See the full potential of accessible practices featured at the seventh annual “New Jersey Assistive Technology & Community Living Summit,” a two-day, statewide conference organized by the Richard West Assistive Technology Advocacy Center returning with double the content.
Bringing together industry professionals, nonprofit and state agencies, as well as disabled individuals and their families, the event will run from 8:30 a.m. on Tuesday, September 19, to 4 p.m. Wednesday, September 20, at the Conference Center at Mercer on the grounds of Mercer County Community College’s West Windsor campus.
ATAC is a “comprehensive statewide program of technology-related assistance designed to increase access to assistive technology for people with disabilities of all ages,” according to the event website, made possible by a subcontract with the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development. The entity is under the Trenton-based parent group, Disability Rights New Jersey, known as the state’s “designated protection and advocacy agency.
Registration for the two-day summit is available online via the DRNJ EventBrite page for the event, with tickets priced at $29 per attendee. Each session lasts about 75 minutes and is structured to include both hands-on activities and discussions about accessible technology.
According to the information on the 2023 event website, which includes a full program schedule and a roster of speakers, the topics range in focus from transition planning to occupational training.
This year’s keynote speaker is Hillary Goldthwait-Fowles, Ph.D., a RESNA Certified Assistive Technology Professional (ATP) with expertise in areas such as accessible educational materials (AEM) and universal design for learning (UDL).
Goldthwait-Fowles is currently an instructional design specialist for the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, a nonprofit organization and research partner with Johns Hopkins Medicine described as being “dedicated to improving the lives of children and young adults with care and research focused on pediatric developmental disabilities and disorders of the brain, spinal cord, and musculoskeletal system.”
Goldthwait-Fowles, who earned her master’s degree in education from Simmons University and is now a certified special education consultant in the state of Maine, has over two decades of teaching experience in both public schools and colleges. She is also involved with online programs as an adjunct lecturer at the University of New England, where she received her CAGS in educational leadership, and the University of Maine at Farmington.
After her 8:45 to 9:45 a.m. keynote address, Goldthwait-Fowles will also host sessions on how to “be a captions captain,” as well as how to find key “solutions” for AT-specific problems.
The two-day event will cover issues like Carmelys Vincent’s “Solving the disparity gap between mental health, disability, technology, and minorities,” where the Rutgers University alum and advocate talks about the importance of establishing a “community involvement action plan” and engaging in conversation with people of marginalized identities.
Others, such as “Considering When to Ask: Reasonable Accommodations and Hidden Disabilities,” with program manager Joe Zesski of the Northeast ADA Center, explore the nuances of disclosing disability in the workplace for both the individual and employer through a series of scenarios and a Q&A.
The 2023 NJATS website describes other time slots as follows: “What do I say: a guide to alt-text and alternatives to image descriptions” with Jason Khurdan, the manager of central services for the Rutgers Access and Disability Resources; “How AT Can Aid People with Brain Injury” with Tom Grady, the director of advocacy and public affairs for the Brain Injury Alliance of New Jersey; and “Accessible Services Through the NJSL Talking Books and Braille Center” with Stephen Felle, an outreach librarian who will speak to the New Jersey State Library’s services offering “no cost audio and braille books to people who are blind or print disabled.”
In a September 2022 interview with U.S. 1 News regarding the previous summit, ATAC director Mike Marotta noted his hopes that its spirit of enrichment and education would help organizations learn that even if they “start small” with implementing assistive technology, over time, “like a ripple effect,” the efforts “will get larger and more inclusive.”
More information: at4nj.org or disabilityrightsnj.org.
