CDCI Welcomes New Personnel

Five new faces are being seen around the Center these days. The Center welcomes Deborah Lisi-Baker, a longtime Vermont disability rights advocate, as our new Assistant Director of Family and Adult Services. Deborah recently stepped down as the Executive Director of the Vermont Center for Independent Living after 10 years with the program. Under her leadership, VCIL became a state leader in Universal Design and accessibility law. Deborah Lisi-Baker is also President of the Vermont Coalition for Disability Rights, and will continue as editor of The Independent, a statewide newspaper for seniors, individuals with disabilities, and family members. At CDCI, Deborah will oversee family support efforts, including coordination of the new initiative, the Family Support 360 Special Initiative Emergency Planning Project, which will build statewide and local strategies for family support during emergency preparedness, using the Vermont 360 collaborative approach of peer navigator teams to support rural families with members with disabilities. Deborah's office is 313 Mann Hall. More new members....

CDCI Art Gallery Opens

Just before the Holiday break the Center welcomed the community to an Open House, celebrating both the joyful season and the opening of the CDCI Art Gallery. Campus and community members gathered for holiday cheer, and the opportunity to meet some of the artists whose work is featured in the new gallery.

CDCI has been collecting art work by and about people with disabilities to line the hall of our Mann Hall offices. (Pictured here is Cindy Melvin pointing to her painintg. Cindy is part of the Center Core Team.) Some artwork was developed by students in the “Can Do Arts” class sponsored by VSA Arts of Vermont, an arts and education organization dedicated to making the world of the arts accessible to Vermonters of all abilities. Other pieces include Read more..

CDCI Faculty offer Spring 2010 Courses

Culture of Disability, EDSP 274

This class, taught by CDCI's Deborah Lisi-Baker and Susan Ryan, explores the medical, social, cultural and political experience of disability though readings, fieldwork, and presentations. Topics covered include disability history and cultural meaning; rehabilitation: the medical model and beyond; self-help and social change movements; and explorations of disability narrative in art and literature. This is a core course for the Certificate of Graduate Study in the Interdisciplinary Study of Disabilities offfered through UVM Graduate College and the Center on Disability and Community Inclusion. Full list of courses.

Announcing New Webinar Series

Free Webinar on Cortical Visual Impairment (CVI)

Free montly series will begin Thursday, January 21, 2010, 3pm - 5 pm.

The Vermont Deafblind Project at CDCI is co-sponsoring a series of webinars for families and professionals on topics relevant to the education of children who are deafblind or have dual sensory impairments. Presented by COPCS (Community of Practice, Creativity and Support), 13 state deafblind projects working in collaboration to promote relevant, evidence-based practices in deafblind education. Experts from these states will present on a variety of topics including parent perspectives, cortical visual impairment, literacy, post-school and transition, sign language and visual or tactile modifications. The first in the series, Introduction to Cortical Visual Impairment (CVI) is scheduled for January 21, 3 pm - 5 pm. For more information click here.