Hills Auslan Circle

HAUC CALENDAR 2010

Committee meetings are held on the 3rd Saturday of the month from 10am to 12:00 at Mundaring sharing.

June 19	WAIDE- Speaker Leanne Potter Find out about what is happening in Deaf Education
July 17	AUSLAN VIDEO (50 mins) - the Prodigal Son Presented by Billy QuickEntirely in Auslan, no voice-over or captions
August 21	Social lunch all invited- venue to be decided
September 18	LAUGHTER WORKSHOP With Janni Goss. Come and give yourself a tonic for free!
November 20	November: (evening session) SIGNED SONG OPEN COMPETITION- details to be announced later

Notetaker and Interpreter available at each session for communication access.

Call Anna (voice or sms) 0429 410 691 for more details.

PUT THESE DATES IN YOUR DIARY

Go to News for details of a special event.

About your committee:
HAUC Committee as at March 2010
AGM in June

President: Anne Jeavons (continuing)
Anne has been post-lingually deaf since her late twenties and abandoned a career in teaching modern languages at Central TAFE to set up the Dept for Auslan and Deaf Studies there. She now signs and uses an Auslan interpreter when necessary. In retirement since July 2004, she devotes her time to raising awareness about Deaf and Hard of Hearing people in the Hills Community. She also sits on the Shire of Mundaring’s Inclusion and Access Advisory Committee.

Vice President: Roslyn Fowler
Roslyn started learning Auslan in 2000 and quickly fell in love with the language. After seeing the promotion for HAUC, she made inquiries and has been an active member ever since, currently serving as treasurer.

She said "I guess it is the friendly atmosphere of HAUC that keeps me involved and the chance to maintain my Auslan skills and support a community organisation that I believe in."

Secretary: Anna Mackintosh (continuing)
With a background in visual art and food, Anna found herself trying to combine the two when given the opportunity to learn cheesemaking in the hills 6 years ago. Her life now includes a young family, growing food and learning Auslan.

"My sister is deaf and although Auslan is her second language, I think it is the language that she reveals so much of herself through and I don't want to miss out on that!" Anna says.

Being involved with the Hills Auslan Circle has given her a much greater understanding of what concerns the Deaf and Hard of Hearing and has revealed the Deaf community to her.

Treasurer: Scott Warner
assisted by Roslyn Fowler

Committee member: Dianne Purnell
Dianne decided to learn Auslan after seeing two people signing at Telethon. She had never seen this language before but thought how wonderful it would be to learn, so in 1999 she enrolled for the part-time course at Midland TAFE. After 18 months Dianne was very keen to learn more about the language and culture of the Deaf community so she enrolled full-time at Leederville TAFE. She qualified as an interpreter in 2004 and has worked as a relief in different schools from K-Yr12 in the meetroplitan areas since 2002.

For the past 3 years Dianne has been contracted at a high school as an educational interpreter, this includes note taking and educational assistants for the students.

"The Deaf community, culture and language is a lifetime education, you never stop learning." Dianne says.

Committee member: Anne Borley

Committee member: Claire Bignell
I am originally from England, and emigrated to Australia in 1968, moved to Perth in 2004. I have considerable hearing loss and learned to lip read through my life. I joined HAUC in 2006. Being a supporter and campaigner for sign language, also subtitling on television and movies.

Committe member: Marie Redmond
I am a single mother to my hearing son who is 13. I have also been involved with CWA (Country Women's Association) for over 14 years.
I have been involved with Captions for many years and still doing it and I love it..I used to be on NWPC (National Working Party for Captioning) from 1998 until 2001. At the moment I am not doing anything in the group but I just keep going on captions to keep contact with Sydney Media Access. Now this year is my first year on the committee for HAUC. See how we go.

Committe member: Yvette Montagu
Yvette clearly remembers the first time she saw sign language. "When I was about 7 years old I was on the Hotham Valley Steam Train with my family and I noticed a group of people all signing. I was amazed and stood there staring. A lady saw me and gave me a bookmark with the fingerspelling alphabet on it. My brother and I spent all day practising, and by the time we arrived back at Midland station we were having fingerspelt conversations. Since then I have always been interested in signed languages." However it was not until she was in her 30's before she started learning part time. She found it so interesting that she went full time to Tafe to do a Diploma in Auslan. She is now studying to become an interpreter.