AUCDigest
August 31, 2007 • Volume 7, Number 8
Center for Development and Learning (NC UCEDD) Interim Director Elected to New Role. Dr. Greg Olley, UCEDD Interim Director, was recently elected President of Division 33 of the American Psychological Association. Division 33 is the division on mental retardation and developmental disabilities. Greg is a long time member of Division 33 and for the past two years has been chairing the Division’s ad hoc Committee on Mental Retardation and the Death Penalty. Greg will begin a role on the Division’s executive committee, and then assume the role of president-elect, and president the following year. He is looking forward to working with the national leaders in the field of developmental disabilities and coordinating their efforts with the UCEDDs.
New Hampshire Institute on Disability (UCEDD/LEND) Faculty Recipient of Exceptional Parent (EP)’s “Parent of the Year” Award. July 30, Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company (MassMutual), in cooperation with Exceptional Parent Magazine and Red Sox minor league baseball team the Lowell Spinners, sponsored Disability Awareness Night. Janet Williamson was honored by receiving the EP Maxwell J. Schleifer Distinguished Service Award from MassMutual’s Terry McMahon at a pre-game ceremony at home plate. Janet was among the first class to graduate from the IOD’s NH Leadership Series, a program which supports self-advocacy and leadership skills for individuals with disabilities and their family members who wish to affect change at a personal, community, and statewide level to support the full inclusion of individuals with disabilities in their schools and communities.
Center for Community Inclusion and Disability Studies (ME UCEDD) Receives Early Childhood Special Educators Grant. The UCEDD, in collaboration with the University of Maine College of Education and Human Development and the Maine Department of Education, has received funding from the Office of Special Education Programs, US Department of Education, to support a four-year project to address Maine’s critical need for highly-qualified Early Childhood Special Educators. The project, Training Opportunities for Personnel (TOP): Birth-5, represents Maine’s only outreach graduate study designed to prepare highly qualified early intervention and early childhood personnel to serve young children birth to age five and their families through the State of Maine’s coordinated birth-5 service delivery system. Contact Sandra Horne for more information.
Center on Disability Studies (HI UCEDD) Student Receives Praise for Lottery.
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The UCEDD has the incredible pleasure of congratulating one of its Certificate on Interdisciplinary Diversity and Disabilities Studies Program students on the publication of her debut novel. Lottery, authored by Patricia Wood, was released for distribution in August 2007. It is the story of a young man with an IQ of 76 who wins the Washington State Lottery. Told in the first person, it gives "voice" to the experiences of a young man with intellectual challenges who is fully included in his community. The novel has achieved an overwhelming response, being reviewed by the Washington Post and New York Times. The UCEDD is sponsoring a public reading by the author on September 12 as part of its 20th Anniversary Celebration. Contact Dr. Jean Johnson for more information. Read more about the novel in this article from the Honolulu Advertisor.
Indiana Institute on Disability and Community (UCEDD) Conducts Disability Poll. A recent Indiana survey identified top health care problems and needs for people with disabilities. Respondents said choice of health care providers was the most important feature to include in health care reform legislation, followed by coverage for specialists, low co-pays, dental coverage, and preventive care. The project, “2007 Indiana Disability Poll,” was a joint effort in collaboration with the Indiana Governor’s Council for People with Disabilities and Indiana Protection and Advocacy Services. For more information, contact Dr. Vicki Pappas at (812) 855-6508 or e-mail [email protected]. Visit the Indiana Institute’s Center for Planning and Policy Studies webpage for more information.
Wyoming INstitute for Disabilities (UCEDD) Host Firsts Conference on Emergency Evacuation of People Unable To Self Evacuate. The WIND UCEDD recently co-sponsored a conference with the state Department of Health, Emergency Medical Services Division and the state Department of Homeland Security. Conference speakers included four citizens with disabilities and representatives from four emergency services; police, fire, medical, and emergency management. WIND staff also crafted a presentation for county emergency management directors at the state’s annual Homeland Security conference, focusing on planning for people unable to self evacuate (UTSE). The UTSE acronym represents an inclusive term for all groups of people who can’t evacuate themselves in an emergency, instead of referencing only people with disabilities. More than 150 people were involved and Dr. Tony Cahill from the University of New Mexico UCEDD partnered with WIND for the Homeland Security presentation. For more information, contact Dr. Ken Heinlein.
A.J. Pappanikou Center (CT UCEDD) Honors Spirit of ADA with Celebration and Transportation Summit. The Pappanikou Center, in collaboration with the Developmental Disability Council and the Office of Protection and Advocacy, hosted its third annual Celebration of the ADA on July 26, 2007. The celebration’s theme was accessible transportation. The event began with an overview of what is being done to promote accessible transportation in Connecticut with speakers from the Department of Transportation, the Bureau of Rehabilitation Services, and the Connecticut Association of Community Transportation. In addition, guest speakers from Colorado shared with the 48 participants how their state has managed to become a model for accessible transportation. The last hour of the event was spent honoring 14 advocates who have gone above and beyond in promoting accessible transportation in Connecticut. Contact Dave Martin for more information on this event.
News and Activities from the South Dakota Center for Disabilities (UCEDD)
- New Developmental Clinic Funded at Pine Ridge Reservation. The South Dakota Center for Disabilities recently received notification that a grant submitted to the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) through the Rural Healthcare Services Outreach Grant Program was awarded to begin a developmental clinic on the Pine Ridge Reservation. This project proposes to develop the Pine Ridge Developmental Clinic by networking and collaborating with local health and developmental service providers in order to replicate a proven successful model from the Rosebud and Cheyenne River Reservation Developmental Clinics administered by the UCEDD. The clinic will address developmental concerns by bringing in pediatric specialists on a monthly basis to work in partnership with the local health and educational services to establish a comprehensive developmental evaluation clinic where children can be thoroughly and appropriately evaluated. For more information, contact Heather Stettnichs, Director of Community Education & Information.
- Upcoming SCDD Events
All three events are featured on the AUCD Network Events webpage.
- September 17–18, 2007: Fall 2007 Autism Workshop
- September 26–27, 2007: Training on Deaf-Blindness
- October 29–30, 2007: Birth to 3 Conference
Various Presentations Provided by Institute for Community Inclusion (MA UCEDD) Faculty.
- Presenters on Employment
- On July 16th, John Butterworth gave a presentation entitled Building Momentum Behind Employment. It explored factors that support and challenge expansion of employment opportunities using almost 20 years of data on employment outcomes and national survey results. The session included discussion of implications for policy and practice with representatives of leadership community rehabilitation programs (CRPs), and engaged participants in a discussion of strategies for supporting change on a CRP and systems level.
- Elena Varney presented at the 2007 APSE conference in July. She gave a talk entitled What Have We Learned from the Customized Employment Demonstrations?, which examined five years of outcomes data from thirty-one demonstration sites across the US. It also provided information about the systems change efforts and what strategies have been used to build the capacity of these systems to implement customized employments.
- Cori DiBiase gave a presentation called Customized Self-Employment in July for the 2007 APSE conference. The presentation covered what support is needed to aide individuals with disabilities who want to begin their own business.
- Presenters
on Education and Parental Leadership. Heike Boeltzig and Matthew Kusminsky presented a
poster at the US Department of Education, Office for Special Education Programs
(OSEP), Project Directors’ Conference in Washington
DC on July 17. At the same
conference, Boeltzig also presented the preliminary findings of an evaluation
of a Parent-Professional Leadership Training implemented by the Federation for
Children with Special Needs at the local school district level in MA. These
findings were part of the A.P.P.L.E. Project, which uses quasi-experimental
design to test the project’s impact on leadership skills of parents with
children who have special needs and how they work with the local school
districts.
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