by Emily Flynn, Information & Advocacy Specialist
Along with my Ability Tools colleague Rosemarie Punzalan, I had the pleasure of attending the 31st Annual Conference for People with Disabilities in San Diego from March 23rd-25th of this year.
We had a fabulous time at this wonderful annual event and so this week I would like to share some of the highlights of our trip!
First we would like to thank all of our awesome Ability Tools members that came by our booth in the exhibit hall. If you are not already part of our network, you can also connect with us today by clicking here. Based on all of the Ability Tools members and people that were familiar with our services that I saw while working at our booth and walking around the convention hall, I would say Ability Tools was well-represented at the conference! We also spoke with many of our awesome AT Advocates who work in the Independent Living Centers throughout California that were there checking out the new technology and making connections with vendors. Ability Tools is very lucky to have so many great and hard working partners.
We also had ample opportunity to walk around the large exhibit hall and discuss AT solutions with the many knowledgeable vendors there. One such vendor was Maggie Mahoney from Grasp Assistive Technologies. Maggie invited me to try out their new Quha Sento Wireless Contactless Puff Switch. The Sento, used with the Quha Zono Gyroscopic Mouse, is the world’s first contactless puff switch designed for those that cannot use a standard mouse. The Sento is easy to learn and adapts to your personal puff volume while also giving you precise clicking and cursors movements that are intuitive and work with Windows, MAC, & Android devices.
It was a very busy but productive week in San Diego, filled with a lot of learning, networking and educating individuals about our statewide AT programs and services. We had a chance to catch up with old friends and make new connections to continue our mission to connect Californians with disabilities to assistive technology devices, tools and services to make life easier.