Category Archives: signal boost

QuickPress: The First Assistance Dog Blog Carnival is Live!

signal boost,

This actually went up a few days ago, and it is awesome.

Sharon’s hosted the First Assistance Dog Blog Carnival at After Gadget.

From the tremendous response of the AD blogging community, it seems as if I’m not the only one who is excited to share an AD “First” with our readers. In fact, the themes of excitement, joy, and pride run throughout the blogs in this edition. There were also a lot of blogs on the same or similar topics. I had hoped to be able to amply blurb/review every submission, but in the end it felt like it would make this post too long and repetitive. So, I have highlighted those that stand out for me in some way in each category — sometimes because a piece is written particularly well, other times because it covers an unusual topic or takes it on in an unusual way — but also included the links for other worthy posts in each category.

Enjoy! If you can’t read them all today, bookmark the page and work your way through the rest over time.

Signal Boost: British Columbia: The BCCPD invites organizations to our ‘Get Prepared’ workshop.

signal boost, ,

Via Email

Fires, storms, H1N1, floods. The BC Coalition of People with Disabilities’ Emergency Preparedness Program can help.

The Get Prepared workshop will use videos, demonstrations, personal stories, and recent Lower Mainland experiences to examine emergency preparedness. We will explore the best approaches that community organizations can use in designing emergency plans that focus on people with disabilities. Krasicki & Ward Emergency Preparedness will bring a display of emergency supplies.

Learn:
– The leading approach to emergency preparedness: Functional Needs
– How to conduct safety drills and evacuations
– Tips by and from people with disabilities on what’s needed
– How to integrate emergency planning into your organization

FREE 37-page handbook: “Workplace Emergency Planning for Workers with Disabilities”

Time and Date: 12:30 – 5:00 pm, November 25th, 2010
Location: Blusson Spinal Cord Centre, 818 West 10th Avenue Vancouver BC
Cost: $65 – handbook and light refreshments included.
Hosted by the BC Coalition of People with Disabilities.
Registration Information

Registration for ‘Get Prepared’

Date: Thursday, November 25th 12:30 – 5:00 p.m.
Location: Blusson Spinal Cord Centre, 818 West 10th Ave, Vancouver
Cost: $65 includes light refreshments and “Workplace Emergency Planning for Workers with Disabilities”, a 37-page handbook.

Please click here to download the registration form and poster PDF.

The registration deadline is November 15th. Please contact sam@bccpd.bc.ca or 604-875-0188 for more information.

Unfortunately I cannot answer any questions about this event.

Canadians: Participants are needed for a study of cell phone based emergency services.

signal boost, , , , ,

(via email)

Participants are needed for a study of cell phone based emergency services.

Researchers at the Neil Squire Society are conducting a study to look at how 911 emergency calls and emergency disaster alerts on cellular phones can be made more accessible.

The goal of this project is to get input from actual cell phone users on how the next generation of emergency services should be designed to ensure accessibility before they are released. Your feedback will be used to make industry and government aware of the unique needs of the Blind community.

We are currently looking for people who are blind and currently use cellular phones and would be interested in attending a focus group or completing a brief survey.

Eligible participants will have a choice of attending one of the focus groups being held in locations across Canada or answering questions in a survey. The focus groups will typically last 2 hours and consist of 6 to 8 people. There will be a brief presentation and an open question and answer session.

To learn more about this research and your eligibility, please contact:

Neil Squire Society
EMAIL: research@neilsquire.ca
Toll Free Telephone: 1-877-673-4636
Address: Suite 220 -2250 Boundary Rd.
Burnaby, BC V5M 3Z3

Principal Researcher
Dr. Gary Birch, PhD, P.Eng.
Neil Squire Society
Executive Director and Director of Research & Development

Sadly, I cannot answer any questions for you regarding this study.

Signal Boost: ADA Transportation Webinars

signal boost, , , , ,

(Via email)

Dear Friends,

The Topic Guides on ADA Transportation, a series of technical assistance documents funded by the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) and developed by DREDF and TranSystems Corporation, will be featured in a series of seven once-a-month webinars, one webinar on each Topic Guide. The webinar series will be coordinated by the DBTAC Great Lakes ADA Center and the DBTAC-Southwest ADA Center in collaboration with Easter Seals Project ACTION.

Registration: Registration is available on-line at www.adaconferences.org.

Funded by FTA to provide technical assistance on transportation to transit agencies, riders, and advocates, the Topic Guides on ADA Transportation bring together the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Department of Transportation ADA regulations, FTA determinations, and best operational practices for ADA compliance. The Topic Guides also draw information from many other sources. The Topic Guides are available online at http://dredf.org/ADAtg.

Webinar Schedule: Second Tuesday of the month, beginning October 12, 2010 and ending April 12, 2011.

Time:
2 pm to 3:30 pm Eastern Time
1 to 2:30 PM Central Time
12 to 1:30 Mountain Time
11 to 12:30 Pacific Time
10 to 11:30 Alaska Time
(Hawaii time will vary)

Presenter(s): Marilyn Golden, DREDF Policy Analyst and invited guests to be announced

This series of Topic Guide Webinars will include:

1. Equipment Maintenance (October 12)

2. Stop Announcement and Route Identification (November 9)

3. Eligibility for ADA Paratransit (December 14)

4. Telephone Hold Time in ADA Paratransit (January 11)

5. Origin to Destination Service in ADA Paratransit (February 8 )

6. On-Time Performance in ADA Paratransit (March 8 )

7. No-Shows in ADA Paratransit (April 12)

View the Topic Guide Home Page, which offers each Topic Guide in HTML, a PDF download, and a plain text option, at http://dredf.org/ADAtg.

The FTA Office of Civil Rights has also linked to the Topic Guides on ADA Transportation on its ADA website at www.fta.dot.gov/ada under DREDF.

Unfortunately I will be unable to answer any questions about these webinars.

Signal Boost: The First Assistance Dog Blog Carnival!

signal boost,

Sharon at After Gadget has just announced that she’s going to go ahead with the Assistance Dog Carnival!

What Will the Assistance Dog Carnival Be About?

Topics will vary with each edition. The host for each edition will announce their theme at least a couple of weeks ahead of time (maybe more, if possible, to give us people with deadline issues a chance to get something in?), along with the deadline for submissions and expected publication date.

I’m very excited about this! Read more about After Gadget.

Signal Boost: Request for Article Suggestions in the Canadian Blind Monitor

signal boost, , ,

The theme for the next issue of the Canadian Blind Monitor will be Passionate Pursuits. We want to hear about the things that AEBC members and other vision impaired Canadians are passionate about and the things in which they are involved. Maybe it’s related to community, family, politics, health, education, a vision issue, recreation, work, etc. It can be controversial or about every day life and either positive and negative in nature. Articles from or about family, friends, and other members of the community will also be considered.

For information or to give suggestions, please call 1-800-561-7447 and leave your phone number so that we can call you to determine if you or someone on the CBM team could write an article about your suggestion. You can also email bcooke[@]blindcanadians[.]ca

Deadline for ideas is October 31. Deadline for articles is December 15. See the AEBC website for writer guidelines. The next CBM out in early 2011.

Survey: The ECHO Project

signal boost,

The ECHO questionnaire has been carefully designed by a team of psychologists from the University of Bedfordshire with input from Network for Surviving Stalking. We want to find out about your experience of harassment – via the internet or your mobile phone – We also want you to tell us how this experience has affected your life. We know harassment/stalking can be a distressing experience not often understood by others. There is also very little research available on cyber harassment/stalking. Your responses will contribute to a greater awareness of the problem and ways of improving it.

We hope completing the questionnaire won’t cause you distress but as it relates to incidents you may have found upsetting, you may choose to fill it in at a time where you have a source of support available

The ECHO Survey

Note: Please take the trigger warning very seriously. Taking this survey has been very upsetting to people because of the subject matter.

Also, as with many surveys of this nature, it is gender-binary.

Canadian Students With Disabilities: There are still spaces in Transcribe Your Class

accessibility, Accessible Tech, Education, signal boost, ,

Transcribe Your Classes!

Please note that spots are filling up quickly for the Liberated Learning Youth Initiative starting this fall. The Youth Initiative provides students with disabilities access to a new Speech Recognition transcription system. During the project, students will be given special user accounts where they will be able to upload recorded lectures and receive speech recognition generated, multimedia transcripts.

Brief application forms are posted at Transcribe Your Class.

We encourage you to review the participation criteria on the website, share this message, and apply to participate. For further information, please contact:

Keith Bain, Project Director, Liberated Learning, Saint Mary’s University
902.496.8741
keith.bain@smu.ca

Janice Stevens, Project Coordinator, Liberated Learning, Saint Mary’s University
902.496.8178
janice.stevens@smu.ca

Calls for Papers

signal boost, ,

US Conference:

The Association on Higher Education And Disability is pleased to announce the Call for Proposals for its 34th Annual Conference, “AHEAD 2011: Sustainable Access through Partnership.”

The conference will be held July 11-16, 2011 at the Washington Convention Center in Seattle, Washington, USA

The Call for Proposals Submission Deadline is October 25, 2010

The 2011 conference theme, “Sustainable Access through Partnership”, celebrates the reality that the accessible college environment, instructional and physical, is the domain of many partners. Recent years have brought the challenges of increasing and emerging student populations and shrinking budgets and resources, leading us to seek equitable design that is sustainable across time, resources, and populations. The 2011 conference will highlight creative approaches to promoting long-ranging, or sustainable, access and equity through collaboration.

Proposals are welcomed from all AHEAD members, college professionals, faculty and others who do research, teach, or work in the fields of disability and higher education.

Full details and instructions for the Call for Proposals are available at The conference webpage.

We look forward to receiving your proposals!

Canadian Conference:

CALL FOR PRESENTATION PROPOSALS

INTERSECTIONS AND CONNECTIONS WITH DISABILITY STUDIES

In keeping with the Congress theme for 2011 “Coasts and Continents: Exploring Peoples and Places / Rivages et continents : exploration des peuples et des lieux,” CDSA-ACEI encourages attendees at the 2011 conference to explore the geographical, historical, literary, artistic, socio-economic and political world that shapes disability studies and can be shaped by disability studies; to explore the place of disability studies in the world and how the world of disability studies is shaped by an individual’s and a people’s experience. This CFP in particular encourages submissions on glocalization, global citizenship and disability studies.

CDSA-ACEI’s 8th annual conference aims to connect Disability Studies scholars with scholars in different fields and spaces; to connect the discipline of Disability Studies globally and glocally.

For the first time for CDSA-ACEI, this CFP has a section where you can indicate whether you want to present your paper in person or virtually (more information on the proposal form).

Check out the conference website

Signal Boost: Assistance Dog Blog Carnival — Your Input Requested

signal boost,

Gentle Readers!

Sharon and Barnum over at After Gadget have it in mind to begin an Assistance Dog Blog Carnival. The majority of the information can be found at their blog:

I love blog carnival and blogswarms. I try to participate in them as much as I’m able (which is a lot less often than I’d like). Lately, it’s been occurring to me, with the blossoming of so many new, thoughtful, lush, sassy assistance-dog blogs that it might be time to start an AD carnival or to do a blogswarm.

However, this would require many interested participants:

– Sites to host the carnivals (if we went the carnival route);

– Bloggers to submit their posts;

– Readers to read the blogs!

Sharon is asking that anyone interested, or with feedback, answers to the questions posed at After Gadget, please leave them in the comments section there. I hope that you can show some support for this, and if you know anyone who might be interested, please feel free to pass this information along!