[nagdu] Jury finds IA Dept. for Blind'sguidedog policy does notdiscriminate

[Angie Matney]

Hi Alysha,

Great post. I think it's important to remember that "orientation" and "mobility" are actually two separate skill sets.

Angie

On Fri, 20 Feb 2009 19:07:44 -0600, Alysha wrote:

>As others have mentioned in their posts, I think we need to consider that 
>much more than just cane travel is offered at training centers. So say 
>there's a guide dog user who is comfortable with mobility but who needs some 
>work on cooking or technology or braille. Then, there doesn't seem to be a 
>program out there this person could attend to learn the necessary skills 
>without risking damage to their relationship with their dog. I do think that 
>cane travel is quite important and that all guide dog users should be 
>comfortable with it, but it seems like all the training centers I've heard 
>about mandate it as the only means of mobility to be used during the time 
>one is there. So I suppose I'm wondering why there are no programs (that I 
>know of) that accommodate the potential needs of guide dog users instead of 
>expecting them to essentially temporarily give up their chosen mobility aid. 
>The important thing is that we can get around independently, not whether we 
>do so with a dog or a cane. Why is it that people seem to link mobility 
>classes only with cane travel? I think a guide dog user could still benefit 
>from mobility lessons that aren't focused on the training of the dog. The 
>problem solving and orientation skills taught in good mobility programs are 
>useful to you no matter what mobility aid you use. So I think it is fair for 
>a program to demand competency with a cane, but I do not think that it is 
>right to restrict the choices of guide dog users to either doing without 
>training in the myriad of skills taught at centers or giving up the use of 
>their dogs for a significant fraction of the day.

>Alysha 


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