Episode 14: 5 Biggest Trends and Predictions for 2020
In this ever-changing world, he who holds back and refuses to adapt gets left behind. As Grace Murray Hopper said, “The most damaging phrase in the language is, ‘We've always done it this way’.” It is crucial, more than ever, to be fluid, to think forward and face the changes head-on. We, as Orientation and Mobility specialists, want to be on that leading edge, at the forefront of what's coming up and what to expect so that we will know where to put our time and energy.
I find this episode special because we are going to be chatting about the biggest predictions and trends that I see happening across our field for 2020. Some of them might surprise you and I'm going to go as far as to say that you're not going to agree with all of them. And that's okay. I'd still love for you to listen and let me know what you think in the end. Here it goes.
1. Cities are getting more complex and more accessible at the same time.
Here in the United States since 1990, we've had the ADA laws. You might have noticed that there are curves and places where there aren't curves anymore and that’s because city planners are trying their best to retrofit our landscape in accordance with the said law. New roadway designs including roundabouts, traffic chokers, and pedestrian relief islands are now more commonplace but they're really complex to navigate. In addition to that, there are also places wherein intersections have Exclusive Pedestrian Phase. It is a portion of a traffic signal cycle that is reserved for pedestrian movements while displaying red on all traffic signals for vehicles and during this phase, pedestrians walk in all directions. In cases like this, the “Go Parallel” technique might be a little outdated. So, I would urge you to have better collaboration with your team members, if you have any other Orientation and Mobility specialists around you, the city planners and traffic engineers to see if there's a way to accommodate these changes and increase the independence and safety of the visually impaired when crossing the street.
2. Caseloads are going to be more diverse.
Across the board, I'm seeing younger Orientation and Mobility specialists fighting for the geriatric community who aren’t working. Unfortunately, sometimes, who that person is, their age, and where they're trying to get to or their needs, don't align with the purpose of the foundation or the agency that's providing the money. And so then, we have a mismatch in what O&M specialist is allowed to provide, and what the student needs. We've also had situations where students haven't before qualified for Orientation and Mobility. What we've seen in the past is that there's like this huge gap where all these people who need services just fall into that loophole. Now, because we've had so much advocacy happening, we're able to get these people out of the loopholes and we're really starting to broaden who we serve. On top of all of that. There's been at least a 16% increase in disabilities over the past decade.
3. Rise of the micro-influencer O&M on Instagram.
Instagram posts are becoming more like mini-blogs, the captions have become more insightful and the use of hashtags are really helping people find topics that they are interested with. I would suggest that you hop on over to Instagram because there are a lot of really great Orientation and Mobility specialist, Teacher for the Visually Impaired putting out fantastic content on Instagram like tactical maps or their lesson plans.
Check out Instagram accounts like:
4. More sophisticated professionals.
Think about this, since the beginning of the tech era, accessibility has been an afterthought. Then Apple said “We aren’t going to do things that way.”, and they put Accessibility options natively on all of their devices. Now, Microsoft and Google are spending millions upon millions of dollars to try to catch up to Apple because they didn't do the research beforehand. They were just doing things as they had always done things.
We're becoming more sophisticated and that we are not interested in doing things the way that we've always done them. “That’s the way we’ve always done things”, is no longer acceptable especially for people who are fresh out of university because they know how fast things have changed. They can see the difference in the way that, the older populations are doing things, and the way that they are have been taught to do things are so different. We are more cognizant, specific, strategic, not only about who we teach, but how we teach. We're also looking at, where are we going to also spend our money? What's important to us? How does this benefit me in the long run? And is it worth it? We are becoming more sophisticated was that we're really honing in on what we spend our time on what we're willing, and not willing to waste our time on as professionals. We want things to be more efficient.
5. Rise of Ridesharing.
We are seeing an increase in rideshare opportunities. If you can teach your students how to use rideshare in some way, even if it's teaching them how to hire a new driver, and then they split that ride with other people, that’s already one big step forward. Just having the ability to have the concept of what rideshare is, will help our students exponentially. It will allow them to feel like they have more of the world at their fingertips. I would also encourage your students’ families to start using this and allow your students to experience what it's like when their families use it to go places. Uber now has UberFamily option. This way, they have a little bit more control in their lives and in their own independence.
So there you have it, my five biggest predictions and trends for 2020.