Five winning stories will be selected by a panel of judges, and the winning entrants will each receive an Amazon Kindle 2 as well as Dragon NaturallySpeaking upgrades for three years.
Hi,
My name is Leo Benoit and I work at an AT (Assistive Technology) center in New Hampshire. If it were not for Dragon Naturally Speaking I would not be sharing my story with you today.
My story begins back in 1986 when I began attending a technical college. My first month there was a trying one because I’ am dyslexic. During that first month I was very anxious and could feel my heart beating out of my chest. At that point I had to decide to calm down and take it easy or I would not be able to make it through this challenging time in my life. I decided to take nine credits for each trimester. I was very up front about my learning disability. My professors were very understanding and worked with me during my three years six months at the technical college. The hardest part of college was writing papers for my classes. It took me three times longer than the average individual and I was usually very mentally drained by the time I completed my assignments and if it was not for my loving wife's help with spelling and grammar it would've taken me longer
When I was at college I began hearing about DragonDictate which was way back in the late 80s. I felt that if I could obtain this product I would have a chance in the working world to use my COTA (certified occupational assistant) degree and help others. When your product was first available it was very expensive. My vocational counselor and I looked into ways of funding this type of assistive technology. After three years I was finally able to own DragonDictate. Ever since then I have been using it on a daily basis to help me with my paper work.
Today I am using NaturallySpeaking 9.5 professional to compose his e-mail and because of it I will not be mentally tired after doing so.
For many of years now I have taught teachers, so that they can help their students with learning disabilities, students with learning disabilities, so that they could be more independent with their writing, workers with physical limitations, so that they can be more productive and people who use it for recreational purposes as well.
I am very grateful that a product like yours was invented. Because of it I can write more intelligently than before. This is not because I did not have a good vocabulary I just did not know how to spell the words that would give my writing power. I would use smaller words such as big instead of gigantic, car instead of automobile and happy instead of joyful. It has helped me and countless others achieve their goals in life, I know this because as an assistant technologist I have introduced NaturallySpeaking to others who need assistive technology to access their computers.
In closing I would like to say it has been a long and rewarding journey thanks for your audience.