Many advocates would agree that the expression, you can’t really understand another person’s experience until you walk in their shoes applies to disability experience. ACIL is working to prove that with our Think This Is Easy? (TTIE) Disability Awareness Training.
TTIE is an in-person, immersive experience perfect for service providers working with individuals with disabilities or anyone who wishes to learn about the challenges and barriers faced by those in the disability community.
ACIL first began offering TTIE nearly 20 years ago in the spring of 2004. The training, which was modeled after a staff training at Nemours Children’s Hospital in Wilmington, Delaware, consists of activities or stations that simulate various types of disabilities or impairments including cognitive, visual, speech hearing, dexterity and mobility. Each training activity is performed by an ACIL staff member, board member, or volunteer, most of whom have some type of disability and often the disability being experienced.
“We try our best to make sure that the person performing each activity has that type of disability to ensure authenticity and allow participants to hear a personal perspective of what it is like to live with each impairment,” said ACIL Executive Director, Jeremy Caffee.
Maria Matzik, Education and Advocacy Specialist at ACIL, first had the idea to bring an immersive disability awareness to the center.
“In 1985, I had a spinal infusion and stayed at Nemours Children’s Hospital for about a year. During that time, I got to see the disability awareness training that all hospital staff were required to go through. Training at ACIL takes about 4 hours but staff at the hospital would participate in various disability immersion exercises for an entire day. Doctors would do their rounds from wheelchairs and physical therapist would visit patients using canes or walkers.” Maria said.
When talking about the inspiration behind TTIE, Maria went on to say that Nemours Children’s Hospital took disability awareness seriously, explaining, for example, that all Respiratory Therapists were required to be intubated, so that they could be put in the shoes of some the children they would be working with who needed ventilators.
“At the time of my stay, the hospital had a rehab director who was a wheelchair user and was very passionate about the fact that their training should help staff experience what life is like for patients with disabilities and help create an awareness rather than just a sensitivity,” explained Maria.
The staff training at Nemours Children’s Hospital and the spirit behind it stayed with Maria long after her time there so, she and the other staff at ACIL in the early 2000s worked for about a year to decide the best way the center could adapt the training for the public.
After ensuring the staff secured permission from Nemours Children’s to bring a training modeled after the disability awareness training at the hospital, Alan Cochrun, the Executive Director of ACIL at the time, dedicated countless hours and personal resources to creating the most accurate experience for people going through TTIE.
Detailing the early days of TTIE, Maria talked about how at the time, the mobility impairment simulation involved using a manual wheelchair to take a bus ride Each participant simultaneously wore a disguise and an MP3 player loaded with a track that repeated phrases like: you are being watched, that person is looking at you, it’s hard to breath, hate, watching, and so on while riding the bus to simulate feelings of paranoia.
“The mobility impairment activity quickly being the aspect of training that most impacted many participants. Safety of participants was very important to Alan, so he and/or one other staff member would escort people through the bus riding experience,” Maria said.
While TTIE was initially offered as a public workshop, ACIL began offering it as a fee-for-service training in 2006 after the former Director of the Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority (GDRTA), Mark Donaghy, went through the training.
Recalling the impact of Mark’s experience, Maria explained that the former director of GDRTA wore a disguise on his bus ride like anyone else, but he was known for wearing suits and he wore one that day, so anyone that really knew Mark should have known who he was despite his disguise. Realizing this, Mark was flabbergasted that a woman he knew very well who he had a meeting scheduled with after TTIE passed him on the street.
“Mark said, ‘Wow. I can’t believe she passed me by just because I am in a wheelchair. Everyone needs to see what this is like.’ At that point, he decided all GDRTA drivers needed to go through TTIE and ACIL staff spent many of the following years putting them through TTIE,” Maria explained.
In addition to GDRTA drivers, hundreds of people from local businesses, ranging from high school and college students to employees of managed care plans and staff members of housing authorities, have completed TTIE.
Over the last year or so, ACIL staff has worked diligently to make TTIE even more inclusive by creating activities that help training participants understand what it is like to live with Autism as well as what it means to have a Schizophrenia diagnosis.
ACIL plans to continue offering the eye-opening TTIE experience to the communities within its service area for years free of charge thanks to a very generous grant from the Disability Foundation.
TTIE is a four-hour time commitment and is limited to groups of 10 people. Larger groups are accommodated through multiple sessions. For more information, costs, or to schedule training contact Independent Living Specialist, Dylan at 937-341-5202 Ext 109 or [email protected].
