In 2010,
the Departments of Justice and Education jointly issued a letter to the
post-secondary educational community, explaining that when it comes to e-book
readers and e-book content, equal access is the law. In 2011, the Department of Education again
made clear that elementary and secondary schools likewise must refrain from
using technology that will deny students with disabilities equal access.
If we can further assist you in understanding which e-books
and e-book platforms are accessible and compliant with federal and state law,
or provide further information about the deficiencies of Kindle e-books, please
do not hesitate to contact us. The National Federation of the Blind, whose
50,000 members comprise not only blind people of all ages and backgrounds but
also parents of blind children and others who support equal opportunity for
blind Americans, has as its ultimate goal the complete integration of the blind
into society on an equal basis with our sighted peers. We are fortunate to live
in an age in which that ideal has been written into law.
Amazon s deliberate choice to scorn that ideal and ignore the
needs of blind readers does not give public schools a free pass to discriminate
on the basis of disability by purchasing and using Kindle e-books in their
classrooms. Nor should your organization be party to such discrimination. Your
Position Statements emphasize the
special needs of underserved populations including children with
disabilities, and you have assumed the
role of being a powerful voice for all children. We look forward to your cooperation in this
matter and are confident you will raise your powerful voice in support of the
rights of our nation s blind and print-disabled students.
Sincerely,
Marc Maurer, President
NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND
Enclosures
cc: David Zapolsky,
Esq., General Counsel, Amazon, Inc.
