Proposed by: Annika Ramos, Vice President of Education
Seconded by: Education Zone
Background
Nowadays, people tend to use subtitles when watching regular tv shows, programmes or films, even without any specific need for it. This is for a number of reasons. Subtitles helps us to engage with content, and allow us to concentrate better.
The university previously ran a feasibility study on closed captions for Qreview videos back in 2016/2017 (https://elearning.qmul.ac.uk/articles/closed-caption-pilot-report-201617/). They found that the feature would be too costly to implement and decided not to continue with the project.
Closed captions are used to supplement dialogue and other relevant parts of the soundtrack – describing background noises, phones ringing and other audio cues that need describing.
Subtitles, on the other hand, provide a text alternative for the dialogue of video footage – the spoken words of characters, narrators and other vocal participants.
What do you want?
For the university to conduct a project to further explore options on closed captions and subtitles for QMplus videos, and implement these for at least core modules. Individuals should be able to choose whether or not to have the feature on.
Why do you want it?
I am proposing this motion as it will help all students, no matter what background or category they are in.
What impact will this have?
For international students, the feature will help to further their English language skills, as well as enable them to have the same chances of success as native English speakers.
For students with disabilities or specific learning disabilities, the subtitling will be useful especially when recordings are difficult to hear or understand.
All students would be able to use this feature to help them revise better, provided the videos are released well in advance before the exam period begins.