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The Dr. Jacob Bolotin Award

Letter of Recommendation Form
Thank you for your support of the Dr. Jacob Bolotin Awards program.
Please complete the form below to submit your letter of recommendation in support of the award nominee. Recommendations cannot exceed 800 words. You will not be able to submit your recommendation if the maximum word count exceeds 800 words.
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Please enter your letter of recommendation in the text area provided below: Members of the Dr. Jacob Bolotin Award Committee, I would like to recommend Sam Dooley's Equalize Editor for the Dr. Jacob Bolotin Award. I am a statewide math consultant for the Iowa Educational Services for the Blind and Visually Impaired and have had the pleasure of working with Sam through my contract work as a Subject Matter Expert (SME) with Pearson. I first met Sam at a conference in 2015. As he was talking about what he was creating, I was so excited about what this would mean for students who were blind or visually impaired while they are creating or accessing math content. During this first visit, I found out that Sam had recently learned the entire Nemeth Braille Code for Mathematics and Science Notation in just a few weeks. He was also quickly learning about the assistive technology tools used by blind students to access digital content. It was extremely evident that Sam was not only a quick learner, but also a great problem solver. After this introductory meeting, Pearson came to me with a consulting agreement to help support this amazing project. Sam stayed in close contact with me and others as he began to work on accessibility issues related to the equation editor. He then proceeded to create a functional solution for instantaneous Nemeth Braille translation of both print to braille and braille to print that led to a patent. As a former math teacher for 18 years and now a statewide math consultant since 2007, I have never seen a tool like the Equalize Editor. The Equalize Editor has the potential to remove access barriers to STEM content for blind students that no other tool can remove. I believe the Equalize Editor can also be used to facilitate the workflow between teachers and students. The Equalize Editor makes it easy for a STEM teacher to get content to their blind student and for a blind student to get work to their STEM teacher. It can support braille literacy for people who become blind as an adult, and it can also support parents who want to help their blind students with their STEM homework. The Equalize Editor is the only math editor I have seen that provides instantaneous braille translation without the end user having to take any additional steps. This allows a student to explain their math work, which is a very common requirement in math classes. Text editors, by definition, are not math editors, so students are having to explain their math without being able to use math within the context of their explanation. All other systems available that are meant for text instead of math create a cognitive load and introduce complexity because students are having to perform a translation of math into words. For efficiency purposes, it is important the students be able to read and write math using math symbols in braille to solve a problem. Sam has carefully designed the Equalize Editor with these kinds of user needs in mind. He actively pursues feedback from users and subject matter experts to ensure that he is solving the right problems in the right way. In my opinion, the Equalize Editor is a highly effective tool that supports braille literacy efforts in a way that has never been available before. I urge you to choose Sam Dooley as a recipient of the Dr. Jacob Bolotin Award during the 2024 NFB convention. This would not only be an honor for Sam, but would also allow him to continue working on enhancements. Additionally, this award would raise awareness about the availability of the Equalize Editor so that blind students can leverage the power of this tool to study STEM subjects and to potentially change the trajectory of their lives and future careers. Respectfully, Sara Larkin Statewide Math Consultant Iowa Educational Services for the Blind and Visually Impaired
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The Dr. Jacob Bolotin Award

Letter of Recommendation Form