Ellen's article in The Independent as part of Deaf Awareness Week 2012!

Wow!

This week our very own Ellen Arthur has been the subject of a feature published by the Independent Newspaper!

The article talks about Ellen's life growing up in a hearing family with her younger deaf sister and about the communication issues she's faced.
It tells us her memories and how sometimes she feels "different". A feeling lots of deaf teens have probably had at some point in their life!!

The article also gives some of the NDCS Look Smile Chat campaign deaf awareness tips!

Learn to communicate
Ellen was born deaf but can hear a little via her cochlear implant. These are her tips for talking to people with hearing loss.

* Get my attention before you start talking, and then look at me as you speak.

* Don't talk too quickly or too slowly. Speak clearly, just as you would to anyone else.

* Lip-reading helps so don't exaggerate your mouth movements or talk too loudly.

* If it's important, write it down or tell me when we're somewhere quiet.

* There are other ways to communicate. Find me online or through my phone.

* Please be patient. It can be frustrating but we will all benefit if we can communicate well.

If you want to read the article then click HERE!! :)

Cinema Subtitles Petition...

With all the current gossip about subtitles on live Tv and in particular Dancing On Ice - check out the story here at the Daily Mail - I thought maybe it was worth publicising the Youth Advisory Board's Cinema Subtitles petition.

Last year at the very first YAB residential in London we realised that as a group we were all extremely passionate about the lack of access for deaf young people (and older people!) to cinema. We discussed all the issues: films available, times of films, travelling to the cinemas... and contacted other deaf young people in our areas to find out their views as well. I'm pretty proud to say that among us we managed to persuade over 500 people to sign a paper petiton arguing that access to subtitled cinema needed to be improved.

At our July residential we discussed how we could take forward the campaign and togther we set up an online petition which you can sign here at campaign to increase the frequency of subtitles cinema showings. We began posting the petition on facebook and twitter and as a result nearly 300 more people have signed up!!

But! We still think more needs to be done to improve access to cinema and we need your help!
Why not...

• sign the peitition yourself
• share it with all your friends - we could easily get 100s more signatures of this happened!
• write to your local cinema and ask them to show more subtitles films
• or even set up a meeting with the manager of your local cinema and tell them about the issues: most films are late at night, popular films aren't subtitles etc... 

This way we can improve the quality of access for all deaf people - I know this is an area with strong opinions. Many people argue that subtitles are distracting and many cinemas are afraid that they will lose profit by showing more subtitled films; however, there is a market out there! About 9million people in the UK are deaf or "hard of hearing" - and thats alot of signatures!!

Thank you :)