Case Study: Smartpen Loaner Program at UC Berkeley

The University of California at Berkeley has been on the forefront of disabilities services since the inception of the concept. The institution’s Disabilities Students Program was started in 1970 with the charge of ensuring that all students have equal access to education. In recent years the program has adopted a library of assistive technologies as a part of the DSP’s accommodation strategy to employ solution-based technologies whenever possible.
In 2010 UC Berkeley’s DSP piloted the smartpen and a year later instituted the first smartpen loaner program. The department created a starter kit, a training program, application and distribution process. The findings of the pilot program pointed to a variety of benefits of the smartpen including being able to support a large variety of disabilities, stress reduction across multiple disabilities and and supporting a wide range of learning footprints.

This video playlist tells the story of the DSP staff, the student trainer, the pilot program researchers and educators who have their hands in this program.