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

Thu Nov 7 15:33:23 UTC 2013

Hey Scott,

Whatever you do, don't let these people advise you to stick the Rochester
method.  That is a very bad idea.  Many of the DB people would not have the
patience to communicate with those using this method.

With the right people, you will...not maybe....you will master ASL somehow.
There are deaf ASL teachers out there who would be willing to work with
people like you.  For those DB people who cannot see, there are other method
to teach ASL.  I know of several who are teaching ASL to totally blind
students, successfully,

Randy

-----Original Message-----
From: nfb-db [mailto:nfb-db-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Scott Davert
Sent: Wednesday, November 06, 2013 8:33 PM
To: NFB Deaf-Blind Division Mailing List
Subject: Re: [nfb-db] My thoughts on training centers blind, and deaf blind.

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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