Monday, May 31, 1998
Women find niche as Web designers
Firm's founder inspired by child
BY DEBORAH KENDRICK
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Elaine Hackett tells with pride and passion of her three current ''clients'' - three women with disabilities, women who may have been forgotten or underestimated by many, whom she is training for real and meaningful employment through her Sharonville company, SpeciaLink.
The nature of their employment couldn't be more contemporary: They're designing Web pages.
Judy, Mrs. Hackett explains, is a woman in her 40s whose cerebral palsy has severely affected fine motor skills such as walking and talking, but who turns out to be a whiz at gathering data on the computer.
She is working for SpeciaLink gathering disability-related sites and other relevant information for the SpeciaLink Web sites.
''The Internet is a place of chaos,'' Mrs. Hackett says, ''and people who can locate, manage, and store data for us are in great demand. If Judy perfects her skills doing this for us, eventually she will be in demand by other companies as well.''
Creating icons
Susan has significant speech difficulties and can only type with one finger, but loves to learn and has plenty of patience. She's learning html (Web page programming language) and is beginning to use it to design Web pages.
Patty is non-verbal and communicates exclusively through technology. Her fingers aren't able to type, but with a fist she can guide a track ball. She is learning a variety of drawing and painting programs and beginning to create icons and images that, before her computer exposure, no one would have dreamed within her capabilities.
Creating icons to represent whole responses to frequently asked questions has proven a great exercise.
''The other day,'' Mrs. Hackett says, ''she created an animated image, a dancing couple twirling across the screen! That takes planning.''
Her niche, Mrs. Hackett predicts, will be in designing gifs (photo images) for Web pages.
''We're working with individuals with real challenges,'' Mrs. Hackett says. ''In time, they will have a following because the work they produce is quality. And as long as somebody doesn't need it yesterday, these women will have valuable services to market.''
There is something of the proud mother in her assessment of her students, and indeed that is perhaps an element for Elaine Hackett in her relationship to everyone she teaches.
It was the Hacketts' own daughter, Elizabeth, born at 3 pounds in 1966 and diagnosed with mental retardation, who inspired her parents to discover the power of technology in the early 1980s.
''We were looking for solutions to our own personal problems,'' Mrs. Hackett says. ''When we began to see how technology could help Elizabeth, we naturally started thinking there must be a whole lot of people with disabilities who could benefit from this same stuff.''
At 55, Elaine Hackett has had her share of challenges, too. Her husband and partner in SpeciaLink, Wally Hackett, suffered a stroke while undergoing knee replacement surgery four years ago. He is still working to compensate for lost sight and learning to provide her with the technical support he once did.
Three weeks after Wally Hackett's stroke, Elizabeth Hackett died suddenly.
At 28, her mother says, Elizabeth had just begun making the connection that only she knew when something hurt in her body. She had mental retardation, two hearing aids, diabetes and asthma, but no one knew she had heart disease.
''The autopsy showed that the arteries to her heart were 80 percent blocked,'' Mrs. Hackett explains, ''but she hadn't been able to explain to anyone that she was experiencing any kind of pain.'' HD:Life with special meaning
The Hacketts' work to ''link'' disability and technology never stopped. Besides working with people with significant disabilities one on one, SpeciaLink now has a Web site that aims to reach out to parents and individuals with disabilities everywhere.
From the SpeciaLink Web site, browsers will find a link to disability-related books, resources and other sites packed with information.
''Elizabeth lived on this earth for a reason,'' Elaine Hackett says peacefully of the loss of her daughter.
At least part of that reason appears to have been to inspire her parents to disseminate the kinds of information they once found so valuable in nurturing their own child.
Deborah Kendrick, a Cincinnati free-lance writer, is a nationally recognized advocate for people with disabilities. Write: Deborah Kendrick, Cincinnati Enquirer, 312 Elm St., Cincinnati 45202; e-mail: 71340.473@compuserve.com.
KENDRICK ARCHIVE
