Autism Society Rocked By Suspected Fraud

Disability Scoop (Feb. 9, 2012)-The former head of an Autism Society chapter is accused of stealing as much as $80,000 from the group, but that’s not stopping her from hosting a conference later this month keynoted by Temple Grandin.

Law enforcement in Suwanee, Ga. have charged Cynthia Pike, the former executive director of the Autism Society of Greater Georgia, with 16 felony counts of theft by conversion, according to documents obtained by WSBTV in Atlanta. The charges come after an audit found thousands of dollars missing from the group’s coffers.

Police say that Pike was giving herself extra pay without consent from the autism organization’s board and spent the group’s money on her personal cellphone bills. So far, authorities said they found as much as $40,000 was misused and they’re still working to identify where another $40,000 went, according to the television station.

Pike, however, said the charges are baseless.

“I unequivocally state that I am innocent of these false charges,” Pike said in a statement posted on the website of Georgia Autism Conferences — a company Pike formed last September.

Pike is scheduled to host her new group’s first autism conference later this month, featuring several nationally-known speakers and exhibitors. The event will be keynoted by famed autism self-advocate Temple Grandin and exhibitors scheduled to participate at the event include everyone from Autism Speaks to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and assistive device maker DynaVox Mayer-Johnson, according to the conference website.

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AAC and Literacy

Presenter: Kenneth P. Whitley, President, Key Technologies, Inc.
Date: Friday, February 10, 2012
Time:8:30am-10:30am
Location: SC Assistive Technology Program
Poplar Building Conference Room
Midlands Center,
8301 Farrow Road,
Columbia, SC
Cost: Free, but pre-registration is required. This workshop is limited to 20 participants.
Description: A wide variety of AAC and Literacy devices will be shown. Typical users and practical features of the devices will be discussed. Participants will have opportunities for hands-on use and question-and-answer. The following AAC and Literacy devices will be demonstrated.

* Ablenet: QuickTalkers, Boost Video Magnifier, TalkTrac Wearable Communicator
* Attainment: GoTalk Express 32
* Freedom Scientific: WYNN 6
* Inclusive TLC: MyZone, Matrix Maker
* Jabbla: Mobi 2 w/Mind Express 4, Allora
* Saltillo: NOVA chat 7, SpeakOut
* Unlimiter: The VoicePen w/VoiceSymbol and VoiceInk
* Words+: Freedom Lite Convertible, Conversa Convertible
* Zygo: Zygo Voice Amplifier, Optimist-MMX-V2, DigiCom 2000

To register for this demonstration:
* Complete the online registration form

For questions, call Will McCain at (803) 935-5004 or Lydia Durham at (803) 935-5263 or 800-915-4522.

NOTE: To register online, click on the title above.
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2012 Accessible Technology Webinar Series

The Great Lakes and Pacific ADA Centers on behalf of the ADA National Network are pleased to announce the 2012 Accessible Technology Webinar Series. Electronic information and communications technology have become essential tools in all areas of our lives and working environments today, and are particularly important to people with disabilities by providing equal access to the workplace and social media.

Please join us for our 2012 webinar series as we explore some of the latest technological trends and their accessibility to people with disabilities.

All sessions are free and scheduled for 2-3:30pm Eastern/1-2:30pm Central/12-1:30pm Mountain/11-12:30pm Pacific utilizing the ElluminateLive! webinar platform.

2012 Schedule:

February 14, 2012 – Making Tactile Graphics featuring Clara van Gerven, National Federation for the Blind

April 10, 2012 - Improving the Web Accessibility Game Plan featuring Karl Grove, Deque Systems

June 12, 2012 - 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act featuring Jim Tobias, Inclusive Technologies

August 14, 2012 - Accessibility of Web Authoring Tools featuring Jutta Treviranus, Inclusive Design Research Center

October 9, 2012 - Using the WAVE Web Accessibility Toolbar featuring Jared Smith, WebAIM

December 11, 2012 - Mobile Accessibility - The Status of Accessibility in Mobile Devices featuring Representatives from the Mobile Manufacturers' Forum

Registration is available on-line at http://www.ada-audio.org/Webinar/AccessibleTechnology/

Questions regarding these programs should be directed to:

ADA Conferences

877-232-1990 (V/TTY)

adaconferences@adagreatlakes.org

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PRO-Parents

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Individual Education Program

(IEP Workshop)

For: Parents/Others of children with Special Needs

Facility Provided By: Orangeburg DDSN

Presented By: Parents Reaching Out to Parents of South Carolina

PRO*Parents

Tanya M. Inabinet

Regional Education Coordinator

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

February 16.2012

10:00am-2:00pm

Orangeburg County DDSN

2785 Magnolia Street
Orangeburg, SC 29116

Workshop Content

___________________

IDEA Changes to the IEP

The Initial Evaluation

What is Special Education?

What is an IEP?

What happens during the IEP meeting?

Seating is limited

Call 1-800-759-4776 or (803) 772-5688

FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

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Encouraging Results With Stem Cell Transplant for Brain Injury

ScienceDaily (Feb. 1, 2012) — "Experiments in brain-injured rats show that stem cells injected via the carotid artery travel directly to the brain, where they greatly enhance functional recovery, reports a study in the February issue of Neurosurgery, official journal of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.
The carotid artery injection technique -- along with some form of in vivo optical imaging to track the stem cells after transplantation -- may be part of emerging approaches to stem cell transplantation for traumatic brain injury (TBI) in humans, according to the new research, led by Dr Toshiya Osanai of Hokkaido University Graduate School of Medicine, Sapporo, Japan.
Advanced Imaging Technology Lets Researchers Track Stem Cells
The researchers evaluated a new "intra-arterial" technique of stem cell transplantation in rats. Within seven days after induced TBI, stem cells created from the rats' bone marrow were injected into the carotid artery. The goal was to deliver the stem cells directly to the brain, without having them travel through the general circulation.
Before injection, the stem cells were labeled with "quantum dots" -- a biocompatible, fluorescent semiconductor created using nanotechnology. The quantum dots emit near-infrared light, with much longer wavelengths that penetrate bone and skin. This allowed the researchers to noninvasively monitor the stem cells for four weeks after transplantation.
Using this in vivo optical imaging technique, Dr Osanai and colleagues were able to see that the injected stem cells entered the brain on the "first pass," without entering the general circulation. Within three hours, the stem cells began to migrate from the smallest brain blood vessels (capillaries) into the area of brain injury."
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F.D.A. Approves New Cystic Fibrosis Drug

New York Times (Jan. 31, 2012)- The first drug that treats an underlying cause of cystic fibrosis, rather than just the symptoms, was approved by the Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday, more than 22 years after the gene responsible for the disease was first identified.

The drug, called Kalydeco and developed by Vertex Pharmaceuticals, counters the effect of one specific mutation in the gene that accounts for 4 percent — or about 1,200 — cystic fibrosis cases in the United States.

“This is a breakthrough therapy for the cystic fibrosis community because current therapies only treat the symptoms of this genetic disease,” Dr. Janet Woodcock, the director of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research at the F.D.A., said in a statement issued by the agency.

The F.D.A.’s approval, while expected, came nearly three months before its deadline. The drug is approved for patients age 6 and older with the G551D mutation.

Kalydeco, known generically as ivacaftor and during its development as VX-770, will cost $294,000 a year, a price roughly in line with those of some other drugs for extremely rare diseases. Vertex said it would have various programs to help patients pay for the drugs or obtain them free.

At such a price, sales of the drug could reach hundreds of millions of dollars a year, even with so few patients.

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Hyperconnectivity In Brain's Hearing Center Caused By Gene Mutation In Autism

Medical News Today (Feb. 2, 2012)-New research from Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) might help explain how a gene mutation found in some autistic individuals leads to difficulties in processing auditory cues and paying spatial attention to sound.

The study has found that when a suspected autism gene called PTEN is deleted from auditory cortical neurons - the main workhorses of the brain's sound-processing center - the signals that these neurons receive from local as well as long-distance sources are strengthened beyond normal levels. These effects, the study shows, can be blocked by a drug currently in use as an immunosuppressant.

"It's long been hypothesized that autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) arise from a partial disruption of long-range connections in the brain during development," explains Professor Tony Zador, who led the study. "Our finding that PTEN-deficient neurons receive stronger inputs suggests that one way this disruption can be caused is by signal enhancement." His team's work appears in the Journal of Neuroscience.

Although ASDs could arise from mutations in any of dozens of candidate genes, a core triad of symptoms defines all cases: impaired language, impaired social interaction, and restricted and repetitive behaviors. "The challenge therefore has been to understand how this diverse set of candidate genes and the pathways they control converge to cause the common signature of ASDs," Zador says.

The auditory cortex, which plays a critical role in auditory attention and perception, forms functional connections with other sensory cortices and critical brain areas. The neural network within the auditory cortex has therefore been a target of studies aimed at understanding how alterations in neural circuits contribute to dysfunction in ASDs.

Zador's team focused for several reasons on the role of one suspected autism candidate gene, PTEN, on circuit alterations within the auditory cortex. Well known for its role as an anti-cancer gene that powers down cell growth, proliferation and survival, this gene has also been linked to ASDs by a slew of studies in humans and mice. PTEN mutations have been found in autistic individuals with extreme macroencephaly - an increase in brain volume. PTEN loss in mice has been found to boost cell size and the number of neuronal connections in the brain.

To decipher the role of PTEN on functional connectivity in the auditory cortex, Zador's group selectively disrupted the function of the PTEN gene in adult mice, only in a subset of neurons of the auditory cortex, while leaving the gene intact in neighboring neurons. The scientists then assessed the effect of the loss of PTEN on connectivity within the auditory cortex using techniques that involve stimulation by laser or flashes of blue light to trigger neuronal activity either locally or in other brain areas that send neuronal projections into the auditory cortex.
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More Web Accessibility Network

WCAG 2.0 and Transcripts

The word "transcript" doesn't appear in WCAG 2.0 because it is strictly interpreted as being only the verbatim text version of that which is spoken. For optimal web accessibility for users with auditory disabilities, information in addition to the spoken content (such as indications of laughter or explosions, or the presentation of visual-only content) are necessary. WCAG uses the term "alternative for time-based media" to describe this descriptive transcript. WCAG 2.0 Success Criterion 1.2.3 (Level A) requires synchronized captions and either audio descriptions or an "alternative for time-based media" (i.e., descriptive transcript).

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Auto-playing Audio

Audio, such as background music, that automatically plays when a user comes to a web page can be very distracting and will interfere with screen reader audio. WCAG 2.0 Level A requires that "a mechanism is provided to stop, pause, mute, or adjust volume for audio that automatically plays on a page for more than 3 seconds". It is usually better to not automatically play audio, but allow the user to manually play the audio if they choose.

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Pop-up Windows

Pop-up windows (new windows that are triggered automatically or when a user activates a link) can cause confusion and disorientation for all users. While screen readers typically indicate that a new window has opened, managing multiple windows can be complicated, especially for blind users. Because of the various difficulties with pop-up windows, they should generally be avoided. If pop-up windows are triggered via a link, the user should typically be informed within the link text that the link opens a new window.

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Layout Tables

Tables in HTML are intended for tabular data. Although using tables for page layout is not considered best practice, this typically has minimal impact on accessibility, as long as two primary guidelines are kept in mind. First, do not use any markup that is typically used to identify data tables. This includes table headers

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Web Accessibility Network

Icons vs. Text

Icons can present complex information, meaning, and functionality in a very small amount of space. A browser's "Home" icon (typically an illustration of a house) readily conveys rather complex meaning and functionality - activating it will take you to the browser's defined home page. While such icons can be very useful, care must also be taken to ensure that the icon is understandable to the end user and reflects well-known conventions. The floppy disk icon, for example, is used for "Save", yet the real-world connection between saving a file and an actual floppy disk (something that is rarely seen and no longer produced) is not present for many people, particularly newcomers to the web and youth. Real text ("Home" or "Save") should be used in place of an icon, or perhaps in conjunction with an icon.

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Avoid Redundant Alternative Text

Images and related text are often paired together, such as a product image with the product name immediately below it, or a photograph with a caption. In instances where the text conveys the content of the image, the image should usually be given null or empty alternative text (alt=""). This avoids the redundancy of having a screen reader read the same information twice (once for the image alternative text and once for the caption or adjacent text).

If the image and the adjacent text are links to the same location, combine both the image and the text into one link and give the image null alternative text. This avoids redundancy, results in fewer links for the user to navigate, and results in fewer links for the user to navigate.

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Extraneous Alternative Text

Alternative text should convey the content and function of an image, but it should not be used to convey additional information that is not presented visually by the image. For example, file size, file format, copyright details, that a graphical link opens in a new window, link destination, price (on e-commerce sites), keywords for search engines, etc. should not be included in alternative text. If this content is important, it should be included in the page in a way (such as in nearby text) that makes it available to all users. If this information is not necessary, it should be removed or may be presented in the title attribute value (which is intended for this type of advisory information).

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Sensory Characteristics

Avoid relying on sensory characteristics, such as shape, size, or visual location. For example, "Click the green button" will not be useful to screen reader users or some users who are color blind. Instead, use "Click on the green button labeled 'submit'" or simply "Click the 'submit' button". Similarly, "Use the form on the right" could be changed to something more descriptive such as, "Use the search form on the right." Other examples include prompts such as "Click the larger button," "Select a state on the east coast on the map", "Instructions are included in the sidebar", etc. Purely auditory cues ("Click 'Continue' after you hear the beep") should also be avoided.

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Adolescents With Autism Spend Free Time Using Solitary, Screen-Based Media

ScienceDaily (Jan. 25, 2012) — "Children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) tend to be fascinated by screen-based technology. A new study by a University of Missouri researcher found that adolescents with autism spend the majority of their free time using non-social media, including television and video-games.
"Even though parents and clinicians have often observed that children with ASD tend to be preoccupied with screen-based media, ours is the first large-scale study to explore this issue," said Micah Mazurek, assistant professor in the School of Health Professions and the Thompson Center for Autism and Neurodevelopmental Disorders. "We found that 64 percent of adolescents with ASD spent most of their free time watching TV and playing video and computer games. These rates were much higher than among those with other types of disabilities. On the other hand, adolescents with ASD were less likely to spend time using email and social media."
The majority of youths with ASD (64.2 percent) spend most of their free time using solitary, or non-social, screen-based media (television and video games) while only 13.2 percent spend time on socially interactive media (email, internet chatting).
This is the first study to examine the prevalence of screen-based media use within a large nationally representative sample of youths with ASD. Data were compiled from the National Longitudinal Transition Study 2, a group of more than 1,000 adolescents enrolled in special education. The study includes youths with ASD, learning and intellectual disabilities, and speech and language impairments."

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Working Too Much Is Correlated With Two-Fold Increase in Likelihood of Depression

ScienceDaily (Jan. 25, 2012) — "The odds of a major depressive episode are more than double for those working 11 or more hours a day compared to those working seven to eight hours a day, according to a report is published in the Jan. 25 issue of the online journal PLoS ONE.
The authors, led by Marianna Virtanen of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health and University College London, followed about 2000 middle aged British civil servants and found a robust association between overtime work and depression. This correlation was not affected when the analysis was adjusted for various possible confounders, including socio-demographics, lifestyle, and work-related factors.
There have been a number of previous studies on the subject, with varying results, but the researchers emphasize that it is hard to compare results across these studies because the cut-off for "overtime" work has not been standardized.
"Although occasionally working overtime may have benefits for the individual and society, it is important to recognize that working excessive hours is also associated with an increased risk of major depression," says Dr Virtanen."

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South Carolina Assistive Technology Expo

Make plans to attend all or part of a unique event in South Carolina!
Please pass this information on to others who might be interested.

South Carolina Assistive Technology Expo

Tuesday, March 13, 2012, 9 am – 4 pm
Brookland Banquet and Conference Center, West Columbia, S.C. 29169

Over 50 exhibits and 12 workshops are available for people to see and try cutting-edge products and services for people with all types of disabilities and age-related limitations.

Workshops will address topics about programs that help people obtain used equipment, apps used with hand-held devices that help people with visual, organizing, attention, memory and communication challenges, information technology accessibility including video captioning, assistive technology for young children, mobility solutions for people with significant physical challenges, funding resources, speech recognition technology and experiences of people who use assistive technology to live more independently. For more information email Janet Jendron.

Some workshops are of particular interest to IT professionals:

Session 1: 9:30 10:30 AM
104 Hand-held devices help everyone, including people with disabilities!
Demonstration of apps and features of the Apple iOS mobile operating system (e.g. iPhone, iPad tablet) as well as the Android mobile operating system (e.g. Droid phone, Xoom Tablet) plus other hand-held devices that help people with visual and motor impairments. How these apps help with employment and independent living. Many apps discussed will help people without disabilities, e.g.,people who can't use their hands for access while driving with their respective devices. Jed Elmaleh, PT MPT, CAPS, MSCS and Clay Jeffcoat, SCSDB

Session 2: 11:30 12:30
204 Video Captioning for Accessibility and Usability
Differentiating between closed captioning and descriptive audio. Designing for readability. Addressing the needs of users with visual and cognitive impairments. Choosing fonts and colors. Free and reasonably priced tools to use in video captioning for the web and educational purposes. Challenges in posting videos on the web. This session is for everyone who uses video, not just web designers. Mark Gamble, Media Specialist, SCVRD

Session 3: 2:00 3:00 PM
304 Creating Accessible Word, PowerPoint and PDF Documents
Important basic principles that everyone should know about making these documents accessible and usable to people who use screen readers, have cognitive and mobility challenges. Topics include document structure, headings, lists, tables, Alt Text, captions and what happens when Word and PowerPoint documents are converted to tagged PDFs. Overview of some tools that can help repair PDF documents. This session is for everyone who works with these types of documents, not just people who design for the web. Natalie Denning, SC.GOV; Steve Cook, SCCB; Matthew Polkowsky, DHEC

303 Speech Recognition
In-depth comparison of the most widely used speech recognition programs (Microsoft Speech Recognition, Dragon Naturally Speaking, Via Voice, Speak Q, and Dragon Dictate Apps for use with the iPad/iPhone/iTouch). Crucial factors that enhance the use of these programs. Challenges that might be faced. Skills necessary to use speech recognition and how to get started. Val Gioia and Mark Daniels, SCDE AT Specialists

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PRO-Parents

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The Journey to Adulthood: What Parents Need to Know Sexuality Training For Parents/Staff of Youth With Disabilities Sponsored by: Sumter DDSN Presented By: PRO-Parents of SC Parents Reaching Out to Parents of South Carolina Tanya Inabinet Regional Education Coordinator __________________________________________ Wednesday January 25, 2012 10:00am-2:00pm Sumter County DDSN 775 Electric Ave Sumter, SC 29153 TOPICS: Conversations about uncomfortable subjects Help Youth understand and prepare for puberty Impact of some disabilities on Adolescent Development and Social Skills (Workshop contains adult content) Please call to register Call 1-800-759-4776 Or (803) 772-5688 FREE WORKSHOP/OPEN TO THE PUBLIC Please visit our website http://www.proparents.org/ for information & registration details

PRO-Parents of South Carolina 652 Bush RIver Road Ste 203 Columbia, South Carolina 29210 This email was sent to: rectanya@aol.com Unsubscribe To access the Center for Disability Resources Library and its materials, please click this link