[nabs-l] A Question for the College Students

[Kaiti Shelton]

I'm going to comment on a few other things if that's okay.  Cindy  has
a great point about google apps.  I don't know them and wish that I
did.  Powerpoint is different though; I was lucky enough to get
extensive MS office training early, so powerpoint is pretty eawsy once
you're familiar with it.  (Justin and all, do you know you can still
use the F7 key to spell-check powerpoint documents)?  I used to worry
about the visual display, but any more there are pre-designed themes
that come loaded into the document.  If you get someone to describe
them once, you can have a few in your back pocket to pick and choose
from independently.  E.G, two of my favorite designs are Newsprint and
Apex).  I just recently made a powerpoint, and it was so great to just
pick Newsprint and only have to worry about the writing.  Sighted
students do this too, so there's no shame in using the set themes.

Cane travel is key.  Each university is different, but I'd definitely
recommend making sure you're comfortable with crossing busy roads if
you aren't already.  I crossed my first four lane road my freshman
year, and although I'm a good cane traveler it just threw me off since
I had never crossed such a wide street with so many cars before.

Another big piece of advice I would offer is don't be ashamed to use
readers.  I'm a huge stickler for braille and doing things myself, but
there really are times when using a scribe or dictating information to
your professors is just the more practical option.  I am taking a
pretty difficult upper-level music theory course now, which requires
me to graph music to analyze it.  My professor suggested that I find
another way to write notes throughout the test, since I was flipping
between programs on my computer constantly.  I lugged my perkins
brailler across campus to do it, but it still took me forever and I
had to dictate the braille to him afterwards.  In some ways, doing it
in this method made me more confused, since I couldn't correct
mistakes in braille as easily as I could on the computer.  The prof
just said that it might be best to dictate from then on.  At first I
hesitated because I wanted to do my own work, but he was good about
telling me in nicer terms to get over myself and accept his offer to
be my scribe.  In this case, I have to admit he was right.  My last
test was completed in the same time as everyone else, which has never
happened before, and I got the highest grade on my tests thus far
because I could catch mistakes without being confused about what the
braille said.

On 11/19/14, Joshua Hendrickson via nabs-l <nabs-l at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> Hi to Chris and all.  I agree with a lot of what has already been
> stated.  Do not be afraid to ask for the help you need in completing
> your class assignments, and doing things like taking tests.  Also,
> while in college, I'd suggest learning the routes to your classes as
> soon as you can.  For the first couple years in college, I found
> students or other teachers to take me to where I needed to go.  I wish
> I hadn't done this.  When I finally learned my routes mainly because I
> wanted to do so, things became a lot easier.  If you know the way to
> your classes and other buildings on campus, you can just go very
> easily to where ever you need to go.  You don't have to try and find
> someone to help you find a certain class, and worry that you might be
> late for the beginning of a lecture.  Also, if your college has a
> tutoring service, I'd suggest taking full advantage of it.  Tutoring
> is how I was able to make it through my college math classes.  Also
> working on independent living skills is also a very good thing to work
> on.  I wish I had worked on this more.  Good luck.  It is a great
> thing to have a list where students can ask advice of one another.
>
> On 11/19/14, Roanna Bacchus via nabs-l <nabs-l at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>> Hi Chris hope things are going well.  I wish I would have worked
>> more on my independent living skills in high school.
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> nabs-l mailing list
>> nabs-l at nfbnet.org
>> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nabs-l_nfbnet.org
>> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
>> nabs-l:
>> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nabs-l_nfbnet.org/louvins%40gmail.com
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> nabs-l mailing list
> nabs-l at nfbnet.org
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nabs-l_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
> nabs-l:
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nabs-l_nfbnet.org/crazy4clarinet104%40gmail.com
>


-- 
Kaiti