Scottish Talking Newspaper Conference

An annual conference takes place in Scotland, offering an opportunity to organisers and volunteers from around the country to meet, share ideas and problems and learn from one another. Listeners are encouraged to come along and meet the "people behind the voices" and, most importantly, give advice so that our service is tailored to meet their needs.

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The 2010 Conference will be held in the
Inchyra Grange Hotel, Grangemouth
(www.macdonaldhotels.co.uk/inchyragrange)
on Saturday 30 October.

Booking forms have been sent to all Scottish TNs

Apart from advice on fundraising and tips on reading aloud, we will be hearing how all the TNs in Northern Ireland have faced the change to digital recording and what the Scottish Parliament are doing for blind and partially sighted people in Scotland.

Exhibitors to include:
Calibre Audio Library
Concept Northern
Graff
Humanware
Optelec
TNF
Torch Trust
RNIB
Visibility

For information or booking forms, available now, please e-mail info@astn.org.uk

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The 2009 conference was held on Saturday 31 October.

Speakers included:

The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) formally took up its powers under the Charities and Trustees Investment (Scotland) Act 2005. Their vision is for a flourishing charity sector in which the public has confidence.

Nicola McBain is the Senior Policy Officer with OSCR and has held this post for nearly four years. The role of Senior Policy Officer is varied, covering equalities, drafting Memoranda of Understanding and project managing the Integrated Reporting project, an initiative to introduce improvements to reporting and the Register. Before taking her post with OSCR, Nicola worked for Perth and Kinross Council.

Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR)
2nd Floor
Quadrant House
9 Riverside Drive
Dundee
DD1 4NY

Phone: 01382 220446

Website: www.oscr.org.uk

Jim McCafferty was educated at the Royal Blind School, Edinburgh.

Employment has included working as a Braille Transcriber and Proof-Reader at the Scottish Braille Press. He has been employed in the latter capacity since 2000. In the 1990's, he spent five and a half years working for the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association in Forfar.

Voluntary work has included the following:

President of the Scottish National Federation for the Welfare of the Blind, 1991-92

National member of RNIB Executive Council, 1986-2002

Currently, Jim represents the Scottish Braille Press on the United Kingdom Association of Alternative Formats, is a member of the adult leader training team of the South of Scotland Regional Council of the Scout Association, and he is Chair of his local Residents' Association.

Jim enjoys visiting Beaver Scout colonies and Cub Scout packs to talk to the young people about how he manages as a blind person, and to show useful equipment. He enjoys socialising with friends and holidaying on Herm, one of the smaller Channel Islands.

Richard G Hellewell FCA - Chief Executive of Royal Blind and Scottish War Blinded

Richard took up office at Royal Blind in 2007, bringing a wealth of experience to the position gained from many years in senior management in the Scottish voluntary sector and the field of disability.

Royal Blind provides three major services.

The Royal Blind School provides high standards of education and care in a safe and enriching environment for children and young people who are visually impaired. We also have a specialised campus for those who have multiple disabilities. Located in Edinburgh, we welcome day and residential pupils from the whole of the UK and beyond.

Braeside House is the only nursing home for older people in Scotland that cares specifically for those with a visual impairment. The standard of care is excellent and is provided in a supportive and professional manner.

The Scottish Braille Press is a leading provider of high quality alternative formats such as Braille, Large Print and Audio, renowned for professionalism and quality, combined with a fast turnaround.

Royal Blind Head Office address is:

PO Box 500
Gillespie Crescent
Edinburgh
EH10 4HZ

Phone: 0131 229 1456

Web: www.royalblind.org

Scottish War Blinded exists to help anyone in Scotland who has served in the armed forces and who is now visually impaired (including those resident in England who may have served with a Scottish regiment).

Scottish War Blinded
Linburn
Wilkieston
By Kirknewton
EH27 8YN

Phone: 0131 333 1334

Lars Ballieu Christensen (born 1963) works with information technology and design for people with special needs. He founded Sensus, a research-based consultancy organisation, in the mid 1980’s. Since then he has advised numerous governments, national and international organisations, NGOs and private companies on accessibility, inclusive design and access to digital information. He is the inventor, or co-inventor, of a number of innovative enabling technologies, including the award winning RoboBraille. RoboBraille is an email-based Braille and audio translation service. Lars is the RoboBraille Co-ordinator and leader of the RoboBraille Consortium, a European-wide organisation operating the RoboBraille service with financial support from the European Commission, Danish Ministry of Education and the Danish Ministry of Social Affairs. As a co-founder, he serves as a board member and Chief Technology Officer of Motto Captura ApS.

A recognised authority on e-accessibility, Lars is the author of multiple articles in Danish and international journals on accessibility, inclusion, information technology, disability and Braille translation. He has co-authored the Danish guidelines for accessible web design and is a member of the Danish Expert Committee on Accessibility at the National IT and Telecom Agency and the Danish Standards Expert Committee on IT Accessibility. He regularly lectures at universities and conferences on web-accessibility, information technology and disability. Although not limited to any particular disability, Lars has extensive working experience with high-tech solutions for the blind, partially sighted, deaf-blind, deaf and dyslexic.

Lars holds a master degree in computer science and journalism from the University of Roskilde. In 1996, he was awarded a Ph.D. in computer science and communication by the University of Roskilde in recognition of his dissertation "Applying Information Technology as an Intelligent Interface for the Blind."

Sensus ApS
Torvet 3-5, 2.tv.
DK-3400 Hillerød
DENMARK

Phone: +45 48 22 10 03

Mobile: +45 40 32 68 23

E-Mail: lbc@sensus.dk

Website: www.sensus.dk www.robobraille.org

Monise Durrani is a producer in BBC Scotland's Radio Features Department. She has made over a hundred programmes for BBC Radio 4 and BBC Radio Scotland, including five series of R4's technology programme "Click On". She is not quite sure how ten years have passed since she first started doing this, but they have!

Monise's first involvement with a Talking Newspaper came at the age of 13, when she was a reader in Helensburgh, and she is delighted to return to volunteering by contributing to Lothiansound, based in Edinburgh.