Introduction to Assistive Technology

Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:03):

All right, wonderful. I am so happy to introduce or reintroduce you to Quinby and Ben, who are joining

us from the Vermont Assistive Technology Program, and Quinby has lost her voice a little bit, so she is

going to be responding by chat. Please feel free to pop any questions into the chat as we go along. And

Ben is going to be presenting for us. I will be hosting those slides from my computer, so let me go ahead

and start sharing those and make sure that works.

Ben Wimett (00:32):

Yeah, sorry you have to hear my scruffy voice for the entire time.

Speaker 1 (00:38):

Perfect. Can everyone see the slides?

Ben Wimett (00:45):

Yep.

Speaker 1 (00:45):

Excellent.

Quinby McLellan (00:46):

Yes. Thank you.

Speaker 1 (00:47):

All right, so I’m going to mute myself and turn it over to you, Ben.

Ben Wimett (00:51):

Right.

Speaker 1 (00:52):

And as we said, any questions, please feel free to pop those in the chat as we go. Thank you.

Ben Wimett (00:59):

I think it’s pretty obvious at this point, but we’re just trying to give you guys an overview of our services,

how to start, what we do. We don’t do a little bit of the gray area that we may help a little bit in, but we’re

not really the be all, end all and how our services work from nuts and bolts to maybe having some time at

the end to answer some deeper questions that you may have. And Quinby is going to interject in the chat.

We’ve already done a little run through so that if I screw up I’m totally comfortable with her interjecting.

And we’ve done this presentation or ones like it several times before and we’re like yin and yang with

each other, so even without her voice I’m sure would have a lot to add. You can go ahead and advance the

slide.

degree in Sociology and American Studies and Sociology from Keene State. My first piece of assistive

technology that was called Assistive Technology to me was a CD-ROM, which we don’t even use

anymore, but they could hold, back in the early ’90s they could hold more information and the first piece

of software I used was called Write:OutLoud, which was basically a text prediction program, but it also

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would repeat sentences to me so that I could make sure I picked the words I wanted, because I think when

I used the software I was probably in first or second grade.

(02:53):

What do I love about? It’s cut off, but I think that question is, what do I love about my job? The people. I

really like taking someone’s Mount Everest and turning it into a molehill for them. Sometimes it takes a

little time, but we get it done. What is my favorite, I’m going to guess that that says pastime time, because

again, it’s a little cut off by people’s faces, which I don’t mind, but I love spending time outdoors in any

way, shape or form. I have an outdoor wheelchair that looks like a tank, so I literally drive over logs and I

go hunting, I go fishing. If it’s outdoors and it’s above 32 degrees, I’m probably out there, and I’m not

working. So, next slide?

Quinby McLellan (03:51):

I’m going to use my voice just a little bit for this and then to the chat. So, thank you all for bearing with

me. Definitely lost my voice. Hopefully it’s just allergies. I am newer to the program, just a little over a

year, and my background is as an occupational therapy assistant in a variety of settings, really love being

able to bring that experience to this world where I can meet with folks from all ages and collaborate with

my colleagues. We come from different backgrounds, so whether it’s a question about switch control and

our colleague Tracy know so much about engineering, we just all bring so many different talents to the

table, and I just love how creative we can be consulting with folks.

(04:45):

My first piece of AT was probably a pencil grip. I definitely had that really intense callus on my middle

finger, because I was gripping the pencil so hard, so I have a strong memory of that, as well as strategies

for self-regulation and managing any stress throughout the school day. And I really love cross-country

skiing this winter, and as we look ahead into the spring, which was finally here, I’m looking forward to

more time hiking and walking outside, and love anything with the arts.

Ben Wimett (05:32):

Good. What is assistive technology? You can tell by the pictures here, it’s a pretty wide gamut of things,

but you can go ahead and advance the slide. This is our favorite term for assistive technology. There’s all

sorts of definitions out there, but we have been hot about this for probably a month or two a few years

ago, and this is the most simple definition we came up with. Assistive technology is a term for creative

tools and strategies that help people work, or live, learn, work and play, also known as AT.

(06:20):

When we think about the assistive technology, when Quinby and I or Tracy or any of our other

counterparts are assessing somebody’s needs, in the back of our heads we’re using this tech spectrum. It

starts with no tech, changing the environment, required tasks for tools or their schedule. It may be

something as simple as letting somebody start, I’ll just use me as an example. Prior to the pandemic I

worked at a different office and I rode the bus to work, and I needed my hours to obviously adapt around

the bus schedule so I could get to work on time and work my hours and then go home.

(07:12):

Another example of that is, how many people have an office right next to a copier or something, or right

next to the mailboxes? It can get pretty distracting for somebody with focus issues, or I’ll be honest, I’ve

got ADD, and my office for a while was right next to the copier and the mailboxes, and it was so

distracting every time somebody walked by.

(07:37):

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Again, a no-tech solution for that would be moving somebody’s office. It doesn’t really have to be

anything fancy. The low-tech solutions are the off the shelf techniques, so the pencil grips, the smart pens,

the … Oh, I don’t know, [inaudible 00:08:00] for making sure something doesn’t fall off of a table or move

around when you’re trying to use it. It’s check writers for visually impaired. About 80 to 90% of what we

have in our inventory would be those low-tech solutions. They’re really simple to grab off the shelf and

even if Quinby and I weren’t there, you should be able to Google what you need to find out about the item

and hopefully figure it out on your own. The last piece is those high-tech complex solutions. A lot of

times it is the AAC apps with speech. It’s some of the higher end environmental control setups these days

that are often tied into speech apps as well.

(08:57):

We do have those apps available, but if somebody really needs some high-tech high-end solutions, we

often work with vendors so that we can come up with the most comprehensive software package for these

high-needs related things and we work with regional techs that know us and our programs really well.

Then if we are working on a high-tech solution and it’s above our heads, we have help too. Quinby and I

are both very skilled, but we’re asked to be generalists in a lot of different fields. We’re actually internally

changing our titles from assistive technology specialists to assistive technology consultants, just so that it

gives … Hopefully gives that feeling that we’re not the be all end all, but we do know an awful lot. You

can go ahead and advance the slide.

Newport because of a federal AT grant, also what we refer to as our core services grant. We do have the

funding with local rehab and stuff, which we may or may not talk about today. I can’t remember, to be

honest with you. It’s been a long day. We serve all ages, disabilities and aging-related needs. That’s really

important, because people seem to think sometimes that we only do the iPads, we only do the higher tech

stuff. No, we do everything from, I always say from birth to dirt. If there’s a need and it’s related to

anything in that definition I shared earlier, we will try to get you off on the right foot and provide you the

services you need.

(11:01):

The next best thing that’s great about us is we don’t require, there’s no eligibility requirements, referral or

paperwork needed. We love paperwork if you can give it to us, because it gives us a deeper, more rich

understanding of who you are and who your barriers are. But it’s by no means required to get in the door

with us. It is extremely helpful, but it’s not. We don’t want paperwork and diagnosis and all that stuff to be

a barrier for somebody getting services. We even take it a step further, and if your needs twice removed

needs some assistive technology and you’re curious about it, you can call about it, just as long as the

person you’re inquiring about lives in the state of Vermont and they’re the ones giving the services, we

can help you. Go ahead and advance the slide. Quinby, did you say something? I want to make sure, I’ll

open it and check.

(12:11):

Oh, okay. Quinby was just saying that bringing up another high-tech solution like Eyegaze for computer

controls, and what Eyegaze is, it probably is what it sounds, but it’s basically using your eyes to control

the computer, both mouse and keyboard. And we are going to talk about Voc Rehab, also known as their

new official name is HireAbility Vermont. So nice catch there, Quinby.

(12:43):

And then I am going to talk about our funding stream and try not to mess this up, because it does get

complicated. First of all, before I ramble anymore, does anybody have any questions either in the chat or

want to turn their microphones on and ask anything? I don’t hear anybody yet, so I’m going to talk a little

bit about our funding structure. We get our funding federally from the administration on community

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living or ACL, and then it goes to DAIL in the state, also known as the Department of Disabilities, Aging,

and Independent Living.

(13:29):

Then it goes to our program, the Vermont Institute of Technology Program, and then in my case and

Tracy Ruth’s case, we are UVM contracted employees to do the field service work that Quinby does.

Quinby, Tracy and I do the same job. We just have different funding structures, so my position and

Tracy’s position is covered by a grant to CDCI. You can go to the next slide.

(14:06):

This map is a little out of date, but this just shows you … The map physically is out of … The picture of

the map. The territories that are listed are up-to-date. Burlington serves Franklin, Grand Island and

Chittenden Counties. Waterbury serves Washington, Lamoille, Caledonia, Essex, Orleans and Orange

Counties. And I serve out of Castleton University, Bennington, Windsor, Rutland, Addison and Windham

Counties. This is our new moved and revamped Burlington Tryout Center. Quinby, do you want to talk

about this, or do you want me to take it?

Quinby McLellan (14:58):

Yeah, I mean, if people can hear me with this sort of soft voice that I luckily have today, I had no voice

yesterday. The Burlington Trial Center is now on the same floor as the HireAbility office downtown on

Cherry Street in Burlington. We moved during the course of pandemic and we’ve been closed to the

public, but we are open now, and folks can use our services in-person or virtually. We’re going to keep

that hybrid model throughout, and we’ve set up the space so that one side is sensory friendly. We’ve

blocked out with this rice paper divider all the visual distractions from the hundreds of pieces of

equipment we have stored there, so folks can sit in there, it’s blue and green and white and just has a low

level of light if folks need that and fluorescent light coverings as well. So, adjustable sit to stand desks

and whatnot. I’m sure I’ll be tweaking that as time goes on, but set up half the space to be more sensory

friendly, which is nice.

Ben Wimett (16:09):

Yeah, Quinby’s done an excellent job. I’m going to have her come down and put her eyes on my space

and put her spin on it eventually here. She’s done a wonderful job. I went up this past summer and went,

“Whoa, you did this all by yourself?” Because poor Quinby has been remote 99.9% of the time since she

started, and she’s done a great job and she’s a great resource for her region, and I also lean on her a lot as

well. Because she knows so much about areas that I don’t, as she was saying before, we have a nice

balance of areas of expertise and passion.

(16:51):

I wouldn’t say that any of us are experts in any area, but we really do have a nice wide net of what we’re

passionate about, what we’re knowledgeable about, and we lean on each other really heavily. We almost

know delay. I at least get called or emailed once or twice a day, and I’m sure Quinby does as well, “Hey

Ben, do you know about this?” We work really well as a team, and it’s really seamless, it doesn’t cause

any delay to our consumers. So, you can go to the next slide if you’d like. I don’t know if you want to talk

more about this, Quinby, but this is [inaudible 00:17:37]-

Quinby McLellan (17:38):

I just have a few more slides just for a quick virtual tour of the new Burlington office. This is all the stuff

we have, so very, very packed, and we’re always getting new equipment in. For example, we just got a

whole bunch of different adaptive utensils for feeding for young kids and children. We did have a lot of

utensils for older adults, but they were way too small. Excuse me, the utensils we had were way too large

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for a child’s hand, so now we have a more variety. But we’re always recycling and so we have the latest

equipment that’s still available and discontinued. AT goes into our AT exchange, which we’ll talk about in

a little bit, but this just shows you the wide range.

(18:30):

We’ve got smart home equipment switches. We have, that white cube is called a little room. It’s an active

learning space for kids who might have low vision or blindness. It’s a way for them to explore safely

different objects with textures and sounds and the vibrations from the wooden board are picked up in their

body as they lay in that sort of denning environment. That’s something that I’ve built. And then we have a

lot of off the shelf sensory equipment, stuff for phones, for amplifying conversations, voice amplifiers as

well, which I definitely would need today. I need some wide range.

(19:22):

And we just have a couple more slides so we’ll go through quickly. Just another view of more equipment

on display here. We can go to the next slide. We have a lot of things for adaptive recreation as well.

You’ll see a strider bike without pedals so the child can balance more easily with both feet on the ground

to pedal. Or for example, there is a hoop extension for playing basketball, and then stored within that is a

soccer ball with bells. So, someone with low vision could hear the ball coming towards them. So, wide

range of adaptive gaming, really try to make it fun. You can go to the next slide. I can keep going if

people can hear me okay.

(20:21):

Just highlighting a couple pieces of sensory equipment. We had an intern who is graduating this year from

UVM and going to get her doctorate in occupational therapy. She created this sensory apron, which is

made out of jean fabric on one side and a sort of blue felt on the other. It’s soft kind of understated and

can be really personalized for any age really.

(20:52):

She made it with older adults in mind since we have so much sensor equipment for kids, but certainly

kids could use this in the classroom or at a vaccination appointment, doctor’s appointment to keep hands

fidgeting and calm bodies. There are carabiners here. You can attach personal toys, a zippered pocket to

add ChapStick or lotion that might be alerting or calming thing for somebody as well as this ribbon with

beads on it to fidget with.

(21:30):

So, that was great. Her name was Sophie and she made this for us to have and loan out. Our loan program

is, we’ll talk about a little bit more in detail, but it’s free and available to anyone to borrow as many tools

as you like for about 30 days at a time. Another sensory item I wanted to feature here is this foot fidget.

It’s inflatable, sort of like a rubberized material that goes right underneath your feet. I actually use it every

day when I’m in the office. You can just place your feet right on top and just pulse your feet and you’ll get

some movement there, which is really helpful to increase focus for one use.

(22:24):

We also have a switch adapted pillow. For example, I loaned this out to a child who had some traumatic

brain injury and some other health needs going on and they were working on cause and effect, and this

pillow is corduroy, it’s soft. You can certainly operate it with the toggle switch, but to give him control

over his environment and to work on that skill, we plugged in a switch into the black port cord that you

see there. I think he was using a proximity switch, so he didn’t have to have any pressure, but with any

head movement or foot movement, depending on where you place the switch … Hi Tamara, thank you for

joining us. He could activate that pillow and it would vibrate. That was a cool tool that we could loan out

as part of his therapy program.

(23:24):

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And then we also have touch points for calm. They look like two watches and you wear them on either

side of the body, it could be on an ankle and a wrist, it could be on a book bag and another piece of

clothing on the other side of the body. And basically, this sends a vibration as well, which can be calming

for people when you press that button in the middle of the watch. So, kind of in the moment strategy.

(24:00):

And then wanted to also highlight some switches here that we have. Folks might be familiar with your

traditional jelly bean, just large colored buttons switch, but wanted to feature some other ones that we

have. So, the Bluetooth iPad adapter works as two buttons switches, but you can also plug in anything

else for iPad control specifically. If a child is going to be using their feet, or their voice, or a head tilt or

really any other way, that is their strength to operate switch control on an iPad, you would need this

adapter. And it’s Bluetooth, it’s really simple to set up to scan through and select items on an iPad. So

that’s very popular. We have a couple of them to loan out. I had mentioned this before, this is one of our

proximity switches. It kind of looks like a candy corn at Halloween, which is cute.

(25:10):

It has, let’s see, I think it has auditory and visual feedback. So you’ve activated it, but you don’t have to

use any tactile physical touch. You just have to be within, I think it’s like one inch range near it and it

could be Velcro to a pillow or to mount near the child towards a body part that they’re able to move. It

could even be just your hand, you’re hovering near it and it’ll light up or you can turn those things off if

the sound and the lights that give that feedback are distracting. So you have some adjustability there,

which is super awesome.

(25:59):

A couple other higher tech switches we have. So even with that, and I’ll answer that question just a

second, even with the Bluetooth iPad adapter, it’s pretty clunky to use with YouTube or iTunes. So we

have had a lot of folks who want to be able to control their music. So excuse me, the company which both

these things are from has been really amazing in inventing lots of different devices. And this applicator on

the left is specific for media, but you don’t have to then switch over to your Bluetooth. You can use this

all-in-one for iPad controls. So whether you’re opening up the internet or email or iTunes, you just press

one button, it’ll switch from media mode back to just normal switch control, which is nice, so it’s all-in-

one. Also, Bluetooth and you can attach whether you use the proximity switch or a joystick or something

like that, you can attach that and you just need this one adapter for your iPad.

(27:17):

Let me just see what that question was again, the proximity switch connected to a call button for a

caregiver. So that’s actually something that we do have requests for a lot. It will really depend on the call

button setup. We’ve found that if it’s a really simple plug-and-play, is it 3.5 millimeter I think is the size

of the typical port. If it can just be plug-and-play and any switch, then yes, some call button systems are a

little bit more complicated, so we’d have to work with the caregiver and with it or whoever has set up that

system to make sure that it would be compatible. But that’s totally something we could brainstorm with

you guys about and suggest some other companies to install. We’ve even installed sip-and-puff devices to

just swap out what they had. So, we have some solutions for that definitely. So the answer is maybe,

depending on the system. Oh my gosh, my voice is coming back. This is exciting.

Ben Wimett (28:26):

Yeah, no, I was just going to say, do you want me to take over? But you actually sound like you’re doing

better the more you talk. This is good.

Quinby McLellan (28:36):

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The one day of rest was good. Yeah, so that was on the other slide just briefly. It’s a joystick method for

controlling the iPad. Instead of switch control in a two button only setup where you’re pressing those, you

can swap out the tops of this joystick to be more comfortable grip depending on what that person needs.

And then this green and red button can do different things, but if those are too small of a surface area for

someone to press, you can plug in external switches. So have lots of joysticks as well. Go ahead. So with

all of the switch choices, we have a variety of toys that have been adapted. One that Ben has is this really

fun, excuse me, T-Rex dinosaur that I’m not sure … He probably makes sounds and I [inaudible

00:29:44]-

Ben Wimett (29:44):

Have, he makes flashes and walks towards you as you push the button?

Quinby McLellan (29:49):

Yeah.

Ben Wimett (29:50):

It’s fun but it’s also sort of creepy. Reminds me something that would be the villain in a Transformers

movie or something.

Quinby McLellan (30:00):

Awesome. Yeah, so we’ve got a variety. We’ve got bongo drums, we’ve got swirl painting, art blowing

water, some sort of water kit where you press a switch and then you see the water kind of move through

all of these obstacles. So all sorts of things that might be motivating and fun to play with their friends or

work also on eye tracking or whatever their skills. And another example we have is just wild amount of

gears that you can put together that light up and move and I can’t remember if they make sounds or not,

but they probably do. So always trying to expand our library with those. Back to you Ben. I’m going to

rest my voice.

Ben Wimett (30:44):

Okay, Quinby gave me the easy slides. So our centralized referral system is really easy. If you have a new

person you want to us to work with, just give the phone number or the email address, list in a email and

we can take care of it. Please provide as much detail as possible. I don’t expect it from this group, but a lot

of times from the general public we get, hi, I’m looking to learn about assistive technology and that’s all

we get. So when we make the phone call, we are kind of in the dark about what you really need. So be as

detailed as possible or as detailed as you would like. We’re not going to get angry if you’re very detailed.

It really does help us do our jobs.

(31:40):

Also, there is a form available on our website for intakes that we may be tweaking in the very near future

so that we can get some more of that additional information we need. But you can go ahead and go to the

next slide. So, this is kind of the core of what we do. And to answer your question, let me just pull that up

really quick before I go into this slide.

Speaker 1 (32:15):

So Ben, Melissa asked, “I’m a school-based OTA, would I be able to borrow an item for a student, or

would a parent caregiver need to do that?”

Ben Wimett (32:23):

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You can borrow, this is how I’m going to answer that question. You can borrow the item yourself, but if

they’re going to be utilizing it in their home without you, I would recommend that they be the one that

actually borrows the device so that if something happens to it and it needs to be replaced, that falls on

them, not on you. Does that make sense? Okay. I’ve had some instances where OTs have borrowed an

iPad for somebody and then the student gets frustrated and hops the iPad across the room and it gets

broken and then the OT is responsible for it, because it’s in their name. That’s why I just give that caveat.

(33:15):

A little bit about the core of what we do. I would say that a good chunk of what we do is this information

and assistance category, general program questions. So what do you guys do? Kind of a little bit about a

little bit of what we’re doing now. Ask us general questions. I have questions around smart homes or risk

grips or I really want to find out more about that glider, but can you tell me about it? Info about AT-

related services.

(33:55):

Maybe you’re looking to purchase a more expensive piece of equipment and you need to know where to

get funding. We don’t provide direct funding, but we have funding partners that we work with a lot so we

can help with that. So another thing with info-related services AT-related services, we may not be the

appropriate service for that individual. So if somebody’s got a visual disability, Vermont association for

the wine and Visually maybe a better fit. And after getting some basic, and it sounds like they may be

able to help you more. I’m going to refer you to let them … because they focus on just that area and they

know it a little bit better than us.

(34:44):

Like I said before, AT funding we work with several state partners, whether it’s the Vermont Center for

Independent Living Hold, a equipment distribution program that is for people that need. Communication

devices. So amplified phones, captioned phones. During the pandemic were able … Or people were able

to get funding for iPads and tablets so that they could do their remote health visits through that program.

phone bill that nobody knows what it goes to. It’s like the Vermont Universal charge or on your cell

phone and on your landline bills. But actually I can tell you the money is used for this program, so it

actually goes to a very worthy use. And obviously, the last thing about information and assistance is if

you call us and reach out on the phone or you email us, we chat on the phone, and we determine that you

really do need to come into the office to see some of our equipment touch if you like to use it with us and

use it with our knowledge so you can get a better feel if it’s right for you. We can schedule a

demonstration either virtually if it’s possible, but if it’s needed we can do in-person demonstrations at this

current time.

(36:24):

And again, it just allows you to kind of get that hands-on feel of is this going to work for me or not? And

then the next part, and I believe the next slide, oh, this is just a little bit more on equipment

demonstrations. I forgot this slide was even here. This is what I get from going from one meeting to

another. But our general process is to when we’re doing demonstrations, gather information, we want to

know a little bit more about you. I always say before I start throwing equipment recommendations at you,

that’s the last thing I’m going to do. And that’s the last thing CLIMBY does. We want to get to know you,

we want to gather information about you. Maybe you have some assistive technology and it’s not working

or you have some assistive technology set up already and it’s not quite missing the mark.

(37:19):

It’s sort of getting there but not quite. We want to know what you’re kind of working with. Again, when

we wrote this presentation, everything was currently virtual that has changed to virtual preferred and in-

person if needed. I think that’s how I would phrase it. Obviously, if someone’s need very quickly

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identifies that virtual is not appropriate, that is fine. We will make in-person work and there will not be a

barrier or a delay to getting you services. Our end goal is for you to be able to ask questions about things

we recommend, about what we talk about, about questions or concerns you have. And then the end goal is

whether or not you can make an informed decision on whether that piece of assistive Technology is going

to work for you.

(38:26):

One of the benefits we have too is, and I was hoping this was the next slide. I was right, because it is. But

I didn’t say it so I didn’t make myself look like a if it wasn’t the next slide. Our next program feature or

subset is actually equipment loans. Sometimes even if you do come into a demo, you don’t know in that

one or two-hour demonstration if this is going to work for you. Number one, it’s not your environment,

it’s not your home, it’s not your school, it’s not your work, it’s not your recreational environment.

Whatever you’re trying to accomplish, you may not know if that’s going to work for you until you can

actually try it where you need to apply it. So we have thirty-day equipment loans. We have about 3,500

pieces of equipment spread out throughout the tryout centers and the sub-offices I will call them. We also

do have two smaller locations in Newport and White River Junction, but they serve just book rehab

clients so they have a much smaller inventory.

(39:39):

Typically, loans are for four weeks or 30 days. There are some instances where the AT specialist or AT

consultant can elect to extend that out. I’ll give you guys the best example I can. The other day somebody

wanted to borrow an iPad from me, she’d never done it before and said, “Geez Ben.” I just realized it’s

great that you can give me this for four weeks. But because of where the student is, he was served by the

district, but he went to an outside of the district school. This occupational therapist could only see him ,or

speech therapists could only see him once a week. And she said, “Would it be possible for you to extend

this out for six weeks?” I looked at my available iPad inventory and what I had coming back in knowing

that school is actually going to be starting to wind down.

(40:42):

I felt pretty comfortable extending that out to six weeks for her. So, we can extend things out on an as-

needed basis. Say you are purchasing something for somebody and you’re just waiting for it to come in,

let us know if at all possible. The last thing we want to have happen is for the individuals to go without. If

it’s really working and you really are purchasing a device, you’re just waiting for Amazon or whoever to

deliver it. We don’t want time to be a barrier to their success.

(41:18):

Again, I should say that we ship all of our equipment for free. We have an account with UPS that it’s no

cost to consumers. That’s both ways. When you’re done and kind of like Amazon, when we send you a

loan, we also send you a return label along with a little survey just letting us know what your satisfaction.

With our service was, not necessarily the device. I just want to make that caveat. There is a satisfaction

survey at the very bottom. It’s with our service, not with the device itself. Again, just to emphasize, we

don’t sell equipment or provide financial loans. We’re prohibited to by our own grant.

inventory is, everything in there has photos categorized. There is pretty, sometimes the price may be a

little out of date, but you should be able to click on a link that’s listed and get a website to come up with

the most current price. You can request loans directly yourself. This is always my bad joke that you can

sit at home in your underwear at two o’clock in the morning and request iPads and pencil grits and

balance bikes and all the wonderful things that we’ve talked about today. From the comfort of your own

home, and you don’t even have to talk to us.

(43:08):

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We do do iPad loans. I would say most of our iPad loans are for AAC or speech communication devices,

but we also have high management organization reminders, voice typing all sorts of the alternatives that

you might need an iPad for. We do have switch controls, stylus, speaker cases, key guards for some apps.

Go ahead.

(43:52):

I’ve already kind of generalized about this, but we have apps for note-taking. We have apps for AAC. I’m

running a little short on time, so I’m going to skip through these a little bit. We have different types of

wheelchair mounts and we’re constantly trying to add more because everybody’s wheelchair is different.

Or everybody’s need is different, so they’re going to need a different setup. So, these are just some of the

different varieties we have. Go ahead and go to the next slide.

(44:28):

I actually talked about EVP already, so I’m going to skip that. But the Independence Fund is our partner at

Vermont Opportunity Credit Union. They provide low-interest loans. Typically, they are actually locked

at 3% depending on what you need. And they can be used for a system analogy. I actually utilize them

myself to purchase a vehicle, which honestly can be the most stressful situation of your life. And when I

worked with them, it was one of the most easy. They did everything for me. When there was problems,

they took care of it. I didn’t have to do it. It was awesome. You can go to the next slide.

we mentioned it briefly in the beginning, if you have a piece of it you want to get rid of or maybe you’re

looking for something, people list things on here either for free to sell or if again, if they’re looking for

something, you contact the seller directly, again is like Craigslist or Facebook Marketplace for AT. We

only ask that if your, and it’s in your agreement when you sign up for an account. But if you’re purchasing

healthcare equipment that needs to be fitted to you, you work with your healthcare provider to make sure

it’ll fit properly and not cause more harm than good. And again, our website For that is listed at the

bottom. So we do provide trainings for a fee for businesses or groups. Say they wanted a targeted training

on a specific app for AACU, or they want to, I worked for Ton University last or I don’t work for them. I

work there. I’m getting tongue-tied today. That’s where my office is.

(46:39):

And when we first partnered together, they asked me, “Ben, we’ve got some amplification systems in our

larger auditoriums in our larger classrooms. Can you do an assessment for us and tell me if they’re out of

date? I did that for them for a fee. It was something that I was knowledgeable enough, but it’s outside of

our scope of work and what we can do in our federal grant. We can do that for a very reasonable fee for

folks. We do provide group trainings as well. Okay.

(47:23):

Ooh, you updated it with a new fancy logo. Good job going behind what it told me. Forgot about that. So

really quickly, we do work with book rehab consumers, whether they’re in the working phase of their life

where they’re still in school for some training or for some degrees. What that entails is that we, at the end

of working with their clients, we provide a written consultation report with all the details of everything we

discussed. We provide links for, we do not purchase ourselves, but most of the time when people are

working with book rehab, they get funding support directly from book rehab. And that’s why that’s listed.

And these kind of more comprehensive ongoing services are provided in our trial centers. We provide, I

forgot to mention, we can provide book rehab clients with morning and training on a limited ongoing

basis as well. Boy, I am getting tongue-tied here.

(48:39):

And as Quinby says, HireAbility/smoke rehab services do not have a fee either. So, our AT program

newsletters, we cover a wide variety of topics, I’ll let you guys read through that, but if you’re not signed

up for our newsletters, please do. We cover, again, a huge variety of topics, from accessible masking to

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continence products to make things easier for folks. I did one on cerebral palsy and actually I knew it was

Cerebral Palsy Awareness Month. I did not realize that this week … Or actually today is Cerebral Palsy

Awareness Day. So, it was actually perfect timing that I didn’t mean to line up, but it lined up very nicely.

And yeah, we do have a YouTube channel. We’ve got what is assistive technology on there, kind of who

we are, a short little overview video. We talk about some specific assistive technology on there. And all

of our videos are captioned. And again, these are just some more resources and lists of the three main

websites we use.

(50:26):

And I’ll give a little hint, the last one there that the … The UVM website, it does have good information

on there, but all that information can be found on our main website as well. It’s kind of redundant, but we

wanted people to be able to access it if they found us from the UVM side of the house as well. And yeah,

that’s just our contact information again, and you can stop sharing your screen and we can answer

questions or do polls or whatever needs to be done.

Speaker 1 (51:07):

Thank you, Ben and Quinby, that was great. Do we have any questions from the group? We have a couple

of minutes and I am then also going to launch a poll just to see the topics that are most of interest to folks.

Ben Wimett (51:23):

No problem, everybody. You’re welcome.

Speaker 1 (51:30):

All right. Let me go ahead and launch a poll. I’m just going to ask for a little feedback about future topics

that we might want to have some training on. If you don’t mind weighing in, and please feel free to add

additional ideas in the chat, but these are some of the frequently chosen topics. Is that showing up for

everybody? Okay, great. I think really we would love to have more information about all the topics, and

certainly, I think apps and iPads comes up quite frequently for many of us in the settings that we work in.

Okay, thank you for your responses. And let me go ahead and launch one more poll just more

specifically, because I thought that those apps might be of interest. Can’t get in that. Okay, so then more

specifically within the apps, what categories of apps are of highest interest for folks?

(53:09):

I see results coming in. Thank you so much. Yeah, communication and self-care are two of the highest

picks, and I would say a lot of these sensory and self-regulation supports also of high interest to folks. All

right, and then the last polling request from me, I’m going to end this poll, thank you, is that I’m just going

to throw into the chat a brief, I think it’s two, maybe three survey questions just for feedback for us about

how you found this survey or how you found this training, if it was helpful for you. I’m going to throw

that up there and we would really appreciate any comments or additional information that you have to

share with us, you can do that in that form too. Thank you very much. And Quinby, did you want to

comment?

Quinby McLellan (54:12):

Well, I can share what I did in chat. I was just responding to Anne’s question that yes, we can see folks in

person for consultations, or virtual. We usually recommend a quick phone call or video call first just to

get a general idea of what you’re looking for and then we can schedule in-person from there if that’s going

to be a good fit for you, for the family, for the student, whoever it is. But we do not do formalized

assessments and evaluations, that’s an occupational therapist or whoever. But we do use the set process

looking at the student, the environment, the task and the tools to inform our process for recommending

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AT, but it’s not a standard assessment at all. It’s more just active brainstorming session and then we try

out AT, see if it’s a fit.

Speaker 1 (55:15):

Thanks Quinby. I know coming from the OT side myself, it’s really fun to have an OTA on staff who can

help work through that process. And I do think it’s just such a nice resource for collaboration, particularly

for those of us that might be pediatric or school-based therapists who we tend to draw from in this

network. And just to have that equipment available, because so often that is a barrier and to know that we

can refer folks with really no eligibility barriers or heavy paperwork load is just such a nice resource to

have in our community.

Quinby McLellan (55:55):

Absolutely. I will say when I was practicing as a CODA in the school system, I was in New Hampshire at

the time, I wish I had known about this program, and there’s one in every state in the country. And so,

we’re just trying to get the word out that we’re free. We’re the ones who have the time to research the

latest technology. You as the therapist or the provider, you’re doing the formalized evaluation, setting of

goals, implementing the techniques and tools. But we’re here as that free resource to say like, “Hey, have

you considered this?” I certainly have done professional development throughout, including when I was a

practicing CODA in those different settings. But I mean, you don’t have the time to know what you don’t

know. So, we’re here to fill that gap and be that missing puzzle piece and part of the team. But you

certainly don’t have to be working with a therapist to come see us, anyone could come.

Speaker 1 (56:53):

And I would say, I would encourage folks if you haven’t signed up for the newsletters, it’s just so helpful

in keeping abreast of what’s new. And there’s always something new on the AT side, so it’s been really

helpful to have these topical newsletters coming out that announce new and exciting tools that are

available. I know we are at the end.

Ben Wimett (57:14):

I don’t like to take vacations for longer than a week, because if I do, everything changes when I get back.

Speaker 1 (57:23):

I hear you, Ben. We are, amazingly that hour just flew by. Thank you so much to everyone for carving

time out of your busy Fridays, and thank you so, so much to Ben and Quinby for organizing and

presenting all of this information to us. It’s such a great resource that’s available, and I think we’ll do our

part to spread the word. And I’m personally going to be calling you up with all sorts of questions for

various situations that I encounter, for sure. And we’re seeing lots of thank yous coming in from the chat,

so much appreciation. I’m going to stop recording.

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