Okay Farrah, let me show you the communication assistance database, and how it
works. So Farrah, this is a way
that people can find someone to
assist them communicating with other
people. It's a database, and
it's on the computer. You could
use this - or anyone could use this -
to find somebody who could assist them.
I'm just going to show you how it works
So, first of all,
it fits somebody that you want
to assist you in the community
like at a meeting, or an appointment
or anywhere, really,
you would say I want somebody in the
general communication assistance
If it's somebody that you need
to assist you with
communicating with police,
or a legal professional
or in a court, you would
look for a communication
intermediary. But let me just show you
the one for general
communication assistance right now
So you would click there
you would put in your postal code
where you live
and then you would say
find assistance, and then
the computer tells you
who's close by
to your postal code or where you
live, and what they
can do. So for example
this area here says
this person has experience
working with disabilities
such as aphasia after a
stroke, or people with intellectual
disabilities, autism
spectrum disorder, acquired
brain injury. So you scroll
down, you find
somebody who's familiar
with your type of disability
if that's important to you.
Over here,
which is equally
important is, does this person
have experience supporting people
who communicate in the way
you communicate? So for instance,
this person is familiar
supporting people whose speech is
unclear, or who use a letter
or an alphabet board, a
picture board, symbol board, or
a communication device.
So everyone is different, and you've got to find
someone that kind of matches what your
needs are. When you find
somebody that you want, you
click contact
You don't know the name of that person at all at
this point, and then
a message is sent
to them, so you write your name,
Here's my name, Barbaba
and then I'm going to put
in my email address
and I'm going to
say, send a message.
So now what happens is
that person gets a message
saying
I'm looking for a communication assistant
and they should get back to you
in one or three days
to say, okay, I'm available
or I'm not available
and then you can take it from there.
You can set up a meeting
and this says, your correspondence
has been sent to them
so then you sit and wait