The University of Kansas Selects Wizzard Software & AT&T Natural Voices Server Edition

PITTSBURGH — The University of Kansas (KU) has chosen AT&T Natural Voices Server Edition for use in the Telephone Reader Dial-up Information Service.  Opened in 1866, the University of Kansas is an educational and research institution with 29,272 students and more than 2,100 faculty members. KU includes the main campus in Lawrence, a city of about 88,000 in northeastern Kansas; the Medical Center in Kansas City, Kansas; the Edwards Campus in Overland Park; a clinical campus of the School of Medicine in Wichita; and educational and research facilities throughout the state.

"Wizzard Software was very accommodating and made the incorporation of Wizzard's offering a breeze," said Steve Kincaid, director of engineering for KU.

The Telephone Reader system provides blind, visually impaired, and print-disabled individuals with access to timely publications, such as television listings, local newspapers or department store circulars.  With a touchtone telephone, users can call the system any time and, using the keypad, select publications, listen to headlines, and choose individual stories from the featured newspapers. The stories are then read in a voice that is supplied by AT&T's Natural Voices text-to-speech engine. 

KU provides the Telephone Reader to a number of clients nationally who run the system locally. One client of KU is the Los Angeles Braille Institute.  The Institute is currently using the Telephone Reader system, powered by AT&T Natural Voices and the Spanish voice font, Rosa, to provide the Spanish-speaking community with access to their Telephone Reader Program (TRP).