AAC-RERC Themes
Supporting the Societal Roles of People Who Use AAC |
| Communication, as an essential life function, must be available to all individuals
irrespective of age, type, and/or severity of disability so that they can fulfill their societal
roles. As AAC consumers attempt to attain the goals of the New Freedom Initiative by being
integrated more completely into school, community, employment, volunteerism, and living
communities, the need to communicate with a range of individuals who are minimally familiar with
them becomes important. Four particular societal roles remain of concern to AAC stakeholders and
the AAC-RERC will focus on addressing these unmet needs:
- Use of AAC technology by children, youth, and adults to
participate effectively in learning and education. There is a need to provide
more efficient connectivity between AAC and IT technology so that distance education and
educational supports can be used effectively.
- Literacy development for children, youth, and young adults
who use AAC technology. There is a current, unmet need for direct
instructional technology that is tailored to the literacy learning and accessibility needs of
AAC consumers and that is readily accessible to teachers and family members.
- Developing employment supports and strategies to allow
integration into the workforce. Given the limited number of
employed AAC users, low-incidence, and geographic diversity of the population, there is a
strong need for Internet-based employment support and training of AAC consumers.
- Enhancing AAC use by identifying vocabulary and messages to
support communication interaction in unique social contexts. There is a need for the
efficient inclusion of vocabulary and messages in AAC technologies that is more readily
accessible to all users. There is also a need to provide ways for users of AAC technologies to
obtain just-in-time vocabulary from outside sources, such as the WWW and their
listeners/interactants.
The following projects are associated with this theme:
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