Hailey Richman

EDU 1400 - Professor Candida Mumford

December 3, 2023

Community-Engaged Learning Reflection Paper

I worked with Amara (amara.org) online. Amara’s mission is for everyone to enjoy

online content, such as Youtube videos that are made by content creators from all over the world.

This is a nonprofit organization that wants to work towards a more open and particpary world

that allows inclusion, accessibility, and belonging. Amara works towards this because they

believe that it creates a world that is more understanding and caring, and they are completely

right. Amara does this through creating a platform, through several volunteering groups and

organizations, for hearing people to create captions for videos for people who are deaf or hard of

hearing. They also provide the option for people who are multilingual to translate the video

captions into different languages to allow people to watch every video from all over the world,

hearing or deaf. You can also apply for jobs through Amara On Demand to easily become a

professional translator, transcriptionist, and subtitler. They accept all languages and specifically

encourage it. If you are unable to give your time through a job or just editing captions on your

free time, they also encourage donations to their organization to continue to fund their process of

keeping their organization alive, so there are several ways to help out. This allows inclusivity

throughout the whole world through one platform and hundreds of people aiding in the world of

entertainment.

Though I am not multilingual, I was able to provide services for people who are hard of

hearing or are deaf through creating captions of Youtube videos. I specifically worked on, and

almost finished, the Youtube video, “Beefing with Taylor Swift Fans!” by the popular Youtuber,

Lofe. I did this through watching the video several times in small increments and typing what I
Hailey Richman

EDU 1400 - Professor Candida Mumford

December 3, 2023

heard. I would then go back and rewatch the clip and double-check that the text was correct

based on what the person in the video had said, and then I would align the text with the video. I

would also have to make sure that the text wasn’t too long or short, and allow enough time for

the reader to understand what was happening in the video but still try to sync up the text with the

lip reading. Syncing the captions was the hardest part of this video because there were parts

where people talked over one another and/or people were talking quickly in a conversation and it

was tough to time it correctly. This process seemed to be very satisfying to me in the end

because it sort of gave me a purpose in what I was doing, because it was something I could be

good at while helping other people and I truly encouraged others to at least try it out.

Throughout this experience of my 15 hours of community service, I have learned quite a

lot about people with disabilities and how their lives are impacted by PWOD and their help. I

was able to understand that even though this was time consuming but didn’t take much effort, I

was able to use my abilities to help the functionality of someone else. This made me understand

how much we can all do for each other at the end of the day, in a big or small way. I believe that

we all deserve entertainment and this activity took little to no effort and a little bit of time to

create these captions for someone who needed it. I had also noticed how many videos still

needed captioning and that made me realize how much could be done to help the disabled

community, considering that there were hundreds of videos and movies only submitted in Amara

and probably thousands more that are still going uncaptioned. I think we can be blind to seeing

what needs to be done in the world, especially in this day and age, because everyone is in their

own world and concerned with themselves. This experience made me understand how big of a
Hailey Richman

EDU 1400 - Professor Candida Mumford

December 3, 2023

difference I can make in someone's life, just by giving them entertainment through captioning on

a video. It’s the way people wind down after a hard day and everyone deserves to have that

experience, but some people aren’t allowed to because the community isn’t willing to give a little

helping hand. This experience allowed me to step back and get out of my own world to see what

I can do for others in my everyday life, no matter what the type of gesture it is, to allow everyone

to live their lives to the fullest extent. In the end, if we all were able to just help out a little, it’s

not that hard and we are able to create a more inclusive and caring world, just like Amara had

wanted and ultimately created.