The Platform
With the Lighthouse Therapy, llc Platform, your students will never have to install software as it runs 100% in the browser. Most other video-conferencing products, such as Zoom, WebEx, GoToMeeting, and Skype, require everyone on the call to download their specific software. Plus, when it’s time to join a session with those products, your student needs a specific meeting-room link you have to create every time. With Lighthouse Platform, your students simply login and click one button to begin!
Lighthouse Therapy, llc Platform does not need any plugins, including Adobe Flash. Flash was one of the first ways websites were able to include animation, but because of major security and reliability concerns, is quickly becoming obsolete. It has never been supported by iPhones, iPads, or Android. For those reasons, we have always been committed to making the Lighthouse Therapy Platform 100% flash and plugin free.
Our Minimum Bandwidth Requirements are extremely flexible. The Lighthouse Therapy, llc Platform’s video dynamically adjusts based on the strength of yours and your student’s Internet connection. The faster and more stable the connection the better the video quality will be. If a bandwidth drops below a certain threshold, the Lighthouse Therapy, llc Platform will automatically drop the video and go into audio-only mode until the bandwidth needed for video resumes. For a good connection, we recommend at least a 1,000kbs download and 500kbs upload speed. Keep in mind, if the Internet connection is being used by multiple devices at the same time, whatever bandwidth available will be split among them.
The aim of the Lighthouse Therapy Platform’s documentation feature is to increase your productivity by enabling you to both view previous notes and write new ones while in a session (or outside a session). Also, with the Lighthouse Therapy, llc Platform, you can securely share notes or homework with your students, so they appear for them on their dashboard. Further, if a new therapist takes over a student, they have access to all previous notes. Because the Lighthouse Therapy Platform is committed to flexibility, there are no templates or goal tracking tools specific to speech or other types of therapy like you would find in an EMR system.
Resources are easily accessible! We have several thousand pre-loaded resources for you to access and will continue to add resources as we grow. You can also upload your own resources, including IEPs in a safe HIPAA/FERPA complaint way to share in an IEP meeting. Students can even upload their work and share with the therapist a special drawing, a favorite story, or an assignment they want to share. Once you upload a resource (card set, Word Doc, PDF, PowerPoint, etc.), you can set it to be shared with others at Lighthouse Therapy. Therapists can go to the resource store and add the resource to their list with just a few clicks. This is great if you have resources or documents you like to use or wish to share with your colleagues.
Your students can play interactive memory games, use and interact with flashcards, play board games, use a whiteboard, watch Youtube videos that are therapist controlled and both the therapist and student can annotate. The materials presented and the size of the video feed are easily adjusted depending on where the student needs to focus to get a greater benefit and experience in the session. There is also the option of a second document camera for testing, hand writing, etc.
With the Lighthouse Therapy, llc Platform, you can upload PDF, Word, and PowerPoint Files. You can also upload images (jpeg, png, bit) into card sets or to create a memory game. All files you upload are saved to your resource list and become available for use in any session.
The Lighthouse Therapy, llc Platform is 100% FERPA and HIPAA compliant.
The Lighthouse Therapy llc, Platform is committed to student security and privacy. We utilize many security measures to protect confidential information including at-rest encryption and 256-bit in-transit data encryption. We also follow all HIPAA/FERPA policies including those related to personal identifiable information.
With the Lighthouse Therapy, llc Platform, you will receive a very high level of help and support. Built into the core of our business is a commitment to see our schools succeed through online therapy. For this reason, support will be provided via dedicated phone line with live tech support.
When a student joins a session early, they will enter a Virtual Waiting Room and the therapist will receive a notification. This will give the therapist the ability to chat with your student to let them know you are in another session or will be late. The chat box will also give the therapist a link to move to the session with them. This is great if the therapist has students back-to-back.
There is also the screen sharing feature. With this, you can share your entire screen or chose a specific application to share. When you share your screen with the Lighthouse Therapy Platform, the screen-share video is placed behind the white-board enabling you to annotate on top of it. Plus, when you share your screen, your camera video does not appear as with other platforms (we do give you the ability to turn off your camera video if you would like).
Group Sessions can technically be conducted with multiple students, though we recommend not more than 3 students simultaneously. Over 3 can be difficult to manage with everyone having the ability to talk. At Lighthouse Therapy llc, we highly encourage these students to login on separate computers. A max of 2 students if they are both on the same computer. This feature is also great for IEP and team meetings, where the number of attendees is virtually unlimited.
