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[MNCDHH logo opening]
[PPT title page with MNCDHH’s logo, “Staff Reports: September 1, 2021 – October 31, 2021”]
[PPT page with the following text, “Communication Strategy, Anne Sittner Anderson, Communications Director”]
[Anne appears on the left, the PPT slide is on the right with the following text, “Communications Activities: #CanDoAnything campaign / community spotlights, Joint COVID-19 report, Draft strategic plan survey, Age-related hearing loss survey, Federal action on hearing aid affordability”]
Anne: Hello, this is Anne Sittner Anderson, Director of Communications at MNCDHH.
Today I’d like to talk about some of the work that has been done in September and October for communications.
First, our contractor Kaitlyn Mielke has resumed interviews for two communications projects. One is the #CanDoAnything campaign, which covers the work experience journeys of community members with a focus on communication strategies. We work hard to cover individuals from all walks of life and perspectives, including individuals from Greater Minnesota. If you know of individuals in your area who should have their story told, please do connect them to Kaitlyn or me. Another item that Kaitlyn has been working on is the Community Spotlights. The most recent spotlight is the Minnesota Deaf Muslim Community (MDMC). If you can think of a community organization who should be spotlighted, please let Kaitlyn or me know.
Second, MNCDHH and DHHSD started drafting a report on the impacts that COVID-19 had on the deaf, deafblind, and hard of hearing communities in Minnesota. The report will cover impacts felt in education, housing, employment, health care, transportation, and law enforcement. If you have information that you think should be included, please contact me at my email address. My email is on the website if you do not have it.
Third, we sent out a survey on the drafted strategic goals so that we could collect community feedback. Most of the feedback is from individuals who self-identify as Culturally Deaf. The second highest group is Hard of Hearing. Most responses were from the Twin Cities Metro Area. The second and third highest group were from Central Minnesota and Southeast Minnesota. There were 74 responses in total but most only answered some questions, not all, so we have a different number of responses per question. Common themes that emerged include:
• Requests that we do not forget about Greater Minnesota
• Concerns about housing, including landlord-renter relations and create housing for Deaf seniors
• Hearing aid affordability
• Desire to see list of legislative actions
• More education on accessibility needs
• Anti-racist and justice-centered presentations and trainings
• Continue Lobby Day and legislative vlogs and videos and voting/civic engagement activities
• Prompts to consider the needs of hard of hearing or deaf individuals who have limited or no knowledge of ASL
• Quality of captions
• More town halls and virtual educational workshops
• Helping seniors adjust to emerging technology
• Partner more with DHHSD and reduce overlap
• Continue work on education, including IEP and IFSP
• Address employment issues by working with business owners/business associations
• Misunderstandings of what RBA is and request to not use acronyms
• More efforts for diversity and inclusion
• Educate health care providers about working with people who are deaf, deafblind, and hard of hearing
• Make sure we reach out to all stakeholder groups, not just a few.
Fourth
We’re excited to let you know we have a summary analysis on data about age-related hearing loss. This report summarizes two surveys, 1) the Minnesota State Survey (MSS) and the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System survey (BRFSS). We will soon be distributing this report and hope this information will help increase recognition of age-related hearing loss.
Due to the length of this video, please use this link for the full transcript: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1gt4H2bAil0V8FXEa5E_1BUmwN9CWa3gEIb2F7RjNuak/edit?usp=sharing
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