KHACHATUR ABOVYAN ARMENIAN STATE PEDAGOGICAL UNIVERSITY

A three-day course on "Functional Vision Assessment" (FVA) is underway at Armenian State Pedagogical University (ASPU) within the framework of cooperation between ASPU and the US-based Perkins School for the Blind.

The course entails several stages: the practical part was preceded by online meetings.

On May 5, Sonja Alimović, Associate Professor at the Faculty of Education and Rehabilitation Sciences in University of Zagreb, and Tatjana Petrović, Director of Mali Dom, a center for MDVI (multiple disabilities and visual impairment) children in Croatia, spoke about visual function testing at ASPU.

Standardized and non-standardized tools for FVA have been entrusted to ASPU, that’s why the course is being held at this educational institution. Representatives of various institutions of Armenia, who participate in the course, will participate in visual function tests and assessment, will learn and be able to apply those assessment tools in practice. This will enable to assess the vision in children with complex and multiple disabilities, which is significantly different from a standard ophthalmic exam.

In fact, this is an innovation in Armenia. “In Armenia, we do not have centers which conduct functional vision assessment. This international experience will help fill that gap and establish such a structure that will make the lives of children with multiple and complex needs easier and help them integrate into society more effectively and successfully," Zaruhi Harutyunyan, a lecturer at the Chair of Logopedics and Rehabilitation Therapy at ASPU, Armenia’s representative at the Perkins School for the Blind, said in a conversation with aspu.am.