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Riverside Public Library demonstrates township-funded Caption Companion for real-time captions
Summary
The Riverside Public Library demonstrated a Caption Companion tablet the board recently funded with a township grant. Director Janice Foley showed that the device provides offline speech-to-text in English and Spanish, produces a transcript when connected to Wi-Fi and can be loaned to support meeting accessibility.
Janice Foley, director of the Riverside Public Library, demonstrated a Caption Companion tablet at the July 8, 2025 Riverside Township Board meeting. The library thanked the board for a township grant that paid for the device and offered it for loan to support patrons and meeting attendees with hearing impairments.
Foley showed the tablet’s closed system operation: it can transcribe speech in real time without Wi‑Fi, accepts audio via a microphone or from ambient room sound if the environment is reasonably quiet and enunciated, and supports English and Spanish speech-to-text. Foley said the device will produce an end-of-session transcript if connected to Wi‑Fi; without Wi‑Fi it performs live captioning only.
Trustees asked whether the device could output to a projector or larger monitor; Foley said the unit is designed as a personal device but she would investigate whether it could be displayed to a larger screen. She also noted that the library maintains iPads at service desks that can be used for basic translation when staff need that capability.
Foley said the device will be available for meetings on request and that staff expect to loan it when patrons or meeting attendees with hearing impairments need it. No changes to policy or additional funding were proposed during the demonstration.
