In­ter­na­tion­al Game Tech­nol­o­gy (IGT), a glob­al leader in gam­ing, to­day an­nounced a tech­nol­o­gy do­na­tion to the LIFE (Learn­ing Is For Every­one) Cen­tre in Cas­cade in recog­ni­tion of Autism Aware­ness Month.

The do­na­tion in­cludes desk­tops with ac­cess to ABC mouse Ear­ly Learn­ing Acad­e­my, tablets, a Smart TV and oth­er as­sis­tive ac­ces­sories to en­hance the learn­ing ex­pe­ri­ence at the cen­tre, which of­fers spe­cial ed­u­ca­tion to per­sons with Autism Spec­trum Dis­or­der.

LIFE Cen­tre has been a ben­e­fi­cia­ry of IGT’s Af­ter School Ad­van­tage (ASA) pro­gramme since 2018. ASA is the com­pa­ny’s flag­ship com­mu­ni­ty ini­tia­tive de­vot­ed to pro­vid­ing youth with ac­cess to tech­nol­o­gy. Along­side the tech­nol­o­gy do­na­tion, IGT teamed up with the pae­di­atric ther­a­py or­gan­i­sa­tion Caribbean Kids and Fam­i­lies Ther­a­py Or­ga­ni­za­tion (CK­FTO)—an­oth­er of its ASA pro­gramme part­ners—to stage a mod­i­fied ver­sion of the CK­FTO Count Me In® Pup­pet Show for LIFE Cen­tre’s stu­dents.

“At IGT, we be­lieve in the pow­er of tech­nol­o­gy to bridge gaps in com­mu­ni­ca­tion and learn­ing, par­tic­u­lar­ly for in­di­vid­u­als with spe­cial needs,” said Dex­ter Thomas, IGT’s Gen­er­al Man­ag­er in Trinidad and To­ba­go.

“We are ho­n­oured to con­tin­ue our con­tri­bu­tion to the LIFE Cen­tre by pro­vid­ing tech­nol­o­gy tools that em­pow­er stu­dents to learn in the ways that suit them best. We al­so wel­comed this op­por­tu­ni­ty to col­lab­o­rate with CK­FTO, an­oth­er one of our NGO part­ners in the IGT ASA pro­gramme, to of­fer the pup­pet show as a fun and mean­ing­ful ac­tiv­i­ty to help pro­mote aware­ness and in­clu­sion in the lead-up to Autism Aware­ness Month.”

The pup­pet show was cre­at­ed as an in­no­v­a­tive teach­ing tool to ed­u­cate chil­dren about their peers with dis­abil­i­ties, help­ing to dis­pel fears, myths and mis­con­cep­tions. The orig­i­nal was tai­lored in length and con­tent to both ed­u­cate and en­ter­tain the broad spec­trum of abil­i­ties in the au­di­ence at LIFE Cen­tre.

“This was a won­der­ful op­por­tu­ni­ty for our chil­dren to see sto­ries sim­i­lar to their own re­flect­ed in the lead­ing char­ac­ters in the pup­pet show,” said LIFE Cen­tre prin­ci­pal Faith-Anne Adams.

“We are grate­ful to IGT for spear­head­ing this joy­ful ac­tiv­i­ty at our Cen­tre, and for con­tin­u­ing to sup­port LIFE Cen­tre’s tech­nol­o­gy needs with its lat­est do­na­tion to our com­put­er room.”

The new equip­ment is the third phase do­na­tion to LIFE Cen­tre and was in­stalled on March 21 by IGT’s vol­un­teer team, Kofi Blair, Re­pair Tech­ni­cian, and Shammah Quin­ton, Sys­tem Ad­min­is­tra­tor sup­port­ed by Leslie-Ann Bax­am, Draw Co­or­di­na­tor Lead, Chelsea Al­leyne, Ad­min­is­tra­tive As­sis­tant and Tanya Singh, Glob­al Peo­ple Ser­vices Rep­re­sen­ta­tive. There are 18

IGT ASA part­ners in Trinidad and To­ba­go, each serv­ing chil­dren and youth in com­mu­ni­ties across the coun­try. IGT’s ASA pro­gramme strives to en­sure that chil­dren of all abil­i­ties have ac­cess to tech­nol­o­gy and learn­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties to de­vel­op the knowl­edge and skills for the jobs of to­mor­row.