News release, July 11, 2006A

Georgia

Department of Labor

NEWS RELEASE

SUITE 642



(404) 232-3685

148 INTERNATIONAL BOULEVARD, N.E.



ATLANTA, GA 30303-1751



FAX (404) 657-9996

Communications@dol.state.ga.us

Michael Thurmond
Commissioner

Sam Hall
Director of Communications

July 11, 2006. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Grady County HS/HT students receive recognition
ATLANTA -- Two Georgia High School/High Tech (HS/HT) students from the Muskogee Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) program in Grady County David McCormick of Pelham and Troy Mallory of Whigham -- recently returned from a trip to Seattle and the Microsoft Corporation headquarters in Redmond, Washington.
There, McCormick and Mallory were recognized as winners in the Microsoft Accessible Computer Program Development Competition, an innovative project designed to reward the students and provide them with a motivational learning experience.
The statewide contest is jointly sponsored by Microsoft and the Georgia Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities, Inc., a nonprofit organization committed to Georgia High School/High Tech. HS/HT is an initiative of the Georgia Department of Labor's Vocational Rehabilitation program designed to get students with disabilities interested in high tech careers.
The two students represented the team from Red Eagle Fenv, the first and only Native American HS/HT program in the country. They were accompanied by HS/HT site coordinator Marian McCormick of Pelham, chief of the Muskogee Creek Tribe in Tama Tribal Town, and Bobby Murphy of Cedar Springs in Early County, a mentor specially trained in accessible program design. Joe Tedesco, executive director of Tech-Able, an assistive technology resource center in Conyers, and Cornelius Butler, a HS/HT graduate and president of Butler New Media in Bainbridge, provided overall technical assistance and training to the students.
As a team, these students and advisers planned, designed, and developed a fully functional bugfree Windows-based application. The Red Eagle Fenv team, which is based at Tama Tribal Town in Whigham, adapted Lower Muskogee Creek Indian myths and legends from printed to electronic format, essentially creating an e-book. The project focus matches a key goal of the Muskogee Creek program to connect its young people to tribal elders through cultural awareness.
(MORE)

HS/HT PROGRAM last add The electronic format is written to a database and stored on a CD, along with the application, which accesses the stories and modifies them using the accessibility features built into the Microsoft Windows XP operating system. The program allows the user to adjust font size and colors, as well as background colors. There is also a text-to-speech option that can be selected. Throughout the competition and on the trip, students applied critical thinking skills, mastered useful computer programming concepts and techniques, deepened their understanding of accessibility and gained personal self-confidence. All will serve them well as they finish high school and move to postsecondary education and work. In addition to a $5,000 grant from Microsoft, funding for the project was provided by the Georgia Department of Labor's VR program, the State Rehabilitation Council, and the Georgia Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities.
NEWS MEDIA NEEDING MORE INFORMATION MAY CALL (404) 232-3685 CY-06-283
The Red Eagle Fenv team (l to r): Marian McCormick, David McCormick, Troy Mallory, Bobby Murphy.