Posted Thursday February 27 2014 at 11:23 pm
in News
Boston Globe, 2/23/2014
Written by David Abel
Photo by Suzanne Kreiter
Beacon Hill resisting ramps, aids for disabled.
For years, Carl Richardson has shuffled gingerly across the uneven sidewalks and poorly cut curbs of Beacon Hill, guided by a dog and the hope that a loose brick or an unexpected slope doesn’t trip him up.
His journey would be made far easier by a city proposal to install 259 pedestrian ramps with tactile warning strips throughout the historic neighborhood, as part of a decades-long effort to bring the city’s curbs into compliance with the federal Americans with Disabilities Act.
But the plan was rejected in December by officials of the Beacon Hill Architectural Commission. Why? Because they believed, among other things, that the bumpy plastic strips would mar the neighborhood’s Colonial-era character.
Long after other parts of the city, including other designated historic districts, have come into compliance with the disabilities act or have reached agreements to do so, Beacon Hill remains the lone holdout. It holds that stance despite the fact that the city stands to lose hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal funds if a plan is not approved within the next month.
Posted Sunday February 23 2014 at 9:31 pm
in Education
A student-driven event hosted by the Berklee Music Therapy Department on the evening of February 27, 2014 to bring students from different schools together to share their
varied approaches to music and healing
An opportunity to learn from each other - and fueled by pizza!
Thursday evening, February 27, 2014
6:30 - 8:00 pm
The Steve Heck Room
1140 Boylston Street, Boston
Berklee College of Music
RSVP to musictherapy@berklee.edu
Could a pair of headphones change the lives of millions of Americans suffering from Alzheimer's and dementia? "Alive Inside: A Story of Music & Memory," a new documentary at the Sundance Film Festival, follows a social worker named Dan Cohen who has launched a campaign to bring iPods and music therapy to nursing homes. One of the central characters he works with is a 90-something Alzheimer's patient named Henry Dryer, who was featured in a video posted online that went viral in 2012, with over 1 million views. The above clip begins with video of Dryer looking largely unresponsive to the outside world. Then he was given a pair of headphones to listen to Cab Calloway, his favorite artist. The music energizes him, awakens him and helps bring back old memories. We play clips from the film and speak with Cohen about his project, "Music & Memory", which he hopes to expand around the world. We are also joined by Michael Rossato-Bennett, the film's director and producer.
