Light Box

The American Printing House for the Blind (APH) has partnered with Olin College's SCOPE program to modernize one of its most widely used educational tools for students with blindness or who have low vision. The APH LED Mini-Lite Box has supported visual skill instruction for decades, particularly for students with cortical visual impairment (CVI), low vision, and multiple disabilities. Today, teachers and families must manually swap physical color overlays to change the light's color and content, a process that interrupts instruction and limits flexibility.

The Olin capstone team will design and prototype an electronically controlled version of the LED Mini-Lite Box that allows teachers to change color, brightness, and light patterns without physical overlays, while preserving the flat, tactile work surface that makes the LED Mini-Lite Box compatible with APH's existing instructional materials. The team will draw on skills in electrical engineering, mechanical design, optical engineering, embedded systems, and human-centered design, with direct input from educators, therapists, and families throughout the process.

This project matters because children with blindness, low vision, and Cortical Visual Impairment (CVI) deserve learning tools that are responsive, intuitive, and affordable. APH's mission is to provide the best educational products for people who are blind or have low vision, and this project moves a proven classroom staple into the next generation of accessible educational technology.