[nabs-l] is there any place for schools for the blind?

Mon Nov 3 01:50:36 UTC 2014

I had Arielle's experience. I went to public and Catholics schools but
every summer I went to a summer programs for visually impaired. It was
through our public schools. I had a very difficult time socially in public
school. I was teased daily most of my life. I am legally blind so i was
teased for being blind and teased for "pretending" to be blind. I was
miserable. Having the summer program to meet others who were legally blind
and totally blind filled that gap. I am still friends now at age 50 with
someone I met in first grade at the summer program. There were time I felt
i was such an outcast thta I wished I was going to a school for the blind.

I am in college now and I find the social situation to be much better.

On Sun, Nov 2, 2014 at 6:19 PM, Arielle Silverman via nabs-l <
nabs-l at nfbnet.org> wrote:

> Hi all,
> This is an excellent question and I see a few points worth considering.
> First, most kids who attend schools for the blind nowadays have
> intellectual disabilities. I’m not sure this trend is a good thing. If
> someone is blind and also has an intellectual disability, sending them
> to a blind school is treating their blindness like the primary
> disability when it’s not. I’ve always wondered if the education these
> kids get at the blind schools really addresses their educational needs
> as well as a special ed program for intellectual disabilities could.
> It also adversely affects the quality of learning for kids who are
> only blind.
> Second, a lot of people say that a mainstreamed environment is a
> better place to learn social skills. That wasn’t my experience. I
> attended public school but went to summer camp and weekend activities
> with local blind kids from ages 9 to 17. Like others have described, I
> had trouble making friends in public school. Sighted kids usually
> ignored me and didn’t much care how I behaved socially. However, other
> blind kids not only were willing to be my friend, but they would tease
> me and give me a hard time if I did things that bothered them. When I
> think about my friendships now and how I interact with people, I can
> trace most of what I’ve learned back to my interactions with other
> blind people. For example, I had a blind best friend for several
> years, who eventually cut off the friendship, and this taught me a ton
> about how to be a good friend and keep my friendships from getting in
> trouble. From ages 12 to 24, all my encounters with romance, crushing,
> flirting, dating and breaking up involved other blind people. If I
> hadn’t had the company of other blind people, I wouldn’t have had any
> of those experiences to learn and grow from. I know some folks are
> very happy and successful without ever befriending a blind person, but
> I don’t like the assumption that interaction with sighted people is
> the only or the best way to become socially competent. The best way to
> develop social skills is just to have social opportunities be they
> with sighted, blind or both.
> That said, I am grateful for my public school education because it was
> academically challenging. Unfortunately, some schools and some
> families still have low expectations. In these cases, a school for the
> blind may be needed to provide essential Braille training or to set
> higher expectations. I don’t think the schools should pull young
> children to live there away from their families, and I think that most
> kids’ attendance at these schools should probably be limited to a few
> years. I’d also love to see more summer enrichment programs that could
> help blind kids have the social opportunities I had while still being
> mainstreamed. I don’t support closing the schools down completely
> because I think that if they can help even a few families who have no
> other resources, they are worth having.
> Arielle
>
>
> On 11/2/14, Carly Mihalakis via nabs-l <nabs-l at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> > Good evening,
> >
> >   Despite all this new fangled tech stuff, think about it, has either
> > our relative position within the social system, or to exceptional
> > opportunity really underwent all that much of a transformation? I
> > mean, for you to queery if blind schools even have a relevance within
> > I think you said today's society? Hell yes they do! Don't you agree
> > that if an institution say, succeeds in helping a single student,
> > then yes, it does have a place! Schools for the blind do in fact
> > serve people. As many have said, blind people with other problems.
> > Are you gonna deny such people access to education for a simple fact
> > of it's not squeezing into your model of educating blind people?
> > Don't mean to be overly harsh but, remember not to assume ALL blind
> > people are made of the same stuff!
> > for today, Car
> >
> >
> > .
> >>So, today I was thinking about a rather interesting question which
> >>came to my mind, and which I've thought about numerous times before,
> >>that being, the place for schools for the blind in today's society.
> >>A few years ago, there was a huge news story that broke in New York
> >>about protesters going to Lavel and NYISE (New York Institute for
> >>Special Ed) to speak out in support of the 2 schools, which then
> >>Governor Quomo I believe it was wanted to cut from the state budget
> >>and close.
> >>And that left me wondering,
> >>as someone who spent most of his elementary years at the NYISE, and
> >>the rest of my term in regular public school, finishing 4th and 5th
> >>grade at a local school and going on to do my entire post-secondary
> >>education in public schools, what exactly did I think?
> >>And to be honest, I don't quite have an answer myself.
> >>I started 4th grade with the Braille Lite and APH's Braille & Speak,
> >>so obviously this is quite a while back.
> >>But I remember in those early years I was shocked at all this tech
> >>that I just was not allowed to use in the school for the blind.
> >>Yet the lite had its problems, as anyone who's used one probably
> >>knows. For one thing, mine kept crashing every 4 to 7 weeks on a
> >>constant schedule and promptly deleting my entire file system. Not
> >>good, to say the least.
> >>But technology has obviously progressed a lot since then, wih the
> >>Braille Note Apex being extremely stable and solid. I've never had a
> >>Braille Note crash, at least never as badly as what used to happen
> >>with the braille lites.
> >>And now with the advance of technology some argue, and I share this
> >>point, that within a few years all we'll really need are braille
> >>displays.
> >>I mean we have JAWS, System Access, Window Eyes, NVDA, Dolfin, and
> >>Super Nova for Windows--Winow Eyes and NVDA are both now free, System
> >>Access now extremely affordable, for about $250 with a package that
> >>gives you way more then just a screenreader, and most if not all have
> >>braille display support built in.
> >>And with VoiceOver on the Mac and accessible versions of other
> >>platforms such as Linux there is no system that is not accessible, and
> >>if there is such a system, there are now ways which are widely known
> >>to make them accessible.
> >>Granted we still have the applications within those systems (Google
> >>apps for example) which can still present challenges but that's just a
> >>piece of what has become a mostly accessible digital ecosystem.
> >>So, where do you think, if anywhere, do schools for the blind fit?
> >>Note that this isn't a chriticism of schools for the blind--I studied
> >>at one, like I said, and they did have their advantages at the time
> >>and perhaps still have in certain circumstances,
> >>but given that they were chiefly in existence to provide an education
> >>to the blind, an education that is now for the most part accessible to
> >>us outside of those limits, do we need schools for the blind anymore?
> >>I myself don't have a position one way or another, so I'm very
> >>interested in hearing your thoughts on this topic.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>--
> >>Jorge A. Paez
> >>
> >>LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/jorgeapaez11994
> >>
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> >
> >
> >
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