Mada, the assistive technology (AT) center in Qatar, and Enable Ireland have created a downloadable guide to AT for employment, and are making it available free to any AT center for localizing.
The guide is available in both English and Arabic versions, and is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial.
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Attribution-NonCommercial
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This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms.
"The aim," notes Mada's CEO David Banes, "is to provide a core resource that can be 'flavoured' as communities require."
Banes has been at the forefront of the effort to create an AT Leadership Network to share resources, knowledge, and best practices among AT centers around the world. With this guide Mada and Enable Ireland set the example: create your resources so that others may localize and adopt them, and help AT gain global traction.
“Enable Ireland is delighted to have partnered with Mada to publish this Employer’s Guide to AT," remarks Siobhan Long, manager of Enable Ireland's National AT Training Service. "For employers, ready access to appropriate information on the benefits of AT in the workplace can make a real impact on their ability to support employees--whether new recruits, employees who acquire a disability or, significantly, those at risk of acquiring a work related injury such as Repetitive Strain Injury. AT really is a tool for all, and we hope that this guide may go some way towards increasing its profile and effectiveness in employment.”
The Employer's Guide to AT provides information on commercial, open-source, and built-in assistive technology options, and covers solutions for sensory and physical impairments, print-disabilities, and issues of ergonomics. It explains what assistive technology is, provides a business case for AT, and discusses implementation. It was first published in November of 2011.
Banes will be helping to lead a pre-conference forum at ATIA Orlando this January, "AT Leadership Forum for AT Centers Around the World". The forum is hosted by the Global Initiative for Inclusive Information and Communication Technologies (G3ict) and is intended for executives running assistive technology centers serving persons with disabilities, special educators and rehabilitation professionals.
The Employer's Guide to AT will be posted on the Mada Web site shortly. In the meantime you can download the Employer's Guide to AT (English docx) version here.
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