By Thursday, Jessica was challenging herself to travel independently between classes while wearing sleep shades.
We want to give a farewell wave to Jessica Edmiston, who spent Monday through Thursday here at the Center, not just observing, but working under sleep shades all week, going to classes with student mentors and working on the basics of Braille, Assistive Technology, cooking and travel. And as it happened, she was here to witness three graduations, including partaking of the meals prepared for 60 by the graduates, and the awarding of their Freedom Bells!
It’s no small deal for Jessica to take a week to do this, since she’s the Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind Birmingham Regional Center Director. That’s a long title, and it has a lot of responsibility to go with it, but her center contains a recently established Structured Discovery program, which is (the methodology and philosophy we employ here at CCB, called the Alabama Freedom Center for the Blind.
Well, yes! And a geek who is blind can be too, as David describes how he’s come from being only able to warm up frozen French fries to making Shepherd’s Pie for fifteen people.
Safe travels to our friends from Rustin as they head back to Louisiana on Friday! Two faculty members and five graduate students in Orientation & Mobility from Louisiana Tech University spent this week in the Denver area, observing and working with our staff, exploring the Metro area and testing out the RTD system.
We have three graduations this week – Courtney, or C.G. as she has been known in her time at CCB, graduated on Monday, Suzie today, wednesday, and Ellen finishes on Thursday. All of them finished excellent wood shop projects last week. Ellen built a very nice bookshelf, and both C.G. and Suzie made the first sets of wind chimes students have made here. There must be something in the air … Well, the ringing of Freedom Bells, naturally!
Another Martial Arts group finished up on Tuesday, earning their orange belts from instructor Rachel. At the start of the ceremony, Rachel commented that each time she comes she is more aware of the spirit of independence and confidence that students and staff at the Center embody. From left to right are Travis, Ceci, Mike, Serena, David, Showe, Chaz and Rachael. Graham graduated from the Center in late April, but was part of this class.
“Is Suzie here this morning?” asked Daniel yesterday at morning announcements.
“No!” protested Suzie
This is how it goes sometimes near the end of a student’s program – things can get bunched up a bit. Suzie will graduate on May 10. On Tuesday this week, she completed her Monster Route – traveling to four places she’d never been before in four Metro-area cities. That’s a big, big day, and her protests were certainly as much about the fact that she was still a little tired as it was about the fact that it was raining yesterday morning.
Believe it or not, the forecasts were correct, snow came in Friday night and is still falling Saturday morning of the last weekend in April. So here’s a warm thought. Serena made applesauce from scratch on Thursday in Home Management – peeling, coring, chopping, cooking and putting the mixture through the food processor. She’s got her hands wrapped around the still-warm quart jar of the golden stuff in the photo above, and she’s probably enjoying some of it this morning!
We have a lot of students nearing the completion of their training programs at the Center, and that always means a steady stream of drops and support drops each week. On Wednesday, C.G. did her final and independent drop, getting back to the Center in no time, even though she naturally had no idea where she was when she was “dropped.” Mike did his support drop the same morning, and Friday Chaz went on his support drop too. Both were successful.
It just so happens that Graham graduated today, but we’re posting a sample of his Tech Class project. He of course worked with screen readers and other tools in his Tech Class, but as a songwriter and musician with a fair bit of recording experience, he wanted to try his hand at recording and mixing a music track for his final Tech project.
Tricky enough, but it takes some skill and patience with the computer and screen reader to make it work with audio editting software, and then only a few such applications are actually accessible for blind users. So, that’s what Graham did, selecting Amy Winehouse’s “Love Is a Losing Game,” recording vocals and guitar and multiple tracks for background vocals, then editting and mixing … Well, here’s a snippet, just to give you the flavor.
We have three graduations this week – Courtney, or C.G. as she has been known in her time at CCB, graduated on Monday, Suzie today, wednesday, and Ellen finishes on Thursday. All of them finished excellent wood shop projects last week. Ellen built a very nice bookshelf, and both C.G. and Suzie made the first sets of wind chimes students have made here. There must be something in the air … Well, the ringing of Freedom Bells, naturally!
