Episode Transcript

Transcript edited by Miri Newman

Disclaimer

Kylo: You’re listening to Let’s Talk! Let’s Talk! Is a digital space for students at Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ experiencing disabilities to share their perspectives, ideas, and worldviews in an inclusive and accessible environment. The views and opinions expressed in this program are those of the speakers, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or positions of Ä¢¹½´«Ã½, Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ Foundation, or our community partners. We broadcast on our home website, , on Spotify, on , and .

Interview Start: Meeting the Guests

Miri: Thank you for meeting with me today and agreeing to do this interview. I’ve been looking forward to telling people about STEAM Centers for a while, ’cause I think that’s a really cool thing that Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ provides. And a lot of the people who were in my graduating class, my graduating cohort, worked at least to some extent with the STEAM Centers. So yeah, will you introduce yourself and tell us how you ended up working at the STEAM Center?Ìý

Nora: Yeah! So; Hi! My name is Nora Hobson. I am an outreach specialist for the STEAM Center, as well as a technician/assistant for the Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ Maker Lab. And that one’s based at Sylvania. So basically, I ended up working at the STEAM Centers by being just a consistent maker within the space. You know, I visited a lot. It was like one of my routine stops, during my student tenure at Ä¢¹½´«Ã½. And basically I came up with a lot of projects, I really like ingratiated myself into the community of the center, and eventually, you know, it being a casual position, eventually another casual left and I was able to kind of apply for and hopefully get the role, which I was really lucky enough to get. So yeah, that’s how I ended up working here.

Miri: How long have you been there?Ìý

Nora: Oh, yeah. I’ve been at the STEAM Centers for about three years.Ìý

Miri: Nice!

Nora: And I’ve done outreach now for about two years. We just started our third grant cycle.Ìý

Miri: Nice. Yeah. So what exactly are the STEAM Centers? What do they do, and how’d they come to be?Ìý

Nora: So the STEAM Centers are — You can think of them as a series of maker spaces. If you don’t know what a maker space is, you can also think of it like a tool library. Basically, we’re like a community space, and we house a variety of different like pieces of tools and technology that it might not be feasible to keep in your home, especially not multiple pieces all at once. . So, you know, we provide access to tools like 3D printers. We have laser cutters in the space, vinyl cutters, so like, you know, sticker-making machines or T-shirt-making machines. I’m currently recording from the sewing room of the Sylvania lab.Ìý

Miri: ±·¾±³¦±ð.Ìý

Nora: Sylvania’s really lucky to have a whole sewing room. Most of the s- other centers will also just have like a sewing machine. But each of the centers are also going to have access to pretty much the same equipment across the district. So this space we have sewing machines, we have embroidery machines, sergers, just a whole fleet of tools and tech. Uh, we also have stuff for electronics as well, so if you wanna get into soldering or introductory circuits as well, just a whole array of things.

Miri: Interesting. Yeah, I have only interacted with the STEAM Center at Cascade, which, mostly what I was there for was the laser cutter and the 3D printers.

Nora: Yeah, yeah.Ìý

Miri: Um, so it’s super cool to have stuff also available for sewing and —Ìý

Nora: ´¡²ú²õ´Ç±ô³Ü³Ù±ð±ô²â!Ìý

Miri:Ìý — garment construction and stuff like that.Ìý

Nora: Or garment repair as well. . I mean, it’s not just, like, creating things, entirely from scratch. It’s about altering them to fit your body better. It’s about, you know, fixing it so that it doesn’t go into a landfill immediately. It’s about, you know, altering it or just, like, completely changing it into something new. Transforming it, really.Ìý

Miri: Yeah, that’s super cool.Ìý

Nora: ³Û±ð²¹³ó!Ìý

Miri: So aside from providing access to all these tools, you also have classes and workshops and stuff that you guys host, right?

Nora: Yeah. Well, so we don’t host classes per se. We collaborate with, um, specific, classes that would like to, you know, use our space or utilize our tools. Like at Sylvania specifically, we have been doing academic collaborations with the engineering department, for introductory engineering classes. We also —Ìý

Miri: That’s pretty coolÌý

Nora:Ìý — today we just had the printmaking, art, I think, 274, class come in to learn how to use our laser for their woodblocks. But yeah, we also do host workshops throughout the term. Each center is gonna have a slightly different workshop schedule just because each coordinator decides to make different workshops and run them based off of need for their space. We’re always gonna have Maker Basics, you know, like 3D printing, come in, learn how to 3D print on our printer. We’re gonna have sticker making, where [you] come in, learn how to take an image that you really love, and make it into a sticker that you can just slap on your tablet.Ìý

Miri: I’ve always wanted to do sticker making. That sounds like fun.

Nora: Sticker making is awesome. The vinyl cutters that we have are awesome. They’re… I mean, it, it’s, it’s all basically magic in here. It’s wild. Um, and then, yeah, we’ll also have slightly more advanced workshops that you have to sign up. Maker Basics are all basically drop-in workshops. So if you ever see an advertisement for it, you know, on the boards, or on Panther Hub, you’re going to be able to just, like, drop in at any time during that lab day. I think even Michael runs it just all week too. You can drop in any time, and we will teach you on the spot for that workshop. That’s a Maker Basics workshop. We’re also doing advanced workshops, which we ask that you sign up in advance for, and those are gonna be one-day workshops where we have, you know, a beginning, a middle, and an end — so please, like, show up on time — where we train you on a process like digitizing for the embroidery machine, or learning how to use the laser cutter, where, you know, we’ll have to teach you a software and then another software, and then we’ll have to show you how to thread the machine. it’s multiple steps, and therefore, It becomes a little bit harder to just, like, jump in and get to it right on the spot.Ìý

Miri: And these are… You mentioned that you do some work with classes, but these are open to, just, Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ students, right?Ìý

Nora: Absolutely. Absolutely, yeah. All of the workshops, we do our best to keep them free. I don’t think we’ve ever had a paid workshop that you have to attend. Even the sign-up ones, you just sign up on Panther Hub and the ticket is free. You just show up, you do it. We provide the materials, we provide the tools. It is all covered by your student fees, so. Within reason! I mean, if you wanna print a million ducks, maybe no a million ducks.Ìý

Miri: Oh, darn. Well, there goes my weekend plans…Ìý

Nora: We’ll let you get to, like, five or 10 pretty easily, you know?

Miri: The rest of the time, for just drop-in times?Ìý

Nora: Yeah. So drop-in times, basically what we’re gonna do, oftentimes we’re, we’ll be assisting classes or students. Like, where we get stretched pretty thin ’cause it’s a pretty high-demand space. Drop-in times are really cool, because they’re basically just open lab hours. Students are basically welcome to come in and work on projects, either for class or for personal projects, anytime during our open lab hours. Each space has assistants and technicians, and a couple of work studies as well to be able to help you through the project, and help you kinda brainstorm how we might help you bring these projects to life. Ultimately they are your projects, so there’s only so much brainstorming that we can do. We’re not gonna build your stuff for you. We’re not a manufacturing space. But as long as you’re willing to come in and, like, learn how to use the tools, and then utilize those tools to create something that you’re excited about and cool with, the world is your oyster at our space. Just come in, talk to us about the scope of your project. We’ll help you brainstorm, and we’ll help you get started on your creative journeys.Ìý

Miri: How do people who come for drop-in times bring materials? Like, do they have to bring all their own materials? Is there, like, a budget thing?Ìý

Nora: No. So, for the most part, the spaces provide materials, especially if you’re doing, like, a project like sticker making or, you know, 3D printing for the first time. You’re welcome to come in and just basically pick from the filaments that we have available to use. We’ll give you some guidance as to, like, what filaments are used for what. Mostly we print in, like, PLA at our spaces. . But if we, if you need something that’s, like, more structural or something that, like, squishes, we have some filaments for that as well. It just really depends on what the project is and why the project might need something different from the standard.

Miri: And what about for sewing? Will the student be bringing — I mean, obviously their own fabric presumably, but, like, thread and stuff, do you provide, or would they be bringing those as well?Ìý

Nora: We, we provide thread. We provide thread. We provide sewing notions. Really, whatever’s in the space is available. Oftentimes we even have fabric, too. We get a lot of people who are really interested in donating fabric, at least at the Sylvania campus.Ìý

Miri: That’s really cool.Ìý

Nora: And I’ve had to actually turn away some fabric donations, ’cause our cabinet is full.Ìý

Miri: Interesting. That’s really cool.Ìý

Nora: But yeah, no, oftentimes, like, especially for, like, costuming projects, if you’re doing, like, a cosplay or something really hyper-specific, a lot of our fabrics just won’t match the vibe of the costume that we’re looking for, in which case I often recommend, like, “Use our fabric for mock-ups. Go insane.” My personal fabric collection here is collecting dust. Um, so I say like, “Please, go after and, like, play. Go forth, play. Do some of the practice projects.” And then for larger projects or projects that you have a really specific vision for, that’s when we’ll say, “Hey, maybe, you know, we’re gonna need you to bring in some of your own materials, bring in your own filament.” Especially like, you know, if you’re, if you’re doing like a dozen patches on the embroidery machine and you’re going to be using a lot of thread from the thread library. You don’t necessarily need to buy all your colors but, you know, replenish some of the, some of the smaller like used spools. Or contribute a new color to the thread library ’cause things like color spools, they get used, but they get used really slowly. So it’s better to have kind of a, more broad color spectrum for students to choose from in general as like a community availability rather than having everyone like buy exactly the supplies that they need, bring it to the space, use what they need, and then take it home with them. That’s a burden on kind of everybody involved.Ìý

Miri: Yeah. That’s a cool thing to suggest that people do, ’cause I wouldn’t have even thought about like being able to use your external materials that you’re gonna bring into the space, and then add them to the collection, have it be like part of a maker Community, where it’s like, “Oh, yeah, you know, I bought this much thread for this project, and I used this much of it, so I’m just gonna leave you guys the rest of it for someone else.”Ìý

Nora: Yeah! Exactly! And it can vary from like material to material. We love getting more thread. We love getting more PLA, as long as it’s not like old PLA. it can gain water and get a little bit harder to use the older it gets.Ìý

Miri: Clog up the machine a little bit. Awesome. One of my colleagues has brought up a couple of times the idea of getting a group of people together to go in and make 3D prints or customizations for mobility assistance tools, or even just parts of mobility assistance or other accessibility tools that people don’t have.

Nora: Absolutely. That sounds awesome.Ìý

Miri: How long does a print take, like if you’re just going in to do that?Ìý

Nora: Yeah, that can wildly vary, unfortunately, depending on the size of the print, and the material that you’re printing with, and the printer that you’re printing on. Our spaces, we mainly have . Prusa’s a brand of printer. And it’s, uh, it’s one of the more common ones. Our spaces tend to have prusa Minis. I think most of the spaces are updated to Mark 4s at this point as well. I don’t know if we still have any Mark 3s around. But we stay within the Prusa ecosystem for the most part. These printers, I would say they could print out something… Oh, let’s see. What’s something that’s a recognizable and common size? I would say that they could print out something the size of in maybe two and a half hours, just off the top of my head.

Miri: So you have a collection of materials. Do you also have displays of things that people have made there?Ìý

Nora: Oh, yeah, absolutely. Each space does displays a little bit differently, but most of the spaces have some form of like display area or display case. Oftentimes they do get a little old and dusty ’cause not many people want to put out their displayed items, and so we end up with a lot of stuff that technicians have made in the space, or just like really cool and innovative projects that happened like three years ago. But most spaces, they do have a space to like showcase students’ work, cool projects, things like that.Ìý

Miri: Nice. So, if there are people who want to come to one of the just drop-in workshops, how do they go about finding out about that?Ìý

Nora: Yeah, so all of our workshops are advertised on . We’re with the Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ STEAM Centers, but you can also find out about them on our Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ webpage, , It’ll also tell you the open lab timesÌý

Miri: If there is someone coming in there with a disability or other accessibility needs, how are those met? What is the best way for somebody with some sort of accommodational need to interact with the space?Ìý

Nora: Yeah. So I mean, every accommodation that someone is going to need is going to be different. I think first things first is we always do our best to just meet that student at the level of need that they need. We do our best to make sure that there are multiple forms of documentation for any given equipment, and also that all of the staff are really well trained and able to operate as teachers and tutors for each piece of equipment within the space. .

Miri: So that includes, like, safety trainings and all that sort of thing?Ìý

Nora: Oh, absolutely. We take safety insanely seriously at the STEAM centers. . We have PPE at every space, for any level of desire or need. So, you know, if you’re operating the band saw, which we have at Sylvania, we require that you tie your hair back, that you wear your safety goggles, that you operate under the safety procedures. And even then, the tools are still, like, locked out, and we’re by your side operating that tool with you because it is such a hazard. We just wanna make sure everything in the space is used and maintained and operated with as much safety in mind as possible.Ìý

Miri: Oh, yeah. I, myself, am absolutely terrified of band saws.

Nora: Yeah. And if a student is ever uncomfortable with using a machine like that, we’re happy to step in and help figure out that situation together. You know? If I need to cut something on the band saw, I can cut it.Ìý

Miri: That’s actually super helpful, I think.I think a lot of people want to make things, case in point myself, and are just intimidated by either the lack of knowledge of how to use a tool so having someone there to very patiently and genuinely guide them through it.Ìý

Nora: ³Û±ð²õ.Ìý

Miri: And also just some of the risks of things. Like, I’m a guitar player. I, I really would like to have all 10 fingers for as much of my life as I can —

Nora: Right?

Miri: — As I can go through, so.Ìý

Nora: Right. No, exactly.Ìý

Miri: Is there anything else that you wanna bring up or any upcoming events that you wanna, like, get out there?Ìý

Nora: Oh my gosh, so many. I know that we have a whole variety of workshops coming up, and I wanna plug every single one of them. We have a Building Day at Sylvania Campus, where we’re gonna build VEX robots and play soccer with them.Ìý

Miri: What’s a VEX robot?Ìý

Nora: It’s a robotics kit. They’re often used for, like, robotics high school competitions, and so you can build them in different ways, and then you can play a variety of different games with them that are like robotics competition kinda games.

Miri: Okay. Like soccer!Ìý

Nora: And then we do have next Friday, all the way out at OMIC, we have aÌý jotes making workshop,Ìý

Miri:Ìý jotes??

Nora: With the community. Yeah, jotes. Jean tote bags. Uh, or jurse!Ìý

Miri: °¿°ì²¹²â.Ìý

Nora: Whichever is worse. Uh, you’re welcome to, you’re welcome to think ofÌý jote or jurse.Ìý

Miri: I was thinking, “Is that like jorts?” But I’m like, “I’m not gonna say that ’cause that, that’d be silly.”Ìý

Nora: Nope. It’s pretty much, it’s pretty much jorts, but the legs are sewn together. You cut off the legs of the pants, and you cut out the crotch, and you sew it across the bottom. And then you add Handles, made out of the previous pant leg straps. You know, it makes a, it makes a very fun and whimsical little bag for you to take around town. It’s one of my favorite projects.

Miri: It’s a conversation piece.Ìý

Nora: It is a conversation piece indeed.Ìý

Miri: Okay, that’s super cool. I might, I might, might-Ìý

Nora: Yeah, it’s a lot of fun.

Miri: I might look into that one.Ìý

Nora: That one’s gonna be out at OMIC in Scappoose, though. So that one might not be —Ìý

Miri: Oh, okayÌý

Nora:Ìý —very close. But keep an eye out for more workshops, ’cause we do rotate out workshops, and especially the bigger ones, we do try to rotate them from campus to campus, too. So, you know, jotes will be back again at Sylvania. We’ll do them at Southeast. We’ll do them at Cascade. We’ll do them at Rock Creek. We try to do as many as we can, all around town.Ìý

Miri: And you keep an eye out for that both on…Ìý

Nora: and Panther Hub.

Miri: Perfect. All right. Thank you very much for talking to me today.Ìý

Nora: Thank you so much, Miri. It was great talking to you.

Outro and Credits

Kylo: Thank you for listening to Let’s Talk! Ä¢¹½´«Ã½’s broadcast about disability culture. Find more information and resources concerning this episode and others at . This episode was produced by the Let’s Talk! Podcast Collective as a collaborative effort between students, the Accessible Education and Disability Resources Department, and the Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ Multimedia Department. We air new episodes on our home website, our Spotify channel, , and .

Episode Transcript

Transcript edited by Hannah “Asher” Sham

 

Disclaimer

Kylo: You’re listening to Let’s Talk! Let’s Talk! Is a digital space for students at Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ experiencing disabilities to share their perspectives, ideas, and worldviews in an inclusive and accessible environment. The views and opinions expressed in this program are those of the speakers, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or positions of Ä¢¹½´«Ã½, Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ Foundation, or our community partners. We broadcast on our home website, , on Spotify, on , and .

Introduction

Miri: Thank you for taking the time to talk with me today. Would you like to introduce yourself and just tell our listeners about your background and your position here at Ä¢¹½´«Ã½?Ìý

Xander: My name is Xander Addams. I have been a Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ student for the last two and a half years. I also work in three different positions at Ä¢¹½´«Ã½. I work as a math mentor with the math department, as a captioner with the Accessible Ed and Disability Resources portion, and, as a student advocate. Specifically, I was put into the Accessibility Hub at Southeast, also with Accessible Ed and Disability Resources. I am getting my associate’s degree, which I just recently got this last spring.Ìý

Miri: Ooh, congrats!Ìý

Xander: I’m transferring to PSU to get my bachelor of creative writing —Ìý

Miri: ±·¾±³¦±ð!Ìý

Xander: — before going on to get my master’s in library sciences.Ìý

Miri: Ooh, okay! Awesome. Is that also gonna be PSU, you’re thinking?Ìý

Xander: PSU doesn’t have a, uh, ALA accredited. I don’t think any college in Oregon does. The closest one that has an Associates of Librarians of America, I think, something like that, ALA – it’s a library association– that is accredited, is University of Washington has an information school up in Seattle. But you can take all of the classes online, I believe. So I will hopefully get my Master’s there. But I have also thought about going overseas for it.Ìý

Miri: Ooh, nice! That would be a pretty good way to get a master’s degree, I think. So what we’re talking about today is the Discord server that you’ve set up for people within the Disability Cultural Alliance, and specifically the body doubling stuff that you’ve been facilitating. Tell us about that. What is body doubling? How did you start that? And what’s the idea behind body doubling?Ìý

What is Body Doubling?

Xander: Body doubling, also known, I believe, as parallel play, is a way for you to occupy a space with another person, and focus on working on tasks, doing homework, doing chores, doing that task that has been — that you’ve been dreading doing, but you’re able to do it because you’re in the presence of someone else who is also actively working. It’s generally used by people of different neurodivergences, um, neurodiversities, mainly because of the, like, communal aspect of doing the thing. It’s very heavily associated with ADHD – which is something I am familiar with since I have that – and I have found it’s extremely helpful for me, and I kinda live by an ethos that if it’s helpful for me, it’s not only gonna be helpful for me. There will be other people that benefit from bringing it into a space.Ìý

Miri: Nice! So you started the server on your own accord?Ìý

Xander: ·¡²õ²õ±ð²Ô³Ù¾±²¹±ô±ô²â.Ìý

Miri: Or was that something you set up through the school?

Xander: I started it as one of the projects that I did as a student advocate. I will say it’s great that we have things like the ADHD Peer Resource Group, and we have the , and we have the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Network, and those are all really great, and they have more consistent times. But if you don’t know about them, it’s kind of difficult to find them, and also they’re on Zoom. And I don’t know about you, but if something’s on Zoom, it’s so easy for me to forget. I started the Discord partially because we were all about student engagement in the Accessibility Hub. The Accessibility Hub is the first disability resource center on campus on any of our Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ campuses, so it’s like a big feat in and of itself, but it’s very difficult to get engagement there because of its location in the building. It’s in the back. And I also started to, like, realize that maybe some of the people that we could be serving to create a community space aren’t coming to campus, aren’t coming to Southeast campus specifically, can’t come to campus for whatever reason. And just because the Zoom times that are being offered aren’t during their schedule doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t have access to a community that they can interact with. And, you know, one of the things that I benefited from was Discord. Discord’s already part of my life, and I know that there are other students out there who Discord is part of their life already. So joining another server and building another community is a lot easier when it’s already part of your daily routine.Ìý

Miri: Yeah, that sounds like a really good thing to have for people, especially with the switch to most things having at least some sort of online option, whether that’s courses in general or tutoring, like I know you do. So how can body doubling aid students who have disabilities or just are struggling with course workload?Ìý

Xander: Body doubling gives you a designated time to work on something, and also it gives you the accountability of you’re with another person who is also, like, working on something actively. At least one other person. Sometimes it’s a larger group. I believe that as we’re talking there are two people body doubling in the server right now.Ìý

Miri: ±·¾±³¦±ð.Ìý

Xander: And it really, helps break down the monotony of, like, I have gone to class, now I have to go home and do all of this myself, and it, it has the… it alleviates the stress of, the grinding the grindset. That’s not, that’s not a word. The mindset of the grind.Ìý

Miri: I think grindset has become common parlance enough that people, people will probably know what you’re talking about.Ìý

Xander: ³Û±ð²¹³ó.Ìý

Miri: It’s in, you know, like a third of all of New Yorker headlines these days, so.

Virtual Spaces for Students

Xander: Yeah. I honestly, I can’t take all of the credit for the body doubling because it is something that I believe in. I started doing it in person in the Accessibility Hub, but, uh, no one ever showed up to that. And a part of the thing that I realized was, you know, no one comes to that campus, and no one comes to visit us, and it was a set time, whereas having it be in the Discord made it a little bit more flexible. And people wanted it in the Discord, and they asked about it. And Michelle, who runs the ADHD Peer Resource Group, has been great enough to also start running, like, designated body doubling hours in both Zoom and Discord simultaneously, which is a huge feat. But I was just like, “We need to… We have the lounge here, people should feel free to use it.” One of the big things we talked about was how Discord isn’t as accessible as Zoom when it comes to voice calls. It’s not a perfect solution, but we did get a bot that was recommended by one of our Deaf student advocates that does transcribe what is going on in a voice call so that Deaf students can also participate, like, in a call with hearing folk. And, if they want to have their, like, ASL body double time, that’s also something we’ve talked about, is doing more language specific body doubling. Part of what is great about body doubling and how it aids students is that it encourages those kinds of connections but it also allows students that, like, structure that is lacking from an adult life, you know?

Miri: Yeah, for sure. That’s something I think about a lot is: when I was in my ASL classes, I ran an in-person study group that met for two hours twice every week before each class. And the difference in progress of people who were in that study group, and it was, you know, a very rough study group. It was mostly just hangout, but you didn’t talk. You only used ASL. But people would come and talk about their week, they’d talk about other classes, they’d ask for some help on homework assignments. The difference in improvement for the people who came to that was remarkable and noticeable, even just to other students. And I am curious, how much do you think, especially since the pandemic, the shift to an online-first structure has affected that kind of culture, that kind of ability for students to actually go onto campus and meet up for coffee or something like that before a class and help each other out? And what you are providing is a new way for students to do that?Ìý

Xander: I think that… Hmm. I don’t think that the push for only online is necessarily good, but I don’t think it’s all bad either. I think that the more modalities that are offered is always gonna be good because there are different types of learning.Ìý

Miri: Oh yeah, I agree.Ìý

Xander: I prioritize taking classes in person, because that’s the way I learn. And the people that want the, like, on-campus experience and want to engage are gonna go to campus and engage. But the people who can’t go to campus but still want to, like, engage with other students, there wasn’t really a way to do that before. Like, there’s Panther Hub, and there are remote options for events. But Panther Hub doesn’t really have, like, a, “Hey, let’s all hang out on the fly and send each other messages,” and that kind of stuff. You don’t really get the bonding experience. It’s just like these are the events that you have. Choose one that fits into your schedule that you’re interested in and go, which is — it’s not bad. It’s still options. We like those. But it could be improved.Ìý

Miri: Yeah. I mean, one of the big things about designing for accessibility overall, is not finding one answer that works for absolutely everybody, but maximizing as many things that work for as many different people as possible.Ìý

Xander: ·¡³æ²¹³¦³Ù±ô²â.Ìý

Miri: What are advantages you can think of about having a dedicated online space like your server, as opposed to something, that is in person or something that is more segmented, I suppose, like a Panther Hub would be?Ìý

Xander: I think that what Discord has that other online services don’t, specifically like the other social medias, is it’s an opt-in. You have to want to be there in order to see the thing. You have to want to be in the server, which makes it less like a social media, like, “Here’s all the things that we have going on,” and more of like a, “Here is a space that is made for you.” One of the benefits of it is that it is asynchronous. You can stop it, go to class, do class, do homework, have life, and come back at the end of the day and catch up on everything that’s going on, and you can make connections with people that you may otherwise not have because, you know, you stay up until 2:00 AM and they wake up at 4:00 AM. And so those kinds of connections where it’s not time restrictive, where it’s not, this is the time to interact right now in this moment, otherwise you miss out. Whereas having it be asynchronous and having it be something that’s always going, always evolving, is so important to people that don’t have that traditional 9:00 to 5:00 lifestyle, which I feel like has been so prioritized. Where everything is open between set hours, these are the engagement opportunities. If you don’t conform to this specific timeframe, you don’t get to interact. And I think that having something that is 24/7, anyone can vent, can engage, can post a silly whatever that they found, makes it a lot more community-based.Ìý

Miri: Your — And I noticed , your server as well has a dedicated channel for pet pictures, which is always a must in any good Discord server that I’ve ever been a part of. Yeah, I think that asynchronicity is super important. Well, the combination of asynchronicity and having a real time option like a voice chat, even video call like Discord has, versus something like D2L, which has forums and forum-like options. But that’s entirely asynchronous, you know? There’s no, no real time feedback even if you’re sitting there spamming .Ìý

Xander: Yeah. Also, with things that are like Panther Hub and D2L, you come in with no knowledge of it. You come in with no experience of it. You don’t know what to do with it. I didn’t even know some of these things existed until I was, like, well into a year into my degree. Whereas Discord is… Technically it’s kind of outside the college, where it’s like the server is in the college, but Discord itself you can have experience. You can know some culture things, and you can come in with that knowledge of, “This is how I add alt text. This is how I do this. This is the, like, vibe that I can see of Discord as a whole.”Ìý

Miri: I do love that it supports alt text.Ìý

Xander: ³Û±ð²õ.Ìý

Miri: It’s, it’s… Like, why? Why doesn’t everything do that? Why doesn’t Google do that?Ìý

Xander: I do wish that their alt text wasn’t as hidden as it is. Like, if there was a way to view it. But that’s mainly because I want to, like, check and see if it exists.Ìý

Conclusion

Miri: Yeah, absolutely. I agree. I’ll wrap it up shortly here and let you have a little bit of a break before the rest of your workday. But, I know that Discord is, you know, common, just an everyday part of our lives for people around our age, and who grew up into the internet. But I know a lot of people have no idea what Discord is or how to use it. So what is Discord? And also, how do you find these things that you’re talking about, like either this in-person schedule, or get an invite to the Discord server?

Xander: I’ll end on our invite to the discord server. And I’ll start with Discord is a community space. I believe it was originally kind of focused on gaming specifically. It is composed of, you have a server, which is essentially a place that you can go that you have to be invited to. It’s a closed club. Some of them are open. Ours is closed, where you have to have an invite to get in. It’s a collection of text channels, some of them that you can write in. A lot of them have their title is, like, the topic, where if it’s general, you can talk about whatever. If it’s resources, that’s mainly for resources. A lot of them are very self-explanatory. We keep the event stuff closed so that we can make sure that the events that are being posted are events that are approved.Ìý

Miri: And by ‘ we’ you mean the moderators, the people running the server?Ìý

Xander: Yes, mainly me. Mainly me and a couple of the other student advocates. And then there are voice channels. I did speak with someone at one point who thought that Discord was one voice channel, and when you joined Discord, you just dropped into a voice channel, and I was horrified by the prospect.Ìý

Miri: Oh, yeah. No, that’s what Zoom is for.

Xander: Everything that is in a Discord server is opt-in. You choose to engage with it. You choose how you engage with it. If you don’t wanna be in voice channels, you don’t have to be. We keep track of all of the resources in forum posts so that people can share their experiences with resources. So if someone has a bad experience, you know about it. If someone has a great experience, you know about it. Our Discord has flyers all around campus where you can scan the QR code and join. The permanent link to our Discord is also on the pcc.edu webpage for the accessibility hub specifically. It’s underneath the picture of the coordinator where it says, “Join our Discord,” and then . And that’s how you might —

Miri: Which I’ll, I’ll put in the episode description as well.Ìý

Xander: Yeah. And that is where you can, you can join us. We’re pretty chill. Like we say, we got a bunch of body doubling going on. There’s some reworking. I am getting ready to put a bunch of documentation together for the next person who’s gonna run it because, as I’m no longer a Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ student, I’m not a student advocate anymore, so I’m just wrapping up that loose end before transferring out.

Miri: Nice. This is a good service that you provide, that I think will help a lot of people. And hopefully after hearing about it here, help even more people, so.Ìý

Xander: Hopefully.Ìý

Miri: Thank you very much for talking with me today, and good luck getting your overseas librarian applications in.Ìý

Xander: Thank you.

Miri: And I hope you get to spend a nice two years kicking back in, like, Dublin, or Oslo, or…

Xander: Yeah, that would be really nice. I’ve looked at the University of Librarianship in Sweden, so you never know, you know?Ìý

Miri: Ooh. Yeah, that would be a good choice, too. All right. Yeah. Thank you very much, and have a great rest of your day.

Xander: You too.Ìý

Outro Disclaimer

Kylo: Thank you for listening to Let’s Talk!, Ä¢¹½´«Ã½’s broadcast about disability culture. Find more information and resources concerning this episode and others at pcc.edu/dca. This episode was produced by the Let’s Talk! Podcast Collective as a collaborative effort between students, the Accessible Education and Disability Resources Department, and the Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ Multimedia Department. We air new episodes on our , our Spotify channel,Ìý, and .