Hi Paul,
Thanks for reminding me of the TechDis site, the site was down for a while,
but it's good to see it up and running again. All these great contacts are
going into my IE Favourites!
I think you're well aware of what I think of the fragmentation in AT! I do
feel strongly that the medical and the educational strands of AT should be
working together more closely in a complementary fashion, rather than
working in parallel as you say. Some barriers need to be broken down and we
all need to be communicating a lot better...
Beginning to feel like a stuck record! ;-)
I'm quite keen from my own experiences (not always good) that technicians
and engineers working in AT don't get recognition of the contribution they
make, which rarely seems to be recognised if they aren't in a Clinical
Scientist role. Of course, there are some places where engineering types are
closely involved in evaluation and prescription of AT, but again, that
depends where you work. Some centres are very good at multidisciplinary
work, others, not so.
I'm not aware of any moves to formalise the role of people who support AT in
schools and colleges outside of the AT Forum work in investigating the
education and training of AT professionals in the UK
(http://www.fastuk.org/atforum-education.php) and the KPT - Keeping Pace
with (Assistive) Technology project
(http://www.fastuk.org/project_details.php?Ref=932).
Anyone else have any information?
Cheers,
Aidan.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Doyle" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, April 04, 2005 12:20 PM
Subject: AT in Education
> Aidan,
>
> AT in education is a whole new can of worms as we discussed at the RAATE
> meeting last year.
> You may already know about the Tech Dis Website http://www.techdis.ac.uk/
> but if not it is well worth a look as it is pretty much the fount of all
> knowledge in the field of education.
> Your comment does however give me the opportunity to highlight the woeful
> state of communication between the education and medical sectors,
> something
> I and many of my colleagues have had personal experience of.
> Are there any proposals to forge better links and perhaps formalise the
> role
> of all those guys and girls supplying and supporting AT in the field of
> education, (like that of the clinical technologist), or are we going to
> carry on working in parallel and on the whole ignoring each other?
>
>
> Cheers
>
> Paul
>
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