[nFBMI-Talk] Update: The 2018 BEET Conference From NFB Of Michiana And Goshen College

Kane Brolin kbrolin65 at gmail.com
Thu Mar 15 20:09:02 UTC 2018


Hi to all members, supporters, and fellow travelers with the Michiana
Chapter of the National Federation of the Blind.

Excitement continues to grow around our upcoming BEET Conference: the
Blind in Education, Employment, and Technology.  Everything is still
on for Friday, April 13, at the College Mennonite Church of Goshen,
Indiana.  But an important change has occurred to our program. I've
got a bad news/good news scenario to report:

Bad news:  Christine Boone, familiar to many of you who might be
reading this from Michigan, is unable to come this year due to a very
important family commitment that was unavoidable.  But  ...  wait for
it  ...

Good news:  We have a new keynote speaker who has not been present at
either of the first two installments of the BEET Conference: Richard
Crawford, a blind professional who just recently retired from 46 years
as a stockbroker in the Sioux City, Iowa, area.  That's right; without
eyesight he graduated college and managed to find and serve wealthy
clients and achieve impressive success, starting in the early
1970s--that is, before the advent of the personal computer, the
smartphone, and Uber--and he did some of his most impressive work in
rural surroundings without easy access to public transportation.  Rich
has served on the board of the Iowa Commission for the Blind and is a
long-time Federationist who knew Dr. Kenneth Jernigan, a titan of the
organized blind movement in the United States from the 1950s through
the late 1990s.

In addition, it looks as though Richard "Dick" Davis of Blindness:
Learning In New Dimensions of Minneapolis, Minnesota is going to join
us and contribute again this year.  I have not received yet absolute
confirmation of this, but he has told me it probably will work out in
his schedule to be here.  While not blind himself, Dick has worked
tirelessly to match blind people up with jobs—even with Fortune 500
companies--for 47 years, in the states of Iowa, New Mexico, and
Minnesota. He has served as an Orientation and Mobility (O&M)
specialist; as a teacher, counselor, and area supervisor in the field
of blindness
rehabilitation; and as director of Minnesota State Services for the
Blind.  Until his semi-retirement at the end of 2016, Dick served as
associate director of BLIND Inc., a training center operated by the
National Federation of the Blind.  Dick now has his own consulting
company, and his passion is helping people who are
blind, to find employment,.  Dick points out that he still engages in
direct job placement, and even now (in his late sixties) he is known
to unload trailer trucks at Federal Express alongside the blind
employees he helped to place there.

I have said it is important for conference attendees to participate,
not just to sit and soak.  For one of our 2017 attendees, Chris
Milewski, this active participation model is about to pay off in a
very personal way.
Chris has gotten accepted and funded for his admission into BLIND
Inc.'s comprehensive blindness training program and is scheduled to
start on May 1, 2018.
There is a strong possibility this will lead to a gainful job
opportunity with a big company with a household name that everybody
would recognize.

Do consider coming and participating.  For further questions, please
write back or phone me at (574)386-8868.  You also are welcome to
write to nfbofmichiana at gmail.com.

Kind regards,

Kane Brolin, President
Michiana Chapter, National Federation of the Blind




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