Services provided in Outreach Centres

Persons with special needs (PWSN) in rural areas generally do not have access to appropriate facilities. As a result, optimum development of their inherent potential becomes difficult and they themselves as well as their families suffer. Aakanksha perceived this gap & need during the field work and started providing services through outreach centres in 2001. But, the work received substantial impetus with the funding support from Paul Hamlyn Foundation in 2011.  

• AIM AND OBJECTIVES

1. To create outreach centres and provide need based intervention services to all special children coming to the centres
2. To provide pre-vocational training to the adult disabled
3. To sensitize community about the needs and strengths of the target group
4. Up-gradation of skills of the community workers
5. Up-gradation of skills of care givers
6. To provide referral services to special children

The Activities carried out in the project can be listed as following:

1. Direct services to the target group
2. Parent training
3. Therapeutic services
4. Counseling services
5. Referral services
6. Providing aids and equipments for the motor, sensory and other development
7. Capacity building to ensure continuity of services
8. Providing transport facility to the target group
9. Develop rapport within the community by celebrating important national events like Independence Day

Human Resource

Special educators, rural workers, ayah mothers and auto drivers were allocated one for each centre. Amongst community workers, 3 were working in villages around Urla & Bhanpuri centres and 1 was assigned for areas around Dharsiwa. Physiotherapist and speech therapist visited all the centres as per requirement. When Urla and Bhanpuri Centres were merged in Phase-III of the project, corresponding manpower was also merged. Special educators and rural workers provided direct services to children at the centres, while ayah mothers supported them. Auto drivers transported children to centres. Community workers provided home based services in Phases – I & II. They also acted as links amongst various stakeholders, such as, children, parents, members of project team, community and local government officials, etc. Community workers also worked towards organizing various programmes as well as helped in availing government facilities for the beneficiaries. Visiting physiotherapist and speech therapist, as the name suggests, visited centres from time to time for providing need based services. Rural workers used to do the follow up work between specialist visits. Parents present during the specialist visits were also being given minimal training as required for follow up at home.    

• NATURE OF WORK AT CENTRES

The work at centres mainly consisted of direct services to beneficiaries, which can be broadly categorized into the following:

• Assessment
• Planning & programming
• Implementation
• Evaluation

In addition to the above, following were also part of the activities:

• Parents counseling
• Behaviour modification
• Co-curricular activities at the centre
• Preparing children for participation in sports & cultural activities conducted by other organizations
• Health check-ups
• Celebration of events, such as National festivals, children’s day and mental retardation day

  Summary of Work Done in out reach centers

REGIONAL LEARNING CENTRE ON DEAFBLINDNESS- EAST WORKING WITH CHILDREN WITH DEAFBLINDNESS AND MULTI SENSORY IMPAIRMENT.

INTRODUCTION

Deafblindness is a unique disability that combines varying degree of both hearing and visual impairment. It hampers communication, mobility, socialization and other important areas of development. They are thus denied even the basic human rights like education, medical care, amongst other needs that are taken for granted by most of us This project commenced on 1st October 2015 and has been funded by Paul Hamlyn Foundation and Supported by Sense International India, which is an esteemed organization in the field of Deafblindness. The activities undertaken in this project is given below

1. Setting up of Regional Learning Centre on Deafblindness for Eastern Region of the country covering Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Odisha, Jharkhand and West Bengal East
2. In partnership with Government District Hospital, Identify children “ At Risk”, children with hearing problems and providing Need Based Early Intervention services in the age group 0- 6 years.
3. Conducting following trainings on Deafblindness

• Regional Level Training
• Training of SSA teachers
• Training of Government Officials
• Training of NGO professionals
• State Level Network meeting of families and teachers

1. With respect to providing direct services to the children with Deafblindness,following work is undertaken

• Clinical and functional assessment of the children
• Preparing IEP
• Providing Need Based Therapy
• Providing assistive Devices
• Providing appropriate vocational training
• Upgrading the resource Room for functional assessment and sensory stimulation