George Brown College Offers Only Training in Province, Leaving Families with Little Aid Scott Wheeler
The Toronto Star , June 17, 2017
When Serena Reynolds became an intervener for the deaf-blind a decade ago, she stumbled into her career by accident.
Like many, Reynolds didn’t know that thousands of children and adults in Ontario live with the dual disability, made famous by Helen Keller and recognized since 2015 in June, during National Deafblind Awareness Month.
Reynolds went to school to become a child needs worker and struggled to find a job until she came across a listing for interveners.
Bob Seed said he’s overcome with relief over a tentative agreement that could result in compensation for former visually impaired, blind and deafblind students at W. Ross Macdonald School who were allegedly abused over a span of more than 60 years.
“I’m over the moon,” said Seed, a former W. Ross Macdonald student and plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit brought against the Province of Ontario, which operates the school. “It’s a huge burden lifted off my shoulders.”
For many in the Toronto’s Deaf community, workers with the Canadian Hearing Society provide essential support, from fixing hearing aids to interpreting at medical appointments, even helping to find employment. Since March, hundreds of CHS workers across the province have been on strike, and the effects are causing many clients to join staff on picket lines.
As hundreds of Canadian Hearing Society workers strike across the province, people who are deaf or hard of hearing are left without some of the counselling and audiology services they rely on.
Deaf-blind people have many different ways of communication.
The methods they use vary, depending on the causes of their combined vision and hearing loss, their backgrounds, and their education.
CBC is expanding a successful pilot project to make its radio programming more accessible to those who are deaf or hard-of-hearing, with As It Happens to now join The Current in posting daily show transcripts online to read, print and share.
“Where do you work?” “What do you do for a living?” In America, these are among the first questions a new acquaintance will ask us. This simple inquiry reflects the cultural emphasis placed on work and career choice in the modern world. But for many, this dreaded question serves as a reminder that even work is a privilege.
Scientists at Binghamton University, State University of New York want to improve sensor technology critical to billions of devices made every year. With a three-year grant from the National Science Foundation, they will start by making a high-performance sensor and applying it to hearing aids.
