[nfb-db] My thoughts on training centers blind, and deaf blind.

Thu Nov 7 01:33:09 UTC 2013

Hi marsha.
Sadly, my vvocabulary is maybe 100 signs. The classes until very
recently have been so infrequent that I haven't benifited much from
them. My receptive skills are certainly better than my actual signing
ones. People have started to tell me that I should just stick with the
Rochester method, but I want to keep trying to learn, you know?

Scott

On 11/6/13, Marsha Drenth <marsha.drenth at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Gene,
> sounds like you have some things to do. In all due time it will get done.
> Good luck, perhaps you will get to come up while I am there.
> Keep us updated.
>
> Marsha drenth
> Sent with my IPhone
>
>> On Nov 5, 2013, at 10:00 PM, "gene richburg" <gene5402 at austin.rr.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> Hi Marsha, well I have either some time in Jan or Feb, but that hasn't
>> been determined yet.  I still have to develop my iep plan with dars, the
>> department of asistive rehabilitation services, HKNC can't give me a date
>> with out that I e p plan, but I have to have a prep meeting  that will
>> include my mom and everyone else.  We were gonna have it on the 24th of
>> october, but Molly Rimer had a death in the family, her niece passed away
>> that morning at age 22, or 23, I for get which, so hopefully things will
>> work out on the 8th of this month, then after the prep meeting then we
>> will be able to develop the actual I e p.  The reason I need a prep
>> meeting, is so my mom can help me figure out what I will be able to expect
>> from Dars, and what they will expect of me.  It's really frustrating, I
>> was supposed to get in back in either august but couldn't because every
>> one that was helping me with the application totally dropped the ball, and
>> me and my mom finally had to step in and straighten everything out,.
>>
>> -----Original Message----- From: Marsha Drenth
>> Sent: Tuesday, November 05, 2013 4:19 PM
>> To: NFB Deaf-Blind Division Mailing List
>> Subject: Re: [nfb-db] My thoughts on training centers blind, and deaf
>> blind.
>>
>> Jean, yes I did receive the student handbook. I got it from the admissions
>> person at HK and see. I think I also read that they do provide the vibrant
>> call alert system. I'm interested in seeing that. Do you have a start
>> date?
>>
>> Marsha drenth
>> Sent with my IPhone
>>
>>> On Nov 5, 2013, at 4:52 PM, "gene richburg" <gene5402 at austin.rr.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi Marsha, did you receive the HKNC student handbook?  I don't know if
>>> they provide consumers, or what ever they call people who come there, but
>>> I think they provide some kind of vibra call system, but I didn't get
>>> that part very clearily, I'll have to go back and read that, perhaps
>>> Scott can clear that up for sure.  But if you need the handbook, I can
>>> email you off list and atatch it to the message.
>>>
>>> -----Original Message----- From: Marsha Drenth
>>> Sent: Monday, November 04, 2013 8:26 PM
>>> To: NFB Deaf-Blind Division Mailing List
>>> Subject: Re: [nfb-db] My thoughts on training centers blind, and deaf
>>> blind.
>>>
>>> Maurice,
>>> I think hands down that no one will argue with you that if someone is in
>>> need of blindness skills training, and if they are just blind with no
>>> additional disablity, then going to a NFB training center is the best.
>>> With that said, I am not just blind, but severely hard of hearing. I have
>>> chosen to go to HKNC because of two main reasons, I do not need blindness
>>> skills. I was blind before I lost my hearing. But I do need the skills in
>>> order to live as a deafblind person. I have traveled with a cane, with a
>>> guide dog, read braille, and am able to use technology. The problem lays
>>> in that I also can't hear. There is only one center in this country that
>>> can train a person who is both blind and hard of hearing. With that said,
>>> most persons who go to HKNC, are in need of a audiologist who has worked
>>> with the dual sensory loss. An in house audiologist who understand the
>>> needs of blind persons, visually impaired persons, and those who also who
>>> are deaf, hard of hearing and or hearing impaired; is something that an
>>> NFB center does not have. Just because I have made this desicion, doesn't
>>> not mean that I am less of a person, less of an NFB member, or think less
>>> of the philosophy.
>>>
>>> Its awesome that you had a successful experience at the CCB. And I am
>>> also not sure, of your hearing issues. But if I am reading your message
>>> correctly, your saying those persons who go to an NFB center, are better.
>>> This is the sort of attitude that divides a group. The NFB centers are no
>>> less better than HK, nor is HK better than an NFB center. Its just
>>> different, serves different disabilities, different needs.
>>>
>>> I have heard of both good and bad experiences at the HK center, jsut as I
>>> have heard of persons going through an NFB center. I just know that for
>>> me, with my hearing loss, it would not be successful to go to a NFB
>>> center. For them to ask me to listen to traffic in order to indicate when
>>> its safe to cross. I can't hear traffic. It would not be viable for me to
>>> have an NFB center to tell me, listen for the water boiling, I can't hear
>>> it boil. The techniques are different, similar but different.
>>>
>>> Granted I haven't been there yet to begin my training. My desicion was
>>> one I made for me. But with that said, I can understand why other
>>> deafblind persons make the same desicion.
>>>
>>> Its unfair to say that HK is not what blind, or deafblind people should
>>> be going to for training, especially if you haven't been there yourself.
>>> I would say that all blind persons should be tolerant of those of us who
>>> have different needs, are in need of different skills than just those you
>>> learn as a blind person.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Marsha drenth
>>> Sent with my IPhone
>>>
>>>> On Nov 4, 2013, at 6:19 PM, maurice mines <kd0iko at icloud.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Good afternoon, I have been thinking for quite some time as I’ve read
>>>> emails on this list recently, that it might be of some benefit to talk
>>>> about the benefits of attending an NFB training center. Of course the
>>>> question that many on this list will ask why are you even discussing
>>>> this? Because I’ve heard a lot recently a.k.a. read a lot recently that
>>>> the feeling seems to be that HK in C is apparently be only game in town.
>>>> But I believe that if my past experience at the Colorado Center for the
>>>> blind is any indication of how and if the training centers handle death
>>>> blindness, one need not have very much worry about. Remember that the
>>>> training is very individualized. So what may work for you and what level
>>>> of deaf blindness you have, it may not reflect how they deal with your
>>>> neighbor at all. Also as far as I understand the training centers do
>>>> reach out to resources to help that training happen appropriately. So
>>>> you’re not going into the great void of the unknown. Also it is good to
>>>> know that based on my experience we found alternative techniques not
>>>> only to blindness but the issues surrounding the lack of hearing. And of
>>>> course we discuss the options should one’s hearing get worse. I guess
>>>> one getting at here is that if you are considering going to a training
>>>> center I think that’s the first part, the second part is actually
>>>> figuring out which one you should go to and the reasons why you want to
>>>> go to it? I think that based on everything I’ve read and people I’ve
>>>> talked to that all three of our centers can handle this well. I think a
>>>> comment by a current staff member made when I was a student at the
>>>> Colorado Center for the blind came out of it conversation regarding the
>>>> disabilities that is neither deaf blindness were just great blindness.
>>>> It surrounds my at that time anyway great fear of writing anything. The
>>>> staff member said quote you can’t just not right. The translation that I
>>>> took away from that and have come to realize in the years since I
>>>> graduated from the Colorado Center for the blind, you can’t just not
>>>> live life because you can’t hear ordered their blindness involved. And
>>>> depending on what you have to do, in many respects you have to get out
>>>> there and just plain live one’s life. Another thought of course comes to
>>>> mind in many of the writings and things that are second national
>>>> president Dr. Jernigan when he spoke about not throwing the nickel. I
>>>> guess it kind of blows down to accept help when you need it and of
>>>> course find ways of not accepting it if you don’t. And last but not
>>>> least he believed in blind people and I extend this adept line people
>>>> blending into society when in wherever it is possible. Just some food
>>>> for thought on a rainy Monday afternoon. I’d certainly would like to
>>>> read some of the thoughts that you all may add to this. But I’ll just
>>>> leave it at this I have an abiding belief in all of the training centers
>>>> and what they can do in the fact that the NFB difference is that they
>>>> care not just there for a paycheck. But because they care and believe in
>>>> turning out capable and competent people.
>>>>
>>>> Sincerely Maurice mines. Phone 360-524-0791, work/school email address,
>>>> Maurice.mines at PCC.edu.
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