National Disability Employment Awareness Month!

October 26, 2022 by Leave a Comment

Happy National Disability Employment Awareness Month from the Accessibility Advisory Committee!

What is National Disability Employment Awareness Month?

National Disability Employment Awareness Month (NDEAM) is celebrated every October throughout the United States. NDEAM, headlined by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP), has a theme each year, the 2022 theme being, “Disability: Part of the Equity Equation.” This NDEAM theme is a great reminder to all in this country that the disability community is a large and greatly underserved population that is very much a part of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. While NDEAM is particularly recognized during the month of October, we can acknowledge and celebrate throughout the year the reality that people do have the potential to be employed, regardless of ability. 

Is National Disability Employment Awareness Month recognized as a federal event?

The President of the United States makes a Presidential Proclamation about NDEAM. Joe Biden made his proclamation on September 30, 2022, and the Department of Labor presented a news release related to disability and equity in the workplace. ODEP has a number of resources on their website (shared below). One these resources is a great page describing Year-Round Employer Strategies for Advancing Disability Inclusion. ODEP also shares videos and the ability to download 2022 posters also posters from previous years’ NDEAM celebrations.

Feel free to drop by the Student Accessibility Services office in Room 5226, or contact Miranda Levy if you would like some NDEAM posters, or posters about mental health in the workplace from ODEP for your department!

How can I support National Disability Employment Awareness Month?

NDEAM is an opportunity to recognize that individuals with disabilities are the same as those who do not have disabilities in that if they want to be employed, this is a possibility. Reflect on what you do and do not know, and seek resources to learn, such as checking out the What Can You Do Campaign. If you are an employee with a disability and feel that accommodations would assist you in your success at work, contact Human Resources. This is about reasonable accommodations under Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act at Shoreline Community College (SCC), given that we are not a federal agency. Also, don’t forget that SCC now has a Career Center for all students, located in the PUB. Feel free to post about National Disability Awareness Month on your social media with the hashtag #NDEAM2022 as well!

Resources

How are we doing?

Please submit feedback about the information that the Accessibility Advisory Committee shares to Miranda Levy via email at mlevy@shoreline.edu so that the committee can review together and serve the campus community better.

disability is part of the equity equation graphic dol.gov/ODEP

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Disability Pride Month and the 32nd Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act

July 11, 2022 by Leave a Comment
Disability Pride Month flag red yellowwhite blue and green diagonal stripes against a black background

Happy Disability Pride Month from the Accessibility Advisory Committee! July 26, 2022, marks the 32nd anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), also known as National Disability Independence Day. The disability community celebrates the ADA, a historic piece of legislation, throughout the month of July.

About the Americans with Disabilities Act

The ADA was passed on July 26, 1990, and was broadened with the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Amendments Act of 2008 (ADAAA), which went into effect on January 1, 2009. The ADA has five titles to provide protections for individuals with disabilities. These titles cover the workplace, state and local government entities (such as Shoreline Community College), places of public accommodation, telecommunications, and some miscellaneous circumstances such as protecting people from discrimination if they file a disability-related complaint. Want to learn more? Watch our “What is the ADA?” video on YouTube!

The Disability Pride Flag

Did you know that there is a Disability Pride Flag? Check out the image attached to this newsletter! The Disability Pride flag was designed by artist Ann Magill, a disabled woman, utilizing feedback from the disabled community. The flag features a black background with five lines (colored blue, yellow, white, red, and green) slashing across diagonally. According to Stony Brook University’s article on July Is Disability Pride Month, “Each color on this flag represents a different aspect of disability or impairment,” while the black field “is to represent the disabled people who have lost their lives due not only to their illness, but also to negligence, suicide, and eugenics.” As of October 2021, the flag changed to its current design, with parallel lines, rather than its former design, which had lines in the shape of a lightning bolt.

Ways to Celebrate

Disability Pride Month and the ADA Anniversary will be celebrated at a variety of events throughout the region, nation, and virtually. Many in the disability community take to social media in July by adding hashtags such as #ADA32 and #ThanksToTheADA to their postings. Join the virtual celebration by adding these hashtags to your own social media posts! Drop by the Student Accessibility Services office in Room 5226, Mondays-Wednesdays, to pick up some disability-themed stickers for your windows, laptops, or water bottles.

Resources

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Happy Fall and National Disability Employment Awareness Month!

October 4, 2021 by Leave a Comment
Welcome to Fall Quarter, and as October arrives, Welcome to National Disability Employment Awareness Month (NDEAM)! NDEAM is celebrated every year, to recognize inclusion in the workplace, specifically with regard to individuals with disabilities. 

As we reflect on NDEAM’s theme this year, “America’s Recovery Powered by Inclusion,” we might think how we can be inclusive towards individuals with disabilities at Shoreline. Coming back to campus, remember that while it’s important to mask up (always!), voices may be muffled when we have that barrier. Be sure that you are speaking clearly, maybe a little louder, and that you are looking forward, directly at the person or people with whom you are speaking.

As always, if you have any questions about accommodations for students with disabilities, you may contact Student Accessibility Services (SAS), or Miranda Levy directly at mlevy@shoreline.edu or via Teams. Miranda is more than happy to speak 1:1 with staff or Faculty or to meet with departments or divisions.

https://www.dol.gov/agencies/odep/initiatives/ndeam

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Disability Awareness Month Tip for Oct. 30: Facts About Traumatic Brain Injury

October 29, 2015 by Leave a Comment

brain
In honor of Disability Employment Awareness Month, the Office of Special Services (OSS) is working to raise awareness of disabilities by offering daily facts and tips about people with disabilities and living with disability. Please take a minute to read and broaden your understanding.

Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) Definition
Traumatic brain injury occurs when an external mechanical force causes brain dysfunction.
Traumatic brain injury usually results from a violent blow or jolt to the head or body. An object penetrating the skull, such as a bullet or shattered piece of skull, also can cause traumatic brain injury.

Mild traumatic brain injury may cause temporary dysfunction of brain cells. More serious traumatic brain injury can result in bruising, torn tissues, bleeding and other physical damage to the brain that can result in long-term complications or death.

Symptoms
Traumatic brain injury can have wide-ranging physical and psychological effects. Some signs or symptoms may appear immediately after the traumatic event, while others may appear days or weeks later.

Mild traumatic brain injury
The signs and symptoms of mild traumatic brain injury may include:

Physical symptoms

  • Loss of consciousness for a few seconds to a few minutes
  • No loss of consciousness, but a state of being dazed, confused or disoriented
  • Headache
  • Nausea or vomiting
  • Fatigue or drowsiness
  • Difficulty sleeping
  • Sleeping more than usual
  • Dizziness or loss of balance

 Sensory symptoms

  • Sensory problems, such as blurred vision, ringing in the ears, a bad taste in the mouth or changes in the ability to smell
  • Sensitivity to light or sound

 Cognitive or mental symptoms

  • Memory or concentration problems
  • Mood changes or mood swings
  • Feeling depressed or anxious

Moderate to severe traumatic brain injuries
Moderate to severe traumatic brain injuries can include any of the signs and symptoms of mild injury, as well as the following symptoms that may appear within the first hours to days after a head injury:

Physical symptoms

  • Loss of consciousness from several minutes to hours
  • Persistent headache or headache that worsens
  • Repeated vomiting or nausea
  • Convulsions or seizures
  • Dilation of one or both pupils of the eyes
  • Clear fluids draining from the nose or ears
  • Inability to awaken from sleep
  • Weakness or numbness in fingers and toes
  • Loss of coordination

 Cognitive or mental symptoms

  • Profound confusion
  • Agitation, combativeness or other unusual behavior
  • Slurred speech
  • Coma and other disorders of consciousness

When to see a doctor
Always see your doctor if you or your child has received a blow to the head or body that concerns you or causes behavioral changes. Seek emergency medical care if there are any signs or symptoms of traumatic brain injury following a recent blow or other traumatic injury to the head.

The terms “mild,” “moderate” and “severe” are used to describe the effect of the injury on brain function. A mild injury to the brain is still a serious injury that requires prompt attention and an accurate diagnosis.

Causes
Traumatic brain injury is caused by a blow or other traumatic injury to the head or body. The degree of damage can depend on several factors, including the nature of the event and the force of impact.

Injury may include one or more of the following factors:

  • Damage to brain cells may be limited to the area directly below the point of impact on the skull.
  • A severe blow or jolt can cause multiple points of damage because the brain may move back and forth in the skull.
  • A severe rotational or spinning jolt can cause the tearing of cellular structures.
  • A blast, as from an explosive device, can cause widespread damage.
  • An object penetrating the skull can cause severe, irreparable damage to brain cells, blood vessels and protective tissues around the brain.
  • Bleeding in or around the brain, swelling, and blood clots can disrupt the oxygen supply to the brain and cause wider damage.

Common events causing traumatic brain injury include the following:

  • Falling out of bed, slipping in the bath, falling down steps, falling from ladders and related falls are the most common cause of traumatic brain injury overall, particularly in older adults and young children.
  • Vehicle-related collisions. Collisions involving cars, motorcycles or bicycles — and pedestrians involved in such accidents — are a common cause of traumatic brain injury.
  • About 20 percent of traumatic brain injuries are caused by violence, such as gunshot wounds, domestic violence or child abuse. Shaken baby syndrome is traumatic brain injury caused by the violent shaking of an infant that damages brain cells.
  • Sports injuries. Traumatic brain injuries may be caused by injuries from a number of sports, including soccer, boxing, football, baseball, lacrosse, skateboarding, hockey, and other high-impact or extreme sports, particularly in youth.

Explosive blasts and other combat injuries. Explosive blasts are a common cause of traumatic brain injury in active-duty military personnel. Although the mechanism of damage isn’t yet well-understood, many researchers believe that the pressure wave passing through the brain significantly disrupts brain function.
Traumatic brain injury also results from penetrating wounds, severe blows to the head with shrapnel or debris, and falls or bodily collisions with objects following a blast.

The people most at risk of traumatic brain injury include:

  • Children, especially newborns to 4-year-olds
  • Young adults, especially those between ages 15 and 24
    Adults age 75 and older

The above information is taken from the following sources:

http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/traumatic-brain-injury/basics/symptoms/con-20029302

http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/traumatic-brain injury/basics/symptoms/con-20029302

http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/traumatic-brain-injury/basics/causes/con-20029302

http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/traumatic-brain-injury/basics/risk-factors/con-20029302

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Shoreline’s Community Integration Employment Program Offers Thanks to the Campus Community

October 28, 2015 by 1 Comment

ciep
In honor of National Disability Employment Awareness Month, Rosemary Dunne, Program Manager for Shoreline’s Community Integration and Employment Program (CIEP), wishes to thank the campus community for supporting the CIEP’s efforts and mission.

In particular, the CIEP staff wants to thank the following people and departments who currently employ, or who have started the conversation about how to employ, CIEP students on campus:

Mary Kelleman, Leah Pearce, and the entire Bookstore Staff
Jennifer Berlin – Lancer Hospitality
Mary Bonar – Visual Arts
Steve Eskridge and Kathy Langer – Athletics
Tasleem Quasim – Education
Patty Jones – The Ebbtide
The Deep Roots Community
The Student Leadership Center

For more information about CIEP, its students and how the people named above are supporting it, please continue reading below and check out the article we published today on Shoreline’s News Site about CIEP. Please contact Rosemary at rdunne@shoreline.edu with any questions about how you can support CIEP.

Thank you! And Happy National Disability Employment Awareness Month!

Shoreline’s CIEP Students Find Meaningful Work on Campus

IMG_0371

A Shoreline CIEP student busy at work in the bookstore.

When the focus of Shoreline’s Community Integration Employment Program (CIEP) shifted recently from helping students with barriers to employment develop job skills to actually helping place students in employment opportunities, CIEP Program Manager Rosemary Dunne looked to Shoreline’s campus community for help in fulfilling the program’s new mission.

“An obvious place to look is our campus,” said Dunne. “Many of our students really like being on campus and being part of this community, so to honor their wishes we reached out to the campus to find paid employment and real life work experience opportunities for them onsite.”

The response, said Dunne, has been encouraging. “There are many areas and departments at Shoreline who’ve been very receptive and creative in working with us. It’s not always easy to do when everyone’s time crunched and looking at the bottom line, but these departments recognize it’s the right thing to do to make that extra step to find space for our students.”

The bookstore is one such department, currently employing three CIEP students.

“The Bookstore in particular has always been very supportive of our program,” said Dunne. “That legacy started with Mary Kellemen (Former Executive Director of Auxiliary and Logistical Services) and has really been carried on wholeheartedly by Leah Pearce (Director, Bookstore) and her amazing staff. Their whole team has been really supportive in creating opportunities for our students with a ‘no problem’ attitude.”

Placing CIEP students in jobs involves being creative with duties and recognizing the worth of the contribution that marginalized populations can make in the workplace. “CIEP students have a range of barriers to employment,” said Dunne, “but that allows people to start thinking outside of the box about how they can recognize and reward each student’s unique skillset.”

Instead of assigning CIEP students a full spectrum of job responsibilities, the goal is to carve out a portion of duties a student can reasonably be expected to accomplish.

For example, Morgan Evert, a CIEP student who’s worked in the bookstore since May of 2015, excels at organizing so she handles duties that encompass those skills. Evert shelves or “faces” books, helps students find what they’re looking for and keeps spaces and equipment clean.

“I really like working in the bookstore,” said Evert. “Everyone is really nice and fun to talk to. And I like working on campus and being able to take part in the fun activities that are always going on because this is a pretty cool college. And it just wouldn’t work very well for me to be working off campus because it would take me too much time to get to and from work and school.”

Examples of CIEP students making meaningful contributions across campus abound. Lancer’s Catering Manager, Jennifer Berlin, recently hired a CIEP student to help with lunchtime rush. Mary Bonar, Program Manager for Visual Arts, is hiring a CIEP student as a lab assistant. And Patty Jones, advisor for The Ebbtide, has supported several meaningful work experiences for CIEP students over the past couple of years, including hiring one student as an Op-Ed writer.

In addition, the Deep Roots Community and Student Leadership continue to embrace CIEP students and provide them valuable work experience.

According to Dunne, the reward to the employing department is immeasurable. “Having a CIEP student around helps boost both morale and work ethic,” she said. “When you see that someone with multiple barriers can come to work and get it done, you realize you can as well and your whole attitude tends to change.”

Of course the goal isn’t to employ the entire program’s roster of 20 students on campus, but rather to honor each individual student’s wish.

“We have several students employed off campus in the larger community,” said Dunne, “but this is a very vulnerable population so it makes sense that many would want to work on campus where they know people, where their support system is and where they feel safe. This is their community, and they want to be a part of it and valued by it.”

In honor of Disability Employment Awareness Month, Dunne and the CIEP program want to thank the following departments who have shown support for CIEP’s mission, either by employing students or beginning the conversation as to how they can employ students:

Mary Kelleman, Leah Pearce, and the entire Bookstore Staff
Jennifer Berlin – Lancer Hospitality
Mary Bonar – Visual Arts
Steve Eskridge and Kathy Langer – Athletics
Tasleem Quasim – Education
Patty Jones – The Ebbtide
The Deep Roots Community
The Student Leadership Center

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