Marie-Josée Barbeau Receives the 2nd Antidote Scholarship in Remedial Education

Druide informatique is pleased to announce that Marie-Josée Barbeau has been awarded the second Antidote Scholarship for remedial education in reading and writing. Barbeau is a PhD student in Education at the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM) working under the supervision of Computer Sciences professor Julien Mercier and Language Didactics professor Line Laplante. The $25,000 scholarship is awarded as part of the research chair program for foundation learning in literacy, established through a donation made to the Fondation de l’UQAM by Druide informatique.

Barbeau has provided remedial education in schools for 21 years and holds a master’s degree in education research. She helps coordinate several research projects and activities focusing on foundation learning in literacy. She is also a lecturer in UQAM’s Department of Language Didactics. Her doctoral studies look at the effects of text-to-speech technology on the reading comprehension of primary school students with serious reading difficulties.

The Antidote Scholarship in Remedial Education is awarded annually to a student in UQAM’s Faculty of Education whose thesis or doctoral project relates to remedial education or to learning difficulties in reading and writing. It is granted as part of the research chair program for foundation learning in literacy, established through a $1 million donation from Druide on the 25th anniversary of the launch of its Antidote software.

Millions of people use Antidote to improve the quality of their writing in both English and French. Its corrector, dictionaries and guides also support those learning to write. Among other benefits, Antidote can counterbalance the varying degrees of spelling deficits associated with dyslexia, and Druide is working diligently on its development. Moreover, some of the Chair’s work could guide this development to provide additional support to these learners.