THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.......

 approved H.R.3061, their version of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2002 Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations legislation and the Senate Appropriations Committee passed their version of this legislation.  Consideration by the full Senate of the FY 2002 Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations bill is expected.

        The House Appropriations and Senate approved an increase of $975 million for President Bush's Early Reading First and Reading First literacy programs, added to the existing $300 million in the Even Start program.
     The House approved an overall increase for all Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) programs of $1.4 billion or 19% over FY2001 funding levels.   
     The House approved an increase of $1.3 billion or 22% for the IDEA Part B State Grant Program over FY2001 funding levels, but the Senate approved only $1 billion.
       The House approved an increase of $46 million or 12% for IDEA Part C Grants for Infants and Families, representing a funding boost 5 times higher than the FY 2001 increase of $8.5 million. The Senate kept the same level appropriated in FY2001.
       The House and Senate approved an increase of $8 million or 10% for IDEA Part D Personnel Preparation Grant program over FY2001 levels.  With the first increase for this program in six years, the funding for this university-based professional development program is up to $90 million.

     The House and Senate must meet to eliminate funding differences in their bills before a final package can be sent to President Bush for his approval.  Currently, all programs funded by the Labor-HHS-Education bill are being funded at FY2001 level under a short-term funding resolution until November 6th.  ASHA expects a final agreement on education funding will be completed before the Thanksgiving holiday.  For more information about IDEA funding, please contact Neil Snyder, ASHA's Director of Federal Advocacy, by e-mail at nsnyder@asha.org or by phone at 800-498-2071,ext.4257.

SOUND RECORDER
If you have a computer in your therapy room, there is a program already on the computer that that you can use as an assistive technology therapy tool.  The program is called Sound Recorder.  If you have a microphone, the program will allow you to record a minute or two of sound and play it back instantaneously.  This can be helpful in articulation therapy because kids like to practice their words on the computer.  Then, depending on how sensitive the microphone is, they sometimes can listen and judge their own speech accuracy.  Even if the microphone is not that sensitive, they usually enjoy hearing themselves recorded and will be enthusiastic about practicing their speech.

Program Setup:  
 Microphone:  Any basic tape recorder microphone with a mini-plug will work.  It does not have to be a computer microphone.  Plug the microphone into the microphone jack on the back of the computer. 

 Finding the Program:  Click on the Start button in the lower left corner of the screen and a menu should appear.  Go to Programs, then Accessories, then Entertainment, and then Sound Recorder.  When you click on Sound Recorder a small window, appears.  The program works like a regular tape recorder and has the same buttons:  play, rewind, fast-forward, record, and stop.  Instead of the words, the buttons have the standard symbols for these functions.  The program won’t work yet, though.  First you have to change the microphone settings in the computer.

 Microphone Settings:  To set the microphone input level:  Use the Start button menus to go to Programs, Accessories, Entertainment, then click on Volume Control.  A box with several volume sliders comes up, but none of them are for microphone recording.  Click on the Options menu in the upper left corner and go to Properties.  This opens another box.  You will see “adjust the volume for”, click Options menu in the upper left corner and go to Properties.  This opens another box.  You will see “adjust the volume for”, click “recording”.  Below that there is a list of volume controls that can be shown.  Scroll down until you find mic and then click on the box next to it so that it is checked.  Click OK at the bottom of the whole dialog box .This will give you the mic volume control.  Click on the slider and drag it up almost to the top.  This setting should work well.  Then close the box by clicking the X in the upper right corner.  The setting should be changed now.

 Making an icon for the desktop:  To make an icon for your desk top computer screen, do the following:  Find the program in the menus like above (Start, Programs, Accessories, Entertainment, Sound Recorder), but when you get to Sound Recorder, click on it with the right mouse button instead of the left.  This should give you another menu.  Click on Create Shortcut.  Now there should be an icon for sound recorder on your computer screen.  Click on it whenever you want to use the program.

2001 PROFESSOR OF THE YEAR NAMED
Congratulations to Mary Steppling, past president of SCSHA!  Mary has been named 2001 Professor of the Year for South Carolina by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement and Support of Education.   The Carnegie/CASE U.S. Professors of the Year program salutes outstanding undergraduate instructors who excel as teachers and influence the lives and careers of their students.  Mary is an associate professor of speech-language pathology at Columbia College.  She received the Columbia College 2000-2001 Teacher of the Year Award. We are so proud of you, Mary.

You Are Invited To Serve On Two New Ad-Hoc Committees
You are invited to serve on two new ad-hoc committees with SCSHA. 
      The first one is a "Medicaid Reimbursement Committee."  This committee will research and begin studying ways to increase the Medicaid reimbursement rate for our state.  We need representation from all work settings as we focus on this new issue.  Much of our work can be done via email with few actual meetings needed.  This is a very important issue that needs our attention especially now with budget problems across all settings. 
     The second one is a "Community Liaison Committee."  These committee members would alternate sending SCSHA representatives to meetings around the state such as State Board of Education, Board of Examiners in SLP and Audiology, etc.  SCSHA attendance at the meetings would provide the association with eyes and ears and increase our visibility among state agencies and with our leaders.  Contact June Maranville at 803-356-5665 or email buginsc@aol.com to get on the list or if you have any questions.  Please seriously consider serving your association by volunteering for committee work!!  

ACTION ALERT
Urge Your Senators to Co-Sponsor H.R. 1394 & H.R. 1395.  Your help is needed in urging your U.S. Senators to co-sponsor two bills that would permanently repeal the $1,500 Medicare rehabilitation cap.  These bills would also provide a technical correction to the outpatient section of the Medicare statute to provide greater patient access to speech-language pathology services in private practice settings. 

SCIENTISTS REPORT FINDING A GENE FOR SPEECH
By NICHOLAS WADE

A team of geneticists and linguists say they have found a gene that underlies speech and language, the first to be linked to this uniquely human faculty. The discovery buttresses the idea that language is acquired and generated by specific neural circuitry in the brain, rather than by general brain faculties. The gene, which joins a handful known to affect human behavior, is of particular interest because its role is to switch on a cascade of other genes in the developing brain of the fetus. Biologists hope that by identifying these "downstream" genes, they may be able to unravel the genetic basis of human language.