CPD Opportunities

Message from OMAA PDC

It brings us great pleasure to share with OMAA members the opportunities for continuing professional development for the year 2025! This year, we’ve partnered with NextSense to provide you with new and engaging courses taught by leading experts in the field of vision re/habilitation and education:

 

Scheduled PD opportunities:

• Visual Perception Impairments after Brain Injury: what are they and how to assess them? 5-6 August 2025. This two-part series of workshops will provide an overview of visual perception impairments and experience with the Oxford Visual Perception Screen. Presented by Dr Kathleen Vancleef, an Associate Professor in Cognitive Neuroscience at Durham University in the United Kingdom and supported by a National Institute of Health and care Research Advanced Fellowship. This event will contribute 2.5 PD hours towards COMS re-certification with ACVREP. Please see this flyer for more information on this exciting PD opportunity.
• Orientation and Mobility for Individuals with Cognitive Disabilities: Commencing on 10th February 2025, this pre-recorded series of modules will focus on information about O&M teaching strategies for individuals who have intellectual or cognitive disabilities. A new module will be released every fortnight. This series will contribute 9 PD hours towards COMS re-certification with ACVREP as it addresses the Core Domains of the OMAA O&M Framework. Visit the website for all the details!

 

Existing On-demand PD opportunities:

• Including Children with Vision Impairments in Physical Activity (6 credits). This course provided the participants with an overview of the strengths of children and adolescents with vision impairments and deafblindness related to motor skills and physical activity. Presented by Dr. Lauren Lieberman.
• Orientation and mobility masterclass series: Technology (5 credits). This series on technology for orientation and mobility is intended to provide the Orientation and Mobility Specialist (OMS) with resources for working with an array of age groups across the lifespan. Presented by Chris Tabb.
• Sensory Efficiency Training Series (4 credits). This series on sensory efficiency led by Chris Tabb is intended to provide those working with learners who are blind and low vision with information related to maximising the use of the various senses.
• The CVI practice framework: An approach for working with children who have cerebral visual impairment in an education or habilitation/rehabilitation context (5 credits). This series provides advice about a CVI practice framework. Presented by Dr Nicola McDowell. 
• Scotland CVI online video series (7 credits) lessons written to explain CVI step by step.

 

Conferences

Please head to our Conferences page for a list of upcoming national and international conferences.

 

CPD earning ACVREP recertification credits

• Orientation Aids and Tactile Maps: 90 minute webinar recorded by AER. This presentation will showcase multiple aids to familiarize students to their environment, including tools that are freely available from Google and other vendors that will allow an O&M to develop electronic and tactile maps for their students. 1.5 CPD points.
• VoiceOver 101 for Sighted iPhone Users: 82 minutes webinar recorded by AER. Helping people new to vision loss to use an iPhone with Voice Over is easier than you think. Learn the basics as well as steps for individuals to learn more on their own. 1.25 CPD points.
• Common Eye Disorders in Childhood: on demand three-part webinar, delivered by NextSense. This webinar is a multi part series investigating the common eye disorders in children and the impact that these have on their development. Offers 2.5 CPD points towards COMS recertification.
• Blindness and Low Vision Masterclass Series 2021: on demand six-part webinar, delivered by NextSense. This series of 6 webinars will investigate and provide advice about specific eye conditions. Can be viewed as a complete series or separate webinars can be purchased individually. Offers 6 CPD points towards COMS recertification.
• Leader Dogs for the Blind Seminars: educational seminars for rehabilitation professionals, including certified orientation and mobility specialists wanting to learn more about guide dogs, technology and all that we have to offer at Leader Dog. Some of our learning modules for professionals will earn you continuing education credits through ACVREP.
• APH Hive (American Printing House for the Blind): offering online short courses on a range of Expanded Core Curriculum subjects, including Orientation & Mobility.
• HumanWare Live Webinar Series: interesting back-to-school topics that focus on the use of braille devices or smart magnification tools. Their sessions are free of charge and allow you to earn one-hour of continuing education credit for each session. A range of upcoming webinar dates throughout September and October 2020 are available, as well as access to recordings of previous webinars.
• AER eLearning: a range of topics available, with discounts offered to AER members (Association for Education and Rehabilitation of the Blind and Visually Impaired) with upcoming dates throughout February 2021.
• Perkins School for the Blind eLearning: a large range of courses available, with some spanning several weeks and others a self-paced style of one hour.
• Perkins eLearning professional development opportunities

 

Non-ACVREP CPD

Here are some other O&M/vision specific online professional development opportunities:

• Deafblind Information Australia (DBIA) has released a series of webinars on deafblindness. Their most recent webinar is on O&M and congenital deafblindness. Follow this link to watch the webinar and Q&A recording on their website, along with past DBIA webinars.
• Better client outcomes through Collaboration: webinar presented by Quantum, Thursday 24 November, 2022, 11 am AEDT. This webinar will explore how Occupational Therapists and Orientation and Mobility specialists can work with Quantum, where together they assess a client, trial Quantum products from a wide array of options to find the best fit, and further support the client by offering Quantum product training where necessary. Registration is required and a recording of the webinar will be made available. Recording available to view here.
• From emerging gestures to tactile sign language: Deafblind International Communication Network Webinar 3, Wednesday 20 April 2022 6.30-8.30pm AEST online.
• Orthoptics and congenital deafblindness: Deafblind Information Australia, Tuesday 4 May 2022 7.30-8.30pm AEST online.
• 2021 Online Tactile Reading Conference, 28-30 April 2021 (Oslo) – recorded presentations available for public viewing on demand.
• Save Sight Community Information Day, 18 September 2021 – online and in-person, Sydney Australia. An annual event for people living with low vision or blindness and those who care for them. This event is an opportunity for people in the vision impairment community to connect with each other, share experiences and get up-to-date information.
• NextSense face-to-face short courses: These sessions offer the research and practical skills as well as networking opportunities.
• NextSense webinars: These are convenient, accessible and can be accessed at anytime. These sessions are presented by NextSense staff and external experts in the field.
• Perkins eLearning free webinars
• The NextSense Institute Podcast: The Renwick Centre Podcast is a regular series that discusses hearing and vision education and health- everything from new resources, emerging ideas and hot-button issues!
• A Step Forward Podcast: a podcast for Orientation & Mobility specialists.
• RO&Ming with Lil: provides a forum for people to learn more about functional vision, and orientation and mobility practice, from an Australian perspective. It offers professional development for O&M specialists and guide dog mobility instructors worldwide.
• Challenge Solutions: a podcast made by a group of blind students for other blind students and teachers of the visually impaired. Their mission is to provide audio lessons on various forms of assistive technology and create a conversation about the challenges faced by blind students and their teachers.
• Be My Eyes Podcast: interviews with the world’s most interesting, passionate people from the blind and low vision community – about living blind in a sighted world.
• Sydney Eye Podcast: this podcast explores topics related to eye health and answers common questions about eye conditions from Sydney, Australia.
• Talking Vision Podcast (Vision Australia Radio): on this weekly radio program presented by Sam Colley, you’ll hear discussions of issues relating to blindness and low vision, stories of inspiration and achievement from people living with vision loss, find out how you can access services from Vision Australia and how you can get involved in assisting Vision Australia to assist people who are blind or have low vision to life the life they choose.

 

Communities of Practice Meetings

These meetings are a means of staying in touch with other O&M specialists around Australasia to share resources, knowledge and experience outside of our organisations. The Membership Engagement Committee will be running these meetings quarterly with different topics to be covered in each session. To find out about upcoming meetings, or to view recordings of previous meetings, check out the CoP Meetings page.

 

Other PD

There is also a range of Australian focused disability related learning opportunities. These are not vision specific, but may have relevance to your professional practice.

• NDS Training and Development; range of topics, prices, durations and delivery methods. Many free online options available. Provided by NDS (National Disability Services).
• Team DSC Training; range of topics, prices, durations and delivery methods. Provided by Disability Services Consulting.