Reprinted from TidBITS#1007/14-Dec-2009 with permission.
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MacSpeech and TEI Offer One-On-One Training
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  by Doug McLean <doug_mclean@tidbits.com>
  article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/10824>

  MacSpeech, Inc., maker of the popular speech recognition utility
  MacSpeech Dictate ($199), has partnered with The Emergent Institute
  (TEI) to offer specialized one-on-one software training. But in a
  twist from the usual training scenarios, TEI employs people with
  disabilities who are also experts in accessibility technologies,
  including MacSpeech Dictate.

<http://www.macspeech.com/>
<http://www.theemergentinstitute.org/>

  While TEI, founded in 2006, was originally a customer of MacSpeech
  (having purchased a copy of the now-retired iListen), the current
  partnership comes out of requests from MacSpeech customers for
  training that goes beyond the basic technical support. Andrew
  Taylor, founder and CEO of MacSpeech, Inc., says, "People seem
  interested in being taught, one-on-one, how to use MacSpeech Dictate
  to its fullest. Our video tutorials have been helpful in covering
  the basics, but a lot of people want their own individual training
  sessions."

  Although one would assume that anyone offering training would be an
  expert in the product in question, TEI's trainers themselves rely on
  MacSpeech Dictate and can thus offer a higher level of insight and
  empathy about using the product in real-world situations.

  Don Whittecar, founder of The Emergent Institute, described the
  project's origins. "Some of us tried speech recognition on the PC
  platform and found it very difficult to use. Our use of the
  MacSpeech family of speech recognition software is centered on
  MacSpeech Dictate, which is significantly easier to learn and
  develop depth of use with. The company and I had discussed several
  ways that TEI and MacSpeech could network over the past two years,
  so when Andrew Taylor became involved and the discussion turned to
  the training aspect, it was a natural fit."

  TEI's training covers any aspect of the program with which you might
  need assistance: creating a profile, controlling your Mac via
  commands, better utilizing the Cache Selection feature, developing
  optimum recognition, working with specialized vocabularies, and
  more. Training is user-directed, so you can get help with the
  precise aspects of the program you want, without wasting time on
  parts you already understand. Additionally, with trainers using a
  combination of screen sharing and phone support to run the virtual
  sessions, you can receive training whenever and wherever it's
  convenient for you.

  MacSpeech Dictate One-on-One Training is available for the entire
  MacSpeech Dictate product lineup, including MacSpeech Dictate Legal,
  Medical, and International. Training sessions cost $69.95 per
  50-minute session, though an introductory price of $49.95 is being
  offered for the first session until the end of 2009 (use the coupon
  code "TRAINING" at checkout to access the discount). Training
  sessions are currently available only to registered users in the
  United States and Canada, and can be scheduled by calling
  888-712-7074.

<http://www.macspeech.com/oneonone/>

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