What an honour!

We are humbled to be named the Burnaby Board of Trade‘s and City of Burnaby‘s Not-For-Profit Organization of the Year at the Burnaby Business Excellence Awards Gala on November 16^th. We thank our participants, volunteers, staff, supporters, and of course, the community of Burnaby!

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Michelle works at a travel company on Vancouver Island. Her job involves talking a lot with customers over the phone.

However, Michelle has hearing loss which made it difficult to accurately hear her clients.

Her audiologist at Hear Inc recommended she apply to WorkBC Assistive Technology Services for help funding a new pair of hearing aids. She applied and was quickly approved.

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Today we’re going to look at a simple, yet elegant AAC app that could be very helpful for individuals who struggle with speech, processing, social interactions, and more. Spoken AAC is an augmentative and alternative communication app that is available for iOS and Android. It requires no specialized hardware and instead harnesses the power of your smartphone to do what it needs to do.

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Neil Squire Regional Manager Charles Levasseur was honoured to receive the Canadian Association of Occupational Therapists Citation Award.

Atlantic Region staff presented the award to Charles during a surprise team meeting on Tuesday.

The CAOT Citation Award acknowledges the contribution to the health and well-being of Canadians by an agency, program, or individual within each province/territory, who is not an occupational therapist. Charles was nominated by the New Brunswick Association of Occupational Therapists.

Charles has worked for Neil Squire for over 20 years, and since 2011, Charles has established several special assistive technology projects for the New Brunswick government. He also developed the AT Help Desk, an assistive technology help line for New Brunswickers with disabilities. He currently sits as chair for the avenueNB Cooperative, which brings more than 20 service providers across the province of New Brunswick together to provide more consistent and more accessible services and increased educational opportunities.

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Carolyn coordinates and oversees administrative tasks, covering everything from human resources, finance, keeping the office organized, event planning, project coordination, and health and safety compliance. However, she was facing a barrier at work with her hearing loss.

“Communication is the biggest challenge that impacts me,” she explains.

Her audiologist at Amplifon referred her to WorkBC Assistive Technology Services for funding for new hearing aids.

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Today, Seaver is joined by co-host Nakia Singh. Join us as we talk about Apple’s upcoming accessibility update, we also get into some app reviews, and, once again we touch on AI and how it is effecting assistive technology in 2023.

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This November, we honour Indigenous Disability Awareness Month.

Indigenous peoples of Canada experience a disability rate significantly higher than that of the general population. Indigenous Disability Awareness Month (IDAM) brings awareness of these barriers and the issues that Indigenous peoples living with disabilities and their families face every day. More importantly though, in spite of these barriers, IDAM celebrates the achievements of Indigenous peoples living with disabilities and recognize the significant and valuable contributions they make to our communities socially, economically, and culturally every day.

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Ed works as a civil engineer in Surrey.

“I lost my hearing almost 10 years ago, which created many barriers and stress. It was very difficult to understand and interact during conversations,” he shares.

His audiologist referred him to WorkBC Assistive Technology Services for funding for new hearing aids. He applied to WorkBC Assistive Technology Services and was quickly approved for a new set of hearing aids.

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We’ve looked at a few OCR/scanning apps in the past, and for the most part, when we’re asked about OCR and scanning apps, we typically recommend Microsoft Lens or Adobe Scan. But, because we’ve found that different users have vastly different experiences and preferences when it comes to this technology, we thought that it would be worth looking at another top-rated OCR app.

iScanner is a highly downloaded OCR app that is currently charting at number 19 in the “business” category in Apple’s App Store, with Adobe Scan being the only OCR app rated higher. So, why is it that this app in particular is currently the second highest rated scanning app on the market?

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Alan works at a post office sorting plant in Kelowna. He has hearing loss, which made it difficult for him to understand instructions and affected his safety as he was unable to hear all the different moving equipment around him in the busy plant.

“[I] was not able to hear adequately,” he shares.

His audiologist at HearingLife referred him to WorkBC Assistive Technology Services for help purchasing new hearing aids. Alan applied to WorkBC Assistive Technology Services and was quickly approved for funding for the hearing aids he needs for work.

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