Signature

An eight year old girl was nominated for a national award – thanks to her signing skills.

Amelia McCabe has been signing since she was a little girl as both of her parents are deaf. The youngster’s talents have even stunned her mother, who set up West Derby-based sign language academy Talking Hands.

Amelia, from Croxteth, is currently taking her level two exams which are an equivalent to a GCSE.

Co.Deaf will be running a free deaf event at County Hall Durham on the 8 May for Deaf Awareness Week. There will be equipment and information stalls available throughout the day with interpreters and lipspeakers available.

Following the recent announcement that our first Signature qualification; Signature Level 1 in British Sign Language has been accredited by Ofqual, we can now confirm that two further qualifications have been accredited and are now also on the new Qualifications & Credit Framework (QCF).

Nominations flying in for the Signature Annual Awards scheme.

The Signature Annual Awards are designed to recognise and reward those who have made in their own way a significant contribution toward achieving a society in which deaf people have full access.

However, with the May 3 deadline for the Learner of the Year and Teacher of the Year categories approaching, there is limited time to ensure that those deserving the recognition receive it and anyone making nominations is urged to do so via the website before it is too late.

Football worker Ryan Williams has made a successful signing after helping develop a new schools programme. The 18-year-old, from the SAFC Foundation, is helping to boost communication skills across Wearside schools with a course that uses football to introduce youngsters to sign language.

Since we began trading as Signature in January, we have been working hard to make a smooth transition of CACDP qualifications to Signature qualifications. We can now reveal that our first Signature qualification has been accredited by Ofqual, and is now on the new Qualifications & Credit Framework (QCF).

There is now only 10 days left to get your nominations in for the Learner of the Year and Teacher of the Year.

Enhancing equality of opportunity for disabled staff within the further education (FE) system is the key focus of this event. Through a mixture of open discussions, workshop activities and keynote speeches this conference will look at the issues and challenges that disabled staff are currently facing and how we can affect change through leadership.

A new service has launched that can help keep organisations on the right side of the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) by granting access to qualified sign language interpreters at the touch of a button.

The National Registers of Communication Professionals working with Deaf and Deafblind People (NRCPD) now offers a new fully-searchable, free to access database of contact details for registered professionals.