“Highlights”

April 22, 2010

In Attendance: Donald Barnes, Hal Suddreth, Jessica Edminston, Judith Gilliam, Matt Kochie, Willie Jenkins, Mona Ivey, Steve Hamerdinger, Cayla Lackey, Jay Croft, Evon Black, Ricky Holeman, Kristine Carroll & Bedarius Bell.  Interpreters were Alice Randolph, Wanda Cobb, and Ted Kotis.

Bedarius Bell provided the ADRS report and apologized that Rita Houston was not available to attend since she was in Washington D. C. for CSAVR.  He made several announcements, including:

• The Interpreter Position for the Montgomery area has been announced internally only but since no applications are expected it will be advertised soon to the public.  There are several interpreters interested and a request was made that several of the DAC members participate on the interview committee.
• The Southeast Regional Institute on Deafness (SERID) will be held on October 15 – 19, 2011 and the first SERID Planning Committee Meeting will be held next week.  Each agency is represented on the committee and we are working on a theme.
• There has been a policy change at the ADRS State Office complex and all visitors are now required to sign in and wear a visitor badge.  There was a “weird” incident recently and this policy has been implemented to provide better safety.
• It was determined that DAC Committee members requesting travel reimbursement will not be required to put their social security number on the sign in sheet anymore since it will be gathered in a different way for confidentiality reasons.

Kristine Carroll, an Evaluator with the Lakeshore Program, provided an update and appreciated being invited to the meeting.  She will be providing information on a regular basis in the Deaf Program Update, a monthly staff newsletter.

• Lakeshore staff recently participated in the ASD Career Day and explained the purpose and types of evaluations and how they work with VR to parents and students.
• They are having ‘College Prep for Parents” meetings at night to assist with transition.
• Kristine has applied to attend the 4 week training program on Deafness in a rehab setting at the University of Oregon.
• They will be having a Deaf College Prep Program at Lakeshore on 7/18 – 7/24.
• Lakeshore staff hope to make a presentation at the University of Oregon at SERID this Fall in Louisville, KY.
• Lakeshore staff are now involved with the Deaf Advisory Committee at ASD.
• Lakeshore has several different types of evaluations they can provide to the consumers, including college evaluations, work evaluations, condensed (focused) evaluations and full comprehensive evaluations.  These evals can be tailored for the consumer and the VR Counselor if needed.
• There was a question about the Learning Disabilities & Deafness Program at Lakeshore and Bedarius will look into the status of the program.

Jessica Edmiston, representing AIDB, discussed the Mentoring Program Grant and the “At Risk Youth” grant that they recently received.  Karen Carden is the Coordinator of the Program and Jessica Parker with AIDB is also involved.

• Several agencies are involved, including AIDB, ADRS, Mental Health and Rev. Jay Croft has also been involved.
• The “At Risk Youth” program was funded in 2008 to AIDB through the Office of Juvenile Justice (OJJDP) with the assistance of Sen. Richard Shelby.
• The students should have a hearing or visual restriction, range in age from 14 – 21and are from ASD, ASB, Gentry or reside in West Alabama.
• 30 students have been identified so far and are students that are not doing well in school and may potentially drop out or are having problems with academics, family, economics, lack of interpreters, etc.
• The goal is to pair the student (up to age 18) with a mentor and they are looking for volunteers to assist.  Mentors will serve for one year – from May to May – and will receive travel reimbursement.
• AIDB will have an “orientation” for volunteers and ADECA is helping with background checks.

Bedarius just got back from CSAVR (Council of State Administrators of Vocational Rehabilitation) in Washington D. C.  He attended the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Committee meeting and there is a nationwide push to use the Model State Plan.  Alabama has used the plan but many states are not using it and in addition, many states do not have DAC’s.

Bedarius thanked the DAC for their guidance in assisting us to have a quality program.

• Bedarius will be joining Dr. Watson in presenting the Consumer Satisfaction Survey to the Deaf & Hard of Hearing Committee soon and probably at SERID.
• There were 2 “hot topics” at this meeting within CSAVR and probably will be discussed at upcoming conferences:  “Audism” - which is discrimination against deaf or non speaking people and “Test Equity” – which is standardized test that don’t match with deaf individuals.

We are starting to plan the “town hall” meetings that will be held around the state with stakeholders to develop the next Deaf Strategic Plan.  We hope to start in May (possibly the 3^rd or 4^th week in Huntsville but exact dates have not been confirmed yet.  DAC members will receive an e-mail with the schedule soon.   

Dr. Watson with the University of Arkansas provided the results of the 2009 Consumer Satisfaction Survey which were positive. 

It was announced that NAD & AAD have been working on a Captioning Bill and hope to have success with that effort.

It was also announced that Steve Hamerdinger recently won an award from the Gallaudet Alumni.  He thanked the committee members for their support.

Steve Hamerdinger announced that there will be a fundraiser for the Bailey Deaf Unit on June 18^th at 7:00 p.m. at St. Stephens Episcopal Church in Montgomery.  The entertainer is Crom Saunders and the cost per ticket is $30.00.