NEC Foundation of America

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Fran Dixon, 202-347-4909
Sylvia Clark, 631-753-7444

NEC Foundation of America - Nurturing a New Generation of Universal Designers

Melville, NY, February 13, 2001 - Imagine a world where things are designed to accommodate people instead of people adapting to things. Universal design is a movement that considers the variety of human physical conditions across the lifespan to create design solutions that work for all users. By funding programs and projects with national reach that encourage future engineering and design professionals to embrace the idea that good design works for everyone, NEC Foundation of America has made universal design a major focus of its grant making since 1991.

"Although the concept of universal design emerged in the 1970s, this is still an idea that requires exposure in many different forums, among design educators, practicing architects, manufacturers, and the general public," said NEC Foundation of America Executive Director Sylvia Clark. "NEC Foundation of America supports a number of projects that spread the word that it makes sense to design products and environments that work for all of us, including the 43 million people in the United States who have disabilities, as well as the growing number of older Americans." Among these are projects that highlight notable examples of universal design, document the history of universal design, increase the number of people with disabilities in the design field, and remind media producers of accessibility techniques for capturing the largest possible audience for their productions.

"One of the most important things we can do to create a more accessible world," according to Clark, "is to expose young people to universal design." The National Engineering Design Challenge, a competition of high school students, gives aspiring engineers hands-on experience to demonstrate universal design concepts. The National Engineering Design Challenge Finals, a program of the Junior Engineering Technical Society (JETS), will take place in Washington, DC, February 19-21 at the Hyatt Regency.

"This year, as they have done over the past twelve years, student teams, with a teacher as a coach and an engineer as an adviser, will conceptualize and build a product intended to help make life easier for people with a disability," said JETS Executive Director Howard Spiegelman. "The product must be inexpensive, safe, durable, usable without any outside assistance, and, most importantly, thanks to the persistent interest and commitment of NEC Foundation of America, demonstrate universal design." More information about the National Engineering Design Challenge is available online at www.jets.org.

Universal Design Exemplars is another program supported by NEC Foundation of America that teaches aspiring design professionals about universal design. This project of the North Carolina State University College of Design's Center for Universal Design sought out and evaluated examples of universal design from the U.S. and abroad and produced an interactive CD-ROM that identifies, describes and visually documents 32 of the best examples of universal design.

NEC Foundation of America is funding the distribution of the Universal Design Exemplars CD to high school and college students studying the sciences, technology and design; to their teachers and professors; and to design professionals. "It's critical that students entering the field understand that design must meet the needs of people. To do this, students need to understand the physical differences among intended users," according to Clark.

Among the winners of the Universal Design Exemplars are the Brookfield Zoo in Brookfield, Illinois, the Freewheeling Mountain Cabin of Asheville, North Carolina, and the National Building Museum in Washington, DC. The Universal Design Exemplars CD can be ordered online at www.design.ncsu.edu/cud.

A related goal of NEC Foundation of America is to increase the ranks of design and engineering professionals who have disabilities. An NEC Foundation of America grant is underwriting the dissemination of several publications as part of Access to Design Professions, an initiative of Adaptive Environments, to assist people with disabilities to enter and sustain themselves in the professions of architecture, industrial design, interior design, and landscape architecture. Adaptive Environments (www.adaptiveenvironments.org), is a Boston-based nonprofit that addresses the environmental issues that confront elderly people and those with disabilities.

"Research on the career choices of people with disabilities confirms that major barriers in both professional schools and the design workplace undermine career development of people with disabilities in the design professions," said Adaptive Environments Executive Director Valerie Fletcher. "If more people with disabilities enter and become successful in the design fields, they will use their personal experience of disability to contribute to great universal design."

Additional NEC Foundation of America grants in support of universal design include:

• Straight Ahead Pictures, a nonprofit media production company, to produce an online museum exhibit entitled Tools and Liberties: A History of Assistive Technology and Universal Design in the United States.
• Bay Area Video Coalition, the most advanced nonprofit video arts production and post-production center in the United States, to develop a Captioning Center to assist nonprofits and independent producers in making their television programs and films accessible to the widest possible audience, including people who are deaf and hard of hearing.

According to Clark "the universal design projects that NEC Foundation of America supports represent a strong synergy between the two major initiatives of the Foundation - science and technology education, principally at the secondary level, and the application of technology to assist people with disabilities." NEC Foundation of America (www.necfoundation.org) was established in 1991 and endowed at $10 million by NEC Corporation and the following US subsidiaries: NEC America, Inc.; NEC Electronics Inc. and NEC Technologies, Inc. NEC Foundation of America remains consistent in its focus on programs with national reach and impact in science and technology education, principally at the secondary level, and assistive technology for people with disabilities. Since its inception, NEC Foundation has awarded grants totaling $3.9 million.

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