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Specialized Note-Taking & Captioning

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Specialized Note-Taking & Captioning


Specialized Note-Takers and Captioners are professional vendors contracted through AAS who are present in class to facilitate access to course content.

Types of specialized note-taking and captioning include:

  1. Computerized Note Taker (CNT)
    • CNTs are exclusively for students who are deaf or hard of hearing
    • CNTs are present in class and take notes of lecture content either in a summary or verbatim/transcript format.
  2. Real Time Captioner (RTC) 
    • RTCs are exclusively for students who are deaf or hard of hearing
    • RTCs are present in class and provide live verbatim real time captioning of lecture content. 
  3. Closed Captioning (CC)
    • CC is exclusively for students who are deaf or hard of hearing
    • CC provides captioning/transcriptions for recorded content such as pre-recorded lectures, videos, etc. 

Instructors are asked to provide course material and/or D2L access to note-takers in advance of the class in order for them to prepare.

Specialized note-taking and captioning services may be required to support students who face challenges that impact their ability to access or process information in traditional ways by providing written or visual alternatives to spoken words.

Specialized note-taking and captioning services are provided by professional community vendors hired by AAS. AAS starts coordinating with vendors prior to the start of each semester to avoid any potential delays. 

Registered AAS students who have accommodations for specialized note taking and/or captioning will receive an email from AAS before classes start each semester. They will confirm class schedules and individual requirements to start preparing for the semester. If a student changes their schedule (add/drop, section change, etc), they are instructed to let AAS know as soon as possible.

While scheduling specialized vendors is best done before classes start, we understand that students may inquire about these accommodations later in the semester. In these cases, a student would meet with their Accommodation Facilitator to discuss and navigate next steps.

Questions about this accommodation can be directed to aasbookings@torontomu.ca.