Computer training for blind deaf and disabled people in their own home

Tutor Seminar - 06/11/2002

Tutor Seminar held on 06/11/2002 12:23:23 at 16 Porchester Terrace

Present:
Anthony Wigram, Avril Hanning, Cliff Docherty, Maria Tremarco, Lisa Oram, Chris Frederick,Patricia Webb, Tracey Fawthrop, Shahab Reza, Simon Smith, Evelyn White, Amjad Taha, Boyko Grigorov, Debbie Brixey, Sina Adekoya, Janice Pearson, Aldo Zeolla, Daniel

Apologies:
Tracy Pernice, John Howlett, David Somerset, Gabriella Gatward, Gianbattista Montagna, Michelle Delgado, Ademola Olayinka, Helen Dashwood, Amjad Rehman, Keith Penrose

Minutes:
1. Minutes of last meeting

The minutes of the last meeting were read. There were no changes made.

2. Administration –Avril Hanning

(i) Lesson Reporting

Avril asked to have a general discussion about the new lesson reporting system and Deborah B said that she felt that we should elimiate text boxing completely and that we should have a text only system.

Simon S also mentioned that he would like to have receipts for the lesson reports he sends in and Avril agreed that this would be a good idea.

Generally the tutors agreed that the new lesson reporting/ invoicing system is working well and that there are a few queries.

Avril also clarified the new paying system in which tutors would receive £33 for lessons sent on the same day, £31 for lessons sent late and £32 for lesson sent the next day because of computer problems. The tutors agreed that this was a fair system and that it was a good incentive to send the reports in on the same day.

3. Structure of Course- Shahab Reza

Shahab went through the structure in which he does his course, from the assessment to the final lesson report. He said that student’s needed time to develop their skills and that he makes and gives notes to students after every lesson. He said that at each new lesson he revises the previous lesson and answers all the questions put forward by the student. He stated that in this way the information becomes more concrete and this would improve their confidence because they know the material very well.

Simon S mentioned that other tutors would not have so much time to spend on certain things as they are working full time and also hold other work. Patricia said that what she does is provide emailing support. Patricia also mentioned that no two students are the same and that each student has different needs.

Anthony W said that this was an individual relationship between the tutor and the student and he was thrilled at the way it works out with all the different tutors and students. At the end of the day it is an understanding between tutors and students and that we are all working together for the same goal.

4. Safer Emailing – Simon Smith

Simon stated that because there was so many viruses going around that it would be safer to BCC bulk emailing than to send it directly or to CC it.
Avril said that this is something that we could do in the future.

Simon also mentioned the issue of technical problems and asked the question of how far do we go with solving computer problems. Anthony said that if it was something simple to install or loading a programme that would be fine. However if there was technical support needed that we should not get involved and that the tutors need to leave and the student’s would have to sort the problem on their own. Anthony also said that little problems was part of the learning process and that if extra lessons were needed that we would be willing to give it provided that the student has shown progress.

We also spoke about giving the tutor 10 minutes to sort it out. Aldo said that this would be very difficult to leave after trying to fix the problem. Patricia said that this gives us time to find our whether or not we could deal with the problem. Shahab stated that if he could solve the problem quite easily that it was no problem and that it would take his student’s a longer time to sort out the problem if the person trying to fix the student’s computer did not do BSL. He said that it made things much easier.

5. Time Limits for Student’s to complete the course- Debbie Brixey

Debbie stated that she would like to know the time limits for the course for all students. She said that one of her students was on the course for 18 months and where should we draw the line.

Avril said that we needed to create a balance between tutors and students and we should consider the period of 6 months. Patricia said that she found 6 months to be fair to the student. Avril said that if their was a genuine reason such as sickness or computer problems that those students would be put on hold until they were ready to start the course again. Avril said it becomes the responsibility of the office if the students are on hold for long periods of time.

6. Discussion on female student’s preferring female tutors

Shahab mentioned that he had a student who preferred to have a female tutors because she had a jealous boyfriend. He said that he felt that this was not right and he wanted to know what we could do about it. Avril said that we had to try and draw a balance between various needs of individual students. On a religious point of view some female students would not be allowed to have male tutors. On the other side some female student’s living on their own with a disability are quite vulnerable and prefer to have a female tutor. We all agreed that we would not stand for racial discrimination, however it was generally agreed that we have be sympathetic to the needs of individual students.

7. Student Recruitment & 8. Development

Cliff Docherty went through what he has been doing in the last few months.

He stated that the key recruitment successes were the taxi cards and Dial a Ride.

He said that the leaflets have been distributed all over London and in Doctors surgeries.

Simon Smith mentioned that we could place an Advertisement on the radio for £70. Anthony said that he would look into that.

9. Funding Update- Chris Frederick

Chris said that he was very busy making the video of U Can Do I.T. and that we had used it for the AGM and the Department of Education and Science. He also mentioned that when he was bidding for funding in a certain boroughs that all the boroughs would like the students to come from their borough. He also mentioned a questionnaire which also needed to be filled in.

Chris also said that we need to look at what students want from the course and that their should be some accreditation. He also mentioned that Sara Cohen of the Westminster Voluntary Association has an AQA system which works on a point system and students could obtain accreditation through this system. Debbie Brixey also mentioned the CLAIT system and Anthony said that we would look into this.

10. Tutor Training- Patricia Webb

Patricia Webb spoke about the Jaws training which she does on a one to one basis with the tutors at her home. She encouraged all tutors to do the training.

11. Date of Christmas Drinks

Anthony mentioned that the Christmas drinks will be held on the 2nd of December at Ye Grapes and that tutors could bring their partners with them. He encouraged all tutors to attend.

12. Website- Cliff Docherty

Cliff mentioned that he would be doing the newsletter on a weekly basis and not a monthly basis from now on and that the message board needs some changes made.

Patricia asked if there was any way that we could make the website more fun. Cliff said that we would need a web designer for that and this is something the charity could not afford at this stage but would definitely want to do this in the future.

Simon also asked Cliff whether tutors could be able to download the new forms from the website and Cliff said that this would be easy to do.

Chris Frederick also mentioned putting his questionnaire on the website.

13. Any other business

No other business was discussed.

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