Archives for September 2005

Got Insomnia? There’s Always Family Feud.

September 29, 2005

This article originally appeared at i711.com.

Last night, I couldn’t sleep until about 2:30 a.m. because of an earlier nap. So I was flipping through channels, and found a show I could watch mindlessly. It was an episode of Family Feud on the Game Show Network channel – and the best thing was that it was captioned. When I was younger, my mother tried to lipread the questions and signed for my dad and me when she could. I remember always laughing at how Dawson would kiss the women every chance he could get, but my family and I never really understood the questions or purpose of the game until we bought the board game version.

Over the summer, my boyfriend, who is a teacher, became addicted to Leave It to Beaver. My stepfather loves old Twilight Zone shows with its campy science fiction stories. That’s because these shows are all in syndication, and they’re all captioned.

There were so many uncaptioned shows I watched as I grew up. I was five years old when captioning began to hit the major networks, although it wasn’t until several years later that there really was a significant amount of captioned shows. I often spent spring and summer breaks at my grandmother’s house, and she would write what was being said on The Price is Right! or Press Your Luck. I would watch, making up my own dialogue and analyzing how the contestants spoke, moved or played.

Last night – rather, this morning – as I was trying to find a decent show, I realized that I had forgotten how it was to watch an entire show from start to finish without understanding the dialogue. It wasn’t hard to do when I was younger, because I was so accustomed to it. But today, it takes me less than five minutes to switch the channel if there are no captions. I have no patience for watching uncaptioned shows anymore.

Even as I write this, I’m flipping through channels at 9:40 a.m., and nearly every show is captioned, including old movies starring Audrey Hepburn. This might not seem like a big deal to people who may think these shows are cheesy or lame. But there have been so many times when I saw references to pop culture – for instance, Hawaii Five-O – that I could understand, but not really relate to. Now, thanks to captions, I can finally relate to who Mrs. June Cleaver is, Jack Nicholson’s “Heeeere’s Johnny!” and what Bob Barker always says at the end of his shows, and so many other cultural references. I’ve been reliving my parents’ childhoods watching reruns of Bewitched, The Mary Tyler Moore Show and other television shows that have brought laughter to so many generations.

Still, there are so many syndicated shows that still aren’t captioned- even if they were captioned the first time around. Love Boat comes to mind. So I think I’ll start finding out information about where to send letters to thank these stations for captioning their shows, and to ask them to consider captioning these shows once again. Maybe if I’m lucky, I’ll be able to enjoy these shows in 10 to 20 years with my own children, regardless of if they’re deaf or hearing.

Now I need to get going. Little House on the Prairie is on.

Copyrighted material. This article can not be copied, reproduced, or redistributed without the written consent of the author.

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Negotiating for the Most Bang: Tom Coons

September 22, 2005

This article originally appeared at deafprofessional.net.

Imagine working in a glamorous city like Manhattan, deciding where advertisements for major corporations will be placed in magazines like Newsweek and Parenting. That’s exactly what Tom Coons, 29, does for Initiative Media, an agency with the Interpublic Group of Companies.

“I work as a junior print negotiator, which is similar to being a media buyer. I work with magazines and newspapers, where I negotiate the cost and positioning of print media purchased by major corporations,” he explains. Carefully choosing various publications to place advertisements in for his clients, Coons also has a variety of other duties that accompany his job. “I have to prepare and provide various reports, such as print posting, flowcharts, rate documents and summaries, and so on. I also make the scheduling, buying and budgeting for my clients.” The clients he works with include major corporations: Bayer, Ross, Burlington Coat Factory, Levitra, Computer Associates, among others.

Coons, who lives in Pleasantville, N.Y., with Ellie, his wife of 15 months, attended the Central Institute for the Deaf in St. Louis before graduating from a public high school in 1995. He then headed for the National Technical Institute for the Deaf (NTID) in Rochester, where he earned an associate’s degree in accounting. He then earned a bachelor’s degree in applied arts and science with concentrations in business, accounting and statistics in 2003 from the Rochester Institute of Technology.

“I got this job through the employment center at NTID. My interviews were conducted with the use of interpreters, and then two weeks later I got the fellowship,” Coons says. “I started out my fellowship by undergoing training and working full-time on a two-year contract with Interpublic. Initiative Media found me to be a valuable employee for the agency and offered me a full time job in the middle of my fellowship program.”

Having worked in this particular position for six months now, Coons was far from a novice when he first began working for the company. “Before I started to work for this advertising company, I had very little experience in the advertisement field,” he remembers. “But for the past 15 months, with training and on-the-job experience, I’ve learned a lot more about how advertisement agencies work, especially within the media field. It’s a fascinating field. A lot of commitment is necessary for this job, and I’m able to offer that commitment.”

Coons has devised unique communication strategies and solutions for his job, where he is the only deaf employee. “The biggest challenge of my job is that I work with a variety of people in the field, including people at magazines like Newsweek, Parenting, Time and Forbes,” he says. “With some co-workers, there is no problem with communication. However, there are those whom I struggle to understand, so I with them I use voice recognition to communicate.” Coons uses programs such as Dragon Naturally Speaking, where people can speak to him by using a microphone and the text appears on his computer screen. “It’s a really innovative method of communicating with people. Plus, I use instant messaging, which is quick, effective and convenient.”

“I also have to learn how to deal with constant emails which must be replied to as quickly as possible,” Coons adds. “People in my position have to be ready for a lot of communication between clients and publishers.”

Dealing with such big names doesn’t daunt Coons. “This job is a demanding job, and it takes a lot of commitment to get projects done as soon as possible. You must be willing to work long hours and be able to handle many assignments on any given day.”

“Success, to me, means that I work hard and do not give up on any of my upcoming challenges,” he says. “My biggest success is that I am capable of working with hearing people in my job. And that’s what drives me to keep doing what I do.”

Copyrighted material. This article can not be copied, reproduced, or redistributed without the written consent of the author.

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You Never Know…

September 8, 2005

This article originally appeared at i711.com.

Last year, my boyfriend had what we thought was a kidney stone attack. We called 9-1-1 from our house, which is in the country about 12 miles from the nearest hospital. The 9-1-1 center hung up on me. I was frantic, trying to think of another way to get Randy to the hospital. Fortunately, the dispatch center had traced my call and sent the police, who arrived about ten minutes later. Another ten to fifteen minutes later, EMTs finally arrived and took Randy to the hospital in an ambulance. So it was nearly 30 minutes before we had any medical assistance. It turned out to be nothing serious, and Randy is just dandy today.

I was concerned about the 9-1-1 hang up, so I contacted the dispatch center manager. Guess what? It was actually my TTY that didn’t work, not their equipment. Apparently my TTY was so old – it was purchased in 1991 – and when I pressed the space bars or keys, they made none of that high-pitched beeping that signals dispatch centers that the call is on a TTY. I was very impressed with how the 9-1-1 center manager worked closely with me to resolve this problem.

This experience taught me a hard lesson: we need to be prepared, and yes, we still need our TTYs. Up to that point, Randy and I hadn’t really touched our TTY in literally two years, other than making quick calls when our Internet was down. Both of our families are all deaf, so we communicated mainly using videophones and e-mail. We did get a new TTY, and have peace of mind now.

After that experience, and after working with the Community Emergency Preparedness Information Network (CEPIN) Project for the past six months, I’ve come to realize how horribly prepared we are as Deaf or hard of hearing people. The CEPIN Project is a $1.5 million grant given to Telecommunications for the Deaf, Inc. (TDI) by the Department of Homeland Security.

But because of this project, I have come to realize just how many people have misconceptions about being prepared for emergencies. Many assume that 9-1-1 calls can be traced to their cell phones (or Sidekicks), that relay services (Internet, video or traditional) can make 9-1-1 calls, and that ambulances or police will automatically come rescue them in the event of an emergency. I also heard of several stories from people living in my town, Faribault, which has approximately 150 deaf people and the Minnesota State Academy for the Deaf with its staff and students.

So I decided to try and to ensure my community’s safety.

First, for my household, I created an emergency kit – one that I can leave near the door and grab if something happens around my house. It contains emergency supplies lasting me up to 72 hours, such as food, water, dog supplies, medication, contacts, my glasses, paper and pen, and so forth. I also made sure I had fire extinguishers throughout the house, and took other safety precautions, such as putting together a list of emergency phone numbers and e- mail addresses and putting that list in a Ziploc bag.*

Even so, I still was worried about what would happen if the entire town lost its power, was attacked, or God knows what other scenario. So I contacted a local deaf leader, and we set up a series of meetings with the fire chief and the local answering service that handles dispatch calls and mass notification of emergencies. From these meetings we devised a few solutions. Although they’re not the most ideal solutions, they’re a start.

The local answering service company created an e-mail list for people with hearing loss living in the county. Those who sign up receive emergency notifications, such as weather reports, prison breakouts (there’s a state prison in our town), Amber Alerts, and any other emergency – via e-mail.

We also set up an emergency preparedness workshop in September for deaf residents. It’s hoped that, at this meeting, in addition to learning basic emergency preparedness strategies, we’ll decide a few other things as a group. For instance, if terrorists or a natural disaster attack our town, we need to choose a central meeting point in town to gather to get medical assistance or get further information with interpreters and assistive devices standing by. We also need to designate a alternate meeting point if that first area is destroyed. Other things that will be discussed include how we can communicate with each other if our pagers and phones aren’t working and how we can get emergency information if we don’t have electricity for the television or computer. Things like that are what we think of in our wildest imaginations but never really do anything about.

We are also working on checking into other solutions, such as Reverse 9-1-1 (where the town contacts each person in the town – deaf or hearing – via phone, TTY, fax, e-mail or any other method, for an emergency). Although these solutions are sometimes costly and time-consuming, at least something is being done.

With the recent devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, it’s become more and more apparent that being prepared for emergencies has become our best hope of survival. We could wait for officials to take care of ourselves, but we still need to learn how to survive in the meantime if they don’t come rescue us in the event of a disaster – whether it’s a snowstorm, heat wave, flat tire, house fire, or a terrorist attack.

Since it’s National Emergency Preparedness Month, let’s try to have deaf people in each community talk with town or county officials and see what can be done for deaf or hard of hearing residents. If the county or town officials in your area aren’t receptive or don’t think you’re worth their time, find someone else. Contact the CEPIN Project regional center for your location and ask for assistance in getting something to happen. As evident from the fiasco in the hurricane- devastated areas, officials might not be prepared themselves. So maybe it’s more important for you to take care of yourself. You may be your own best rescue. You never know what could happen.

Copyrighted material. This article can not be copied, reproduced, or redistributed without the written consent of the author.

Filed Under: Community resources

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