Senior Living Communities

From Carolyn Odio, member of a CCRC community, and author of A-Z HEARING LOSS

Getting the word out: Publicity

Once you have a tiny planning group (2-5 people) interested in establishing a hearing loss support group, the next steps are to get organized, plan a program and assess your publicity access capabilities. 

For example, Panorama has established “Intranet” called KYA with 50+ groups participating; this helps with publicity…as does our manually delivered monthly Panorama News with a calendar at the end of the publication (which I attach a sample below). Another form of publicity include announcements on our Panorama TV station (volunteer run). 

Important: Publicity must reach those residents who do NOT use electronic devices such as email, computers, etc. This is especially critical in a Senior environment. 

Programs

Finding an engaging program topic and speaker is the challenge. 

–Do you have access to a Speakers Bureau?

–Does a member have access to an Audiologist, that uses “Best Practices”? Be careful – bring a good audiologist! 

Virtual Programs

–You can join another group that has a meeting already set up virtually if you have basic equipment to handle a hybrid meeting (Zoom or Google Meet, etc.) That way you can use TED Talks, or YouTube videos from Dr. Cliff Olson, AuD. For preplanned programs. Also, check the USA Calendar on HLAA Leaders in groups.io

     1) Meeting Room setup (I like chairs around a table format) in a cozy environment that comfortably fits the number of attendees. Obviously, there is guesswork involved in determining the right size for the first meeting.

     2) Large Screen TV that can accommodate an HDMI cord to plug into a laptop. Check for an HDMI port on both devices.

     3) Captions can be provided via a Zoom Call. In person I use one PowerPoint screen template on a laptop computer and enable the caption capability within PowerPoint. It captions anyone (speaker and attendees) that the computer audio picks up.

Meeting Sign-In

Be sure that everyone signs in to the meeting so you have a list of attendees for announcing future programs. I use the sign-in sheet to send out additional resources discussed in a meeting. For example if you are talking about Hearing Aids, I might send out a Hearing Aid Checklist out to those who have signed in. This encourages everyone to actually sign in!

Materials

Make sure you have resources and materials available at the meeting as well. Popular items include buttons that read “Face Me – I Have Hearing Loss,” Police Visor Cards or the Blue Envelope Program for a traffic stop, and DMV applications to put the hearing loss logo on your driver’s license. Find that information in A-Z HEARING LOSS DIRECTORY with a search.