Equality & Diversity (Learning Disability)

This one-day workshop is aimed at carers (employed and volunteers) and support staff who work within the setting of Learning Disability services. The course has been designed to enable participants to reflect upon the history of people with Learning Disabilities and raise their awareness and understanding of Equality and Diversity in a Learning Disability context.

Learning objectives:

By the end of the course participants should have understood:

• A conceptual and ethical framework: Equal Opportunities / Diversity / Prejudice / Discrimination / Oppression
  / Anti-oppressive practice
• An overview of Valuing People: A New Strategy for Learning Disability for the 21st Century (Department of Health, 2001)
• An overview of The Learning Disability Task Force annual report 2006-07
• How people with Learning Disabilities have been regarded and issues of self- identity
• Norms, labels, stereotypes, prejudices and discrimination
• How people with Learning Disabilities have been discriminated against and how they have been subject to prejudice
  and discrimination
• What it feels like to be on the receiving end of discrimination/oppressive behaviour
• The language and the behaviours that support and reinforce the marginalisation of people with Learning Disabilities
• The history of people with Learning Disabilities in United Kingdom
• What is Institutionalisation – a hidden history
• The issues raised by Video Silent Minority, a television documentary (1981) of what happened out of view in
  St Lawrences and Borocourt; two understaffed long stay institutions
• De-institutionalisation and the revolution of the 1980s, including the theory of “Normalisation” and “Ordinary living”
• The cycle of oppression and the cycle of empowerment
• An overview of the Law, including the Disability Discrimination Act (1995) and the Human Rights Act (1998)
• What is Direct and Indirect discrimination, harassment, victimisation
• How to work in an anti-oppressive way
• How to overcome the barriers that reinforce discrimination and prevent equality
• The power we have as practitioners
• How we can use this power in the interest of and people with Learning Disabilities

Training methods:

• Word shower method
• Small group work
• Debate and reflection
• Simulation exercises
• Talk and chalk
• OHP/PowerPoint presentation
• Role-play
• Handout
• Self-assessment questionnaire
• Case study
• Quiz
• Tutor presentations
• Video(s)
• Examination of policies/ guidelines/documentation

CP30/4.9