Some of Our Parts

It’s the end of another week (and hopefully the end of another exam for you guys! Here’s some disability related news to take you into the weekend.

• A letter to my wheelchair.
• The International Day of People with Disability is only around the corner! This year’s theme is Sustainable Development: The Promise of Technology.
• A typeface designed specifically to assist dyslexic people read
• Here’s a quick guide on service dogs and small business
• Did you miss Quippings at the Fringe Festival?
• Passionate about disability and the arts? Join the Guardian‘s live webchat next week.
• What does this state election mean for you and your disability?
• What about the mental health of kids with intellectual disability?
• Another perspective on dying with dignity

Happy Friday! The first week of exams is over! Hope everyone is taking some time out to look after yourself with study breaks.

Here are some fun things happening in the disability related world:

• Can a Deaf person also be a sign language interpreter? Sure can!
• Smells like sign language! (note, this video is ASL, not Auslan)
• Video games which open the door for the blind to play
• Disney petitioned to produce a film hero with Down’s syndrome
• Have you seen the trailer for The Theory of Everything?

Good luck with those exams!

There are few people who need the benefits of online shopping more than the disabled, but one blind woman says she is being discriminated against because of problems with the Coles website.

Gisele Mesnage is now taking on the supermarket giant in the courts and if she succeeds her lawyer said it could have implications for other websites.

Read more at ABC News.

It’s that SWOT VAC kind of year. Hope everyone’s exam preparations are going well! You might have seen yesterday we posted that there are now 24 hour study spaces at Clayton, for all those night owls who work best after dark.

Also its Halloween! Are you getting your trick or treat on?

• For those wheelchair users, here are some really clever Halloween costume ideas!
• Heading to the UK soon? The Festival of Dyslexic Culture is on this November.
• While you’re there, check out Ben Holt’s Tube Challenge!
• Why Musharaf Asghar feels lucky to have a stammer.
• Have you heard of the Teal Pumpkin Project?
• Are you graduating this year? How do you feel about the future?’
• Check out the new parking logo at this New York college.

Are you interested in Disability Studies? There are two great new opportunities being advertised at the moment!

Curtin University has an ARC funded project within the Faculty of Humanities in Disability and Digital TV: Access, representation and reception. This project investigates the impacts digital televisions have on the social inclusion or exclusion of people with disability through a user-focused analysis of accessibility and representation.

Further abroad, the University of Leeds has a position for a University Academic Fellow in Disability Law.

As we start to enter exams period, all current Monash students can access a 24 hour study area to study in preparation for exams around the clock:

Building 10, Ground floor, Center Cellar Room

Students will require their Monash Student ID to gain access to the space after hours. This space is now available for use and will be until at least Friday 21 November.

Are you a student or recent graduate with a vision impairment? Would you like to help improve access to graphical materials in university educational materials?

Graphs, maps, schematics, diagrams, cartoons, non-standard scripts and many other visual representations can be used to convey important information in study materials. A research team from Monash and Deakin Universities is investigating how vision impaired University students access these materials and how the current processes can be improved.

You will be asked to share your experiences and opinions in an interview up to one hour in length at your place of study or via phone in November 2014. Participation is entirely voluntary and confidential, as detailed in the attached explanatory statement.

Responses from the interviews will be used to develop a model for improved provision of accessible graphics which will be promoted throughout Australian Universities. Participants will have the opportunity to register to trial this new model for their 2015 study materials.

To get involved and help make a difference, please contact Leona Holloway at leona.holloway@monash.edu or (03) 9903 2401.

KPMG has been engaged by the Australian Government Department of Education to conduct an evaluation of the Disability Support Program. The Disability Support Program is one of the Australian Government’s key responses to assisting people with disability and removing barriers that may be preventing access and participation.

The evaluation will use a variety of methods and tools to collect information including this online survey.  The survey asks broad questions of your experience as a student with disability at university and you do not need to have knowledge of the Disability Support Program. The survey is entirely voluntary and please be assured your responses will be confidential.

Interviews (face to face or telephone) will also assist in the evaluation of the program. The final question of the survey asks if you would be willing to participate in a short interview with one of KPMG’s team. Your participation, whilst very much valued is optional. If you would like to be a part of the interviews would you be so kind as to indicate “Yes” and then complete the contact details as KPMG will need a way to contact you. Guidance about how KPMG will store and use your information can be found in KPMG’s privacy statement.

We greatly appreciate your participation in this survey as we understand this is busy part of the year for you.

Follow the link to the online student survey.

“You’re a really nice computer.”

Happy Friday every body! It’s going to be a cracker of a weekend, so make sure you get some sunshine (and study for exams of course…).

There’s a whole bunch of news this week about the visibility of people with disabilities in the media.

• Where are they all? In children’s books? On TV? On The Apprentice?
• Well here are 10 amazing characters who happen to have a disability.

In other disability news…

• Different bodies, different clothes?
• More wonderful bodies in a fashion shoot.
• A panel discussion on art, bodies and disability.
• Thinking about breaking into politics?
• A personal narrative on mental health.
• Think you knew blindness?