[NFBNJ] The Braille Monitor, January 2019
joe ruffalo
nfbnj1 at verizon.net
Wed Jan 2 15:41:32 UTC 2019
Greetings to all!
Happy new year!
Hoping for a healthy and productive 2019.
I have pasted the Braille monitor for January, 2019.
Please read and share with others.
This issue, like the other monthly issues, are filled with educational,
motivational and inspirational articles that will raise your expectations to
live the life you want!
Warmly,
Joe
We care. We share. We grow. We make a difference
Joe Ruffalo, President
National Federation of the Blind of New Jersey
973 743 0075
nfbnj1 at verizon.net
www.nfbnj.org
Raising Expectations To Live The Life You Want!
Your old car keys can be keys to literacy for the blind.
Donate your unwanted vehicle to us by clicking
www.carshelpingtheblind.org
or call 855 659 9314
***
BRAILLE MONITOR
Vol. 62, No. 1 January 2019
Gary Wunder, Editor
Distributed by email, in inkprint, in Braille, and on USB flash
drive, by the
NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND
Mark Riccobono, President
telephone: 410-659-9314
email address: nfb at nfb.org
website address: http://www.nfb.org
NFBnet.org: http://www.nfbnet.org
NFB-NEWSLINE� information: 866-504-7300
Like us on Facebook: Facebook.com/nationalfederationoftheblind
Follow us on Twitter: @NFB_Voice
Watch and share our videos: YouTube.com/NationsBlind
Letters to the President, address changes, subscription requests, and
orders for NFB literature should be sent to the national office. Articles
for the Monitor and letters to the editor may also be sent to the national
office or may be emailed to gwunder at nfb.org.
Monitor subscriptions cost the Federation about forty dollars per year.
Members are invited, and nonmembers are requested, to cover the
subscription cost. Donations should be made payable to National Federation
of the Blind and sent to:
National Federation of the Blind
200 East Wells Street at Jernigan Place
Baltimore, Maryland 21230-4998
THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND KNOWS THAT BLINDNESS IS NOT THE
CHARACTERISTIC THAT DEFINES YOU OR YOUR FUTURE. EVERY DAY WE RAISE THE
EXPECTATIONS OF BLIND PEOPLE, BECAUSE LOW EXPECTATIONS CREATE OBSTACLES
BETWEEN BLIND PEOPLE AND OUR DREAMS. YOU CAN LIVE THE LIFE YOU WANT;
BLINDNESS IS NOT WHAT HOLDS YOU BACK. THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND
IS NOT AN ORGANIZATION SPEAKING FOR THE BLIND-IT IS THE BLIND SPEAKING FOR
OURSELVES.
ISSN 0006-8829
� 2018 by the National Federation of the Blind
Each issue is recorded on a thumb drive (also called a memory stick
or USB flash drive). You can read this audio edition using a computer or a
National Library Service digital player. The NLS machine has two slots-the
familiar book-cartridge slot just above the retractable carrying handle and
a second slot located on the right side near the headphone jack. This
smaller slot is used to play thumb drives. Remove the protective rubber pad
covering this slot and insert the thumb drive. It will insert only in one
position. If you encounter resistance, flip the drive over and try again.
(Note: If the cartridge slot is not empty when you insert the thumb drive,
the digital player will ignore the thumb drive.) Once the thumb drive is
inserted, the player buttons will function as usual for reading digital
materials. If you remove the thumb drive to use the player for cartridges,
when you insert it again, reading should resume at the point you stopped.
You can transfer the recording of each issue from the thumb drive to
your computer or preserve it on the thumb drive. However, because thumb
drives can be used hundreds of times, we would appreciate their return in
order to stretch our funding. Please use the return envelope enclosed with
the drive when you return the device.
[PHOTO CAPTION: Mandalay Bay Resort]
Las Vegas Site of 2019 NFB Convention
The 2019 convention of the National Federation of the Blind will take
place July 7 to July 12, at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino, 3950 South
Las Vegas Blvd, Las Vegas, Nevada 89119. Make your room reservation as soon
as possible with the Mandalay Bay Resort staff only. Call 877-632-9001.
The 2019 room rate of $99 per night applies to singles and doubles as
well as triples and quads. Hotel and sales taxes are 13.38 percent and 8.25
percent, respectively. The resort fee (normally $37 a night) will be waived
for NFB convention attendees. However, fees for internet access, local and
toll-free calls, and fitness center access may apply. The hotel will take a
deposit of the first night's room rate for each room and will require a
credit card or a personal check. If you use a credit card, the deposit will
be charged against your card immediately. If a reservation is cancelled
before Friday, June 1, 2019, half of the deposit will be returned.
Otherwise refunds will not be made.
Rooms will be available on a first-come, first-served basis.
Reservations may be made before June 1, 2019, assuming that rooms are still
available. After that time the hotel will not hold our room block for the
convention. In other words, you should get your reservation in soon.
Among its features is an aquatic playground called Mandalay Bay Beach
which has real sand, a wave pool, and a lazy river. The hotel is also home
to an aquarium with more than 2,000 animals including sharks, green sea
turtles, and a Komodo dragon. Plus, it offers top-notch entertainment
including Michael Jackson ONE by Cirque du Soleil.
The schedule for the 2019 convention is:
Sunday, July 7 Seminar Day
Monday, July 8 Registration and Resolutions Day
Tuesday, July 9 Board Meeting and Division Day
Wednesday, July 10 Opening Session
Thursday, July 11 Business Session
Friday, July 12 Banquet Day and Adjournment
Vol. 62, No. 1 January
2019
Contents
Illustration: A Choir Serenades the National Federation of the Blind
American Nightmare: How Workers with Disabilities are Denied Economic
Prosperity
by Mark A. Riccobono
Shaping Automotive Innovation for the Future: An Alliance with the Blind of
America
by Mitch Bainwol
Inaccessible Medical Devices Have Life or Death Consequences
by Anil Lewis
Busting Myths about Disability and Personal Finance
by Kane Brolin
Las Vegas Calls to the Members of the National Federation of the Blind
by Terry Rupp
I Voted Twice
by Dan Burke
Leading with Conviction: Making Equality for People with Disabilities a
Priority for the United States of America
by Neil Romano
New JAWS and ZoomText Annual Home Licenses Now Available through the
Freedom Scientific eStore
by Curtis Chong
This is Not a Stick
by Nancy Burns
Are We Handicapped, Disabled, or Something Else?
by C. Edwin Vaughan
Building the Federation Brand Part 4: A Second Look at Our Brand Values
by Chris Danielsen
The Future Is Ours
by Ronza Othman
Why We Question the Wisdom that Leads to Low Expectations for the Blind
by Gary Wunder
Of Elvis and Structured Discovery
by Karl Smith
Recipes
Monitor Miniatures
[PHOTO CAPTION: Members of the Voices of Light Choir pose with President
Riccobono, Gabe Cazares, and Conchita Hernandez at the Jernigan Institute]
A Choir Serenades the National Federation of the Blind
Each year we open our doors for tours. Some of them are for sighted
people who need to learn more about us and why we exist. Some are for our
members who already know what we do but deserve to see our headquarters
that they are a part of building and maintaining. Some of our tours are for
people from other countries, and they provide the opportunity for us to
learn, teach, and extend a helping hand to our fellow blind men and women
throughout the world.
We were recently visited by a delegation from the Guatemala School
for the Blind. Our visitors were members of a ten-person choir, the
students being composed of boys and girls ranging in age from eight to
fourteen. They were accompanied by three adults, one being a blind teacher
who was in charge of the choir. Of the three adults, one could speak
English, so she acted as the interpreter.
Those of you who have heard the most recent presidential release
received part of the gift the choir left with us. They asked to do another
song which turned into a twenty-two-minute concert. It was delightful and
can be found at: https://nfb.org/images/nfb/audio/misc_2018/guatemalan-
choir-1.mp3 or https://nfb.org/images/nfb/audio/misc_2018/guatemalan-choir-
medley.mp3.
The delegation was interested in many things they saw during the
tour. One was the rocket made by the blind in 2004 at our Rocket On! event;
they were also intrigued by the books depicting the stars. But the object
that drew the most attention was Dr. tenBroek's old cane. It is a
relatively short, thin, and fragile device, and it was clear that at the
time it was being used, the purpose was more for alerting the sighted to
the presence of a blind traveler then to giving that blind traveler
information to navigate the world independently. That cane, of course, was
just the beginning of a revolution in travel that would change the cane's
primary purpose from a signpost to a badge of independence allowing for
safe and efficient travel.
The children were absolutely astounded at the length of some of the
canes they saw and were particularly interested in the length of Anil
Lewis's cane. They couldn't believe that anyone would use a cane that long,
so the obvious question they wanted answered was, "How tall is he?" To his
initial distress, they proceeded to find out, each of them trying to reach
the head of this tall, cane-using blind man.
Anna Kresmer, our librarian at the Jernigan Institute, said, "I work
here because of the good things we do, but some days make it absolutely
clear why this is where I belong. When they left the library, I felt very
happy because it confirmed once again why this is where I work and the
difference I can make."
[PHOTO CAPTION: Mark Riccobono]
American Nightmare: How Workers with Disabilities are Denied Economic
Prosperity
by Mark A. Riccobono
From the Editor: This article first appeared in The Hill on November
30, 2018, and can be found online at https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-
blog/civil-rights/419107-american-nightmare-how-workers-with-disabilities-
are-denied.
"Workers paid only a few dollars per hour." "Disabled workers
exploited for profit." "Employers pay next to nothing for manual labor." If
you read these headlines at the top of your newspaper, would you think you
were reading about sweatshops in some distant, developing country? If
someone were to tell you that every day hundreds of thousands of workers
with disabilities are paid less, typically far less, than the minimum wage
in cities like Boston, Los Angeles, Cleveland, or Salt Lake City, would you
believe them? Would the thought ever cross your mind that this could happen
right here in the United States?
The stark reality is that everything you just read is true. People
with disabilities are paid subminimum wages, and it's completely legal for
companies to do so.
The Fair Labor Standards Act, passed in 1938, was a landmark law
enacted with the specific intention of protecting the rights of American
workers. It established such modern norms as a forty-hour workweek,
overtime pay, restrictions against child labor, and the federal minimum
wage. However, it also introduced an exception to that minimum wage with
the inclusion of Section 14(c), which allows employers to obtain a special
wage certificate granting the permission to pay people with disabilities at
a rate "lower than the minimum wage." There it is in black and white,
discrimination codified into United States law.
According to the Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division, 321,131
Americans with disabilities are currently employed under 14(c)
certificates. That is more than 300,000 people who are legally able to be
paid less than the minimum wage by employers like major restaurant and
hotel chains, consignment stores, and school districts. Even more
disturbing is that the vast majority of these organizations are nonprofits,
which receive set-aside government contracts for hiring workers with
disabilities while paying those same workers subminimum wages. This is
perhaps the most insidious and cruel form of "double-dipping."
Many argue that giving disabled Americans something to do, even if it
means paying us next to nothing, is better than us doing nothing. They will
argue that earning a paycheck, even if a week's check amounts to just a few
dollars, provides a sense of dignity for disabled Americans. They argue
that providing some place for disabled Americans to go, even if it is a
workshop where we perform repetitive and mind-numbing labor, is better than
sitting at home. They argue that all of these things foster feelings of
pride and independence in disabled Americans. This misguided notion of
charity is actually pity and is insulting to disabled workers because it
presumes we do not know and can't understand the value of money. I'm not
convinced that anyone can feel proud and independent when their paycheck
for a week of work is not enough to afford a value meal at a fast food
restaurant. Are you?
To put it bluntly, Americans with disabilities do not want your pity.
We want your respect. We want you to respect us enough to extend the
opportunity to work in a meaningful job, to work side-by-side with you
toward a common goal, and most importantly to earn a living wage so that we
can be independent.
The American Dream is generally understood as the opportunity for
anyone, regardless of background, to achieve success and prosperity through
hard work and determination. Section 14(c) creates a second class of
citizens, based solely on disability, who are unable to experience the
benefits of that dream. Americans with disabilities are determined, we are
willing, and we are most definitely able to work hard, but regardless of
how hard we work, success and prosperity will always be well out of reach
as long as Section 14(c) is on the books. Our nation's commitment to end
discrimination against people with disabilities must include ending the
payment of subminimum wages, otherwise it is nothing more than a hollow
platitude.
-----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Mitch Bainwol]
Shaping Automotive Innovation for the Future: An Alliance with the Blind of
America
by Mitch Bainwol
From the Editor: At the 2018 National Convention on the afternoon of
July 8, 2018, Mark Riccobono said, "I have pages and pages of introduction
for our speaker. The most important thing for you to know is that Mitch
Bainwol has the responsibility of leading the Alliance of Automobile
Manufacturers, an organization that has come to be a true friend of the
blind of America and has helped us provide leadership in both pedestrian
safety and in the emerging area of autonomous vehicles. As you heard in the
presidential report, we were honored to be part of a number of events in
the autonomous vehicle space with the alliance over the past year that
demonstrate that they recognize that when it comes to making sure that the
automotive industry of autonomous vehicles thinks about equal access for
blind people, there's one organization to call, and that's the National
Federation of the Blind. Here is our friend, our colleague, Mitch Bainwol."
Good afternoon, everybody. It's great to be here in Orlando. I've
been in the room for about an hour, and I can tell you I am blown away by
the joy, the energy, the passion-congratulations to Hans [a cofounder of Be
My Eyes, who received a Bolotin Award] and all the other award winners. So
I'm going to take a few minutes and talk about our partnership and talk
about technology. I'm really proud to represent the auto industry in
Washington and in all fifty states, especially at this remarkable time for
mobility, and I bring greetings from the most dysfunctional city in America-
so thanks for the excuse to escape.
Before I jump in, let me thank President Mark Riccobono, Vice
President and Board Chair Pam Allen, the NFB's amazing staff, and all of
you for this warm welcome. I really appreciate it. I hardly ever travel on
Sundays, and I'm going on from here later today to California. I'm going to
be with Secretary [of Transportation Elaine] Chao in San Francisco, but I
really wanted to take this opportunity to be here to say thank you and to
share some thoughts about the amazing technology that is revolutionizing
transportation today and what these developments mean for society and for
you.
While I'm honored to be here as a speaker, I'm even more humbled and
delighted by the productive and uniquely strong relationship we've forged
in recent years. Our partnership between the nation's foremost advocacy
group for the blind and its foremost alliance of automobile manufacturers
is sure to make a difference. The faster the pace of change, the better.
Working together we can and we will accelerate the enormous benefits
innovation offers for everyone.
Topping the list in our collaboration has been the Coalition for
Future Mobility, a pioneering network that joins dozens of advocacy groups,
associations, and companies together in the fight to speed up the
deployment of self-driving vehicles. This is an active coalition, and
everyone in the game has stepped up. But no organization has been more
committed or more effective than the NFB. [applause] NFB's push for a
regulatory framework in Washington and the states that will foster the
rapid development of these AVs, [autonomous vehicles] the partnership has
already yielded success: we passed the bill in the House of Representatives
unanimously. When passed by the Senate, this act will create national rules
facilitating the development and testing of self-driving cars, cut through
the chaos of different state laws, and provide a mechanism for large-scale
testing once key safety standards have been met. That large-scale testing
is essential to get these cars on the road so that you can be in them.
Importantly, this testing will also offer special provisions to
protect access by the disabled, including people with visual impairments.
The NFB has been invaluable in this mission. Self-driving technologies
promise to yield a huge dividend for the mobility of persons who are blind
across the states. You know that, but politicians didn't know that, but
they're learning fast. Together, we're going to push for Senate passage,
and I'm optimistic that this common-sense, bipartisan bill will soon become
law.
I was also honored last September to join Mark at an event in
Michigan with Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao when the secretary
unveiled a paradigm-shifting revision in the government's policy for
autonomous vehicles. That Mark was featured at the event shows the respect
and importance the NFB plays in the policy process at the very highest
levels of government. At that event Mark said it very well, he said it
perfectly: "The development of self-driving vehicles will remove the
artificial barriers of the past that have hindered mobility and
accessibility for the blind and push toward a future in which sightedness
does not determine mobility."
Secretary Chao's vision of the future focuses on three highlights:
vehicle safety for all, flexibility for auto makers to experiment with new
technologies, and clarity in the legal framework. In recognition of our
ongoing partnership and the NFB's pioneering push toward the self-driving
future, the Auto Alliance this past January recognized Mark with the
inaugural Autos2050 Innovation Award. He was up there in a room with about
seven or eight major innovators from across the globe who are working with
the technology. Mark is obviously driving not the technology but the
policy, and everybody has got a huge piece of this puzzle. [applause]
All of these initiatives, as Mark mentioned, built on our earlier
collaboration on the Pedestrian Safety Enhancement Act, which mandated that
a sound be added to electric vehicles so that people who are blind or
visually impaired can hear the vehicles approaching. I'm eager to see how
our partnership moves forward into the future.
So where are we? Let me tell you where we are: the answer is we're in
the midst of an historic transportation revolution. It began a long time
ago in 1956 when then-President Eisenhower signed the law establishing our
nation's highway system linking every major city in the country into a
seamless network of high-speed roads. It enabled the growth of suburbs and
allowed the movement of people and goods with remarkable speed and
convenience. This is still the paradigm we operate with today, but the
system is under strain. Congestion is everywhere. Americans spend billions
of hours every year in traffic. Roads are far safer than they were in 1950
by a factor of probably seven to one, but an unacceptable number of
injuries and fatalities still plague our streets and highways. And for many
the freedom of mobility remains unnecessarily and unacceptably elusive.
Dramatic change is coming, though; it's happening as we meet.
Looking ahead, by 2056, one hundred years after Eisenhower's
visionary leadership on automotive transportation, autonomous vehicles will
be virtually ubiquitous. Every car on the road in 2055 or so will be self-
driving, revolutionizing the way we conceive of mobility yet again. Self-
driving vehicles, enabled by cutting-edge sensors, can travel faster and
closer together, cutting commute times, easing congestion, saving fuel
costs, and lessening harmful emissions. They can free occupants to work on
other tasks in the car, enhancing freedom and productivity. And most
importantly, self-driving cars will all but eliminate the more than 90
percent of traffic accidents and fatalities that occur from human error.
For you, however, the impact of self-driving cars will be far more
personal, be more transformative, and more powerful. Mobility in most of
the US today depends on driving. Those who are unable to drive see their
opportunities for employment and education diminished. Many people who are
blind are forced to rely on costly ride-sharing services or taxies-you know
this better than I-or depend on inefficient public transportation and
paratransit providers. In rural areas in particular, options are even more
limited. This reduced mobility is a major factor contributing to the higher
rate of unemployment among the blind.
Auto makers want to help solve this problem. We're approaching a
future in which every blind or visually impaired person can own and operate
a car, offering seamless point-to-point service through voice-operated self-
driving technology. I'm going to say that one more time: we are approaching
a future in which every blind or visually impaired person can own and
operate a car offering seamless point-to-point service through voice-
operated self-driving technology. [applause] The simple ability to commute
by car to work, school, doctor's appointments, restaurants, cultural
opportunities, church, and more-taken for granted by most-will finally,
finally be made available to all.
This transformation is already begun. Nearly all major auto companies
are hard at work creating the autonomous vehicles of the future, and self-
driving technologies like parking assist, lane correction, and automatic
braking are already standard features in many new vehicles.
Change is coming, of that we are sure. The only real question is the
timetable, the speed of change. In my experience there are two types of
politicians: those who are cautious to a fault, hesitant to allow new
innovations for fear of the consequences. They're more concerned with how
things have been done in the past than how they'll be done in the future.
They prefer protection to innovation. Perfection is the standard they
demand, even if that standard ultimately equals paralysis and stagnation.
The second type of politicians are those who embrace the future, who foster
the next generation of solutions, and welcome transformative change. These
to me-and I suspect to you-are the real heroes. The questions around
autonomous vehicles are more political than they are technological. Some
states like Nebraska just weeks ago have chosen to lead in the new
frontier, allowing manufacturers to test new technologies and eliminating
fees on self-driving vehicles. Right here in Florida, State Senator Jeff
Brandes and Governor Rick Scott also have been leaders in getting self-
driving vehicles on the road by eliminating legal and regulatory obstacles.
They've ensured that autonomous vehicle technology will be considered in
future planning by Florida cities. Other states have opted to go the
opposite way: taxing these vehicles, restricting their operation, and
putting road blocks in the way of deployment. Developments in Washington
and in state capitols over the coming months will determine which approach
prevails: the leaning forward approach or the leaning backward approach.
The alliance will always push for innovation and progress, but we
cannot do it without your voice. The NFB has been an invaluable partner in
the push for standardized, forward-looking, national framework for self-
driving vehicles. Those who are blind and visually impaired have too much
at stake to allow trepidation and fear to impede progress toward a future
that prioritizes mobility for all. We can't slam the brakes on progress,
and we won't. This is a battle we will fight, and we will win. Your passion-
which I've seen evidence of in the room today-can make the difference.
I want to close with this call to action for each of you. Make your
voices heard where ever you live from Augusta to Honolulu, from Tallahassee
to Olympia, and especially in Washington, DC. Remember that line from the
movie Network, "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore."
That should be our theme, it should be our message, and that is our joint
calling. Make it known that self-driving vehicles will revolutionize the
way you live your life, and dare any politician to deny that simple human
urge of free movement. No more excuses: let's pass the law and liberate
mobility. [applause] The future is in our hands; we only need to reach out
and take it. I'm proud to say that the nation's auto makers will fight this
fight with you every step of the way. Thank you, and congratulations on a
great conference. [applause]
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Anil Lewis]
Inaccessible Medical Devices Have Life or Death Consequences
by Anil Lewis
From the Editor: In successfully dealing with blindness we talk a lot
about alternative techniques. If I can't see when the bacon is crisp, is
there another way to tell? Yes, there is. If I'm pouring a cup of coffee,
can I tell when the cup is getting full, short of it overflowing? Of
course. When using equipment made for the sighted, we can often figure out
alternative ways to memorize the buttons, learn the calibration of the
knobs, or count clicks. Sometimes we can set the temperature of an oven if
we know that each time it is started, it begins at a specific temperature
and that each beep raises or lowers the temperature by five degrees. All of
these techniques let us use equipment out of the box, but when we talk
about medical equipment, the consequences of error are significant. If my
oven begins with a temperature of 325, I try to set it at 450, and because
I miss a beep I am at 425, this is usually not a disaster. A few more
minutes in the oven means I come out with a clean knife. But if I am
measuring an injectable drug, one missed beep may completely change the
effect of the dose. Even this assumes that the medical equipment being used
accurately beeps for each incremental change or that it beeps at all. Not
all equipment does. Pressing a button to elevate the dose may cause an
increase of one unit; accidentally holding that button a little longer
often means that the unit scrolls more rapidly, so all bets are off in
terms of the number that I have when I remove my finger. Again, the result
is far worse than burned bacon or biscuits.
Blind people should not have to guess when it comes to settings on a
piece of equipment that is digital. What can be displayed can easily be
spoken. Whether equipment uses buttons or touch screens, we have examples
of programs that allow blind people to use both. The quality of life for
blind people is too important to leave to chance or even to the development
of alternative techniques if we can devise them. When it comes to equipment
that can determine life or death, a blind person should not have to be at
the top of his or her game to figure out some innovative way to make a
device for a sighted person work for one who is blind. Here is what the
National Federation of the Blind is doing about this most insidious issue:
Diabetic retinopathy is one of the largest causes of blindness, yet
the technology that allows individuals to monitor and cope with this
disease remains fundamentally inaccessible to blind people. Blind people,
as a subset of society, are also affected by other diseases like cancer but
have no independent access to the technologies that help manage these
diseases. Medical technology that allows individuals to independently
administer dialysis and chemotherapy treatments in the home is inaccessible
and creates an unnecessary dependence on others. The National Federation of
the Blind is working to increase the accessibility of medical technologies
so that blind people can live the lives we want.
At our 2016 National Convention of the National Federation of the
Blind, our members passed Resolution 2016-16. This resolution highlighted
the "Technology Bill of Rights for Individuals with Diabetes and Vision
Loss" that asserts meaningful access to the same life-changing diabetes
information, diagnostic tools, and treatments as are available to others.
These rights should be universal to blind people regardless of their
medical condition.
Blind people struggle to use the limited, makeshift tools and
strategies available to us to care for ourselves, while the rest of the
world is on insulin pumps and continuous glucose monitors that they can
fully access safely and independently. Using workaround strategies in order
to access medical equipment puts blind people unnecessarily at risk. We
seek to remove this risk by making the technology nonvisually accessible to
the blind through tactile markers, speech, large print, and/or Braille
access. When done correctly, this is simpler than most people think and
enhances innovation with little to no additional cost.
In January of 2018, we launched the NFB Accessible Medical Technology
Working Group, a forum through which we can identify priorities and share
ideas for increasing the accessibility of medical devices and apps, because
unlike most other technologies, medical devices have life-or-death
consequences.
Medical technology that can be used in the home, accessed using a
smartphone app, and sometimes worn on the body empowers individuals with
confidence, convenience, flexibility, and improved quality of life. These
devices can collect and transmit information directly to medical
professionals, eliminating the need for in-person doctor visits and
reducing overall medical expenses.
It is imperative that blind people be involved in the process of
making these devices accessible. Blind people interested in working on this
taskforce should join our NFB Accessible Medical Equipment Discussion Group
by visiting: http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/accessible-medical-
equipment-discussion-group_nfbnet.org. As a member of this discussion
group, you will be informed about our current efforts, be able to provide
input and suggestions, and volunteer to assist with the evaluation and
development of accessible medical technology.
Through our NFB Accessible Medical Technology Working Group, we are
seeking to establish relationships with manufacturers that will allow us to
leverage their desire to develop innovative, life-sustaining medical
technologies with our expertise in accessibility. Through this initiative,
we are working to get ahead of the curve by encouraging the developers of
these technologies to take accessibility into consideration during the
design and development phase.
Manufacturers of medical technology interested in partnering with the
National Federation of the Blind should email accessiblemedical at nfb.org
with the contact information for your representative and information on
your product. We will follow up to determine how we can work together to
make your product accessible.
----------
Leave a Legacy
For more than seventy-five years the National Federation of the Blind
has worked to transform the dreams of hundreds of thousands of blind people
into reality, and with your support we will continue to do so for decades
to come. We sincerely hope you will plan to be a part of our enduring
movement by adding the National Federation of the Blind as a partial
beneficiary in your will. A gift to the National Federation of the Blind in
your will is more than just a charitable, tax-deductible donation. It is a
way to join in the work to help blind people live the lives they want that
leaves a lasting imprint on the lives of thousands of blind children and
adults.
With your help, the NFB will continue to:
. Give blind children the gift of literacy through Braille;
. Promote the independent travel of the blind by providing free, long
white canes to blind people in need;
. Develop dynamic educational projects and programs that show blind
youth that science and math are within their reach;
. Deliver hundreds of accessible newspapers and magazines to provide
blind people the essential information necessary to be actively
involved in their communities;
. Offer aids and appliances that help seniors losing vision maintain
their independence; and
. Fund scholarship programs so that blind people can achieve their
dreams.
Plan to Leave a Legacy
Creating a will gives you the final say in what happens to your
possessions and is the only way to be sure that your remaining assets are
distributed according to your passions and beliefs. Many people fear
creating a will or believe it's not necessary until they are much older.
Others think that it's expensive and confusing. However, it is one of the
most important things you will do, and with new online legal programs it is
easier and cheaper than ever before. If you do decide to create or revise
your will, consider the National Federation of the Blind as a partial
beneficiary. Visit www.nfb.org/planned-giving or call 410-659-9314,
extension 2422, for more information. Together with love, hope,
determination, and your support, we will continue to transform dreams into
reality.
Invest in Opportunity
The National Federation of the Blind knows that blindness is not the
characteristic that defines you or your future. You can live the life you
want; blindness is not what holds you back. A donation to the National
Federation of the Blind allows you to invest in a movement that removes the
fear from blindness. Your investment is your vote of confidence in the
value and capacity of blind people and reflects the high expectations we
have for all blind Americans, combating the low expectations that create
obstacles between blind people and our dreams.
In 2017 the NFB:
. Distributed over seven thousand canes to blind people across the
United States, empowering them to travel safely and independently
throughout their communities.
. Hosted forty-eight NFB BELL Academy programs, which served more than
350 blind students throughout the United States.
. Provided over one hundred thousand dollars in scholarships to blind
students, making a post-secondary education affordable and attainable.
. Delivered audio newspaper and magazine services to 118,900
subscribers, providing free access to over five hundred local,
national, and international publications.
. In the third year of the program, over 350 Braille-writing slates and
styluses were given free of charge to blind users.
Just imagine what we'll do next year, and, with your help, what can
be accomplished for years to come. Below are just a few of the many
diverse, tax-deductible ways you can lend your support to the National
Federation of the Blind.
Vehicle Donation Program
The NFB now accepts donated vehicles, including cars, trucks, boats,
motorcycles, or recreational vehicles. Just call 855-659-9314 toll-free,
and a representative can make arrangements to pick up your donation-it
doesn't have to be working. We can also answer any questions you have.
General Donation
General donations help support the ongoing programs of the NFB and
the work to help blind people live the lives they want. Donate online with
a credit card or through the mail with check or money order. Visit
www.nfb.org/make-gift for more information.
Bequests
Even if you can't afford a gift right now, including the National
Federation of the Blind in your will enables you to contribute by
expressing your commitment to the organization and promises support for
future generations of blind people across the country. Visit
www.nfb.org/planned-giving or call 410-659-9314, extension 2422, for more
information.
Pre-Authorized Contribution
Through the Pre-Authorized Contribution (PAC) program, supporters
sustain the efforts of the National Federation of the Blind by making
recurring monthly donations by direct withdraw of funds from a checking
account or a charge to a credit card. To enroll, visit www.nfb.org/make-
gift, and complete the Pre-Authorized Contribution form, and return it to
the address listed on the form.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Kane Brolin]
Busting Myths about Disability and Personal Finance
by Kane Brolin
From the Editor: Kane Brolin and his wife Danika have been self-
employed for nearly twenty years. Most recently, Kane has been working as
the owner/operator of a financial planning and brokerage business based in
Mishawaka, Indiana. Having been totally blind since infancy, Kane serves as
president of the Michiana Chapter in the National Federation of the Blind
of Indiana, and when this article was posted, he was serving as president
of a small private school board as well.
But Kane has vivid memories of a seven-year stretch of time when he
was unable to land full-time employment, even after attaining a bachelor's
degree and even though he had worked continuously part-time for years. That
struggle to land work-or even a second interview for a job-is something he
can call to mind as clearly now as if it had happened yesterday. It gives
him a heart for the 70 percent of blind, working-age Americans who are
unemployed, even now in 2019. Experience has taught him that the condition
of unemployment is not always caused by a lack of jobs. Sometimes blind
Social Security or Medicaid recipients choose to remain unemployed because
they are frightened they will lose benefits-especially health benefits-that
have been critical to their financial survival. Now that the most recent
recession is over and given that jobs and accessible technology solutions
are more plentiful than ever, Kane feels we are living in a window of
opportunity like never before. While that window remains open, it's time
for us to step up and raise our own expectations of ourselves and to
realize that getting a job does not have to threaten our survival, nor does
it have to lead to our being deemed ineligible for the government-sponsored
benefits that have served us as a lifeline. Here is what he says:
It seems the internet has become a great leveler. Just a click or two
can make any of us sound like an expert. And let's face it: The only thing
more stimulating than taking part in a heated debate is feeling like we've
won that debate. But would you trust your child's financial future-or your
own, for that matter-to an internet search engine or an online discussion
forum?
Recently while perusing an email list for parents of children who
live with visual impairment, I ran across some well-intentioned advice
meant to help one of the listers figure out how to save for her daughter's
college education. There was only one problem: the advice presented was
wrong.
As a Certified Financial Planner Professional, I have learned over
more than a decade that often the best thing I can do is prevent a client
from making irreversible, costly mistakes. While qualifying to hold the
Chartered Special Needs Consultant designation, I learned that if you're
investing for the future needs of a son or daughter with a disability, some
mistakes are so costly that they may disqualify your family member from
receiving critical, government-sponsored benefits such as Supplemental
Security Income or Medicaid. At the very least, not understanding the
characteristics of the investment product you could be buying could
dramatically lower the amount of money your son or daughter will have
access to when it comes time to spend some of it. So let's bust two myths
that I find to be annoyingly persistent in today's marketplace.
If I am the recipient of SSI, SSDI, Medicare, or Medicaid, going to
work will cut off my benefits. It's not worth it. Not only is this
statement false, believing it prevents many people with a disability from
attempting to earn higher education, because they think that working full-
time at any job eventually will deprive them of health benefits or much-
needed home- and community-based services from Medicaid. Why try for a
college degree if there is no way to use that degree later without risking
financial ruin? What a lot of people don't realize is that the Social
Security Administration has an incentive program called Ticket to Work
whose purpose is to help recipients of SSI, SSDI, Medicare, and Medicaid
transition into the workplace without sacrificing their benefits. By
drawing from expert advice, keeping good records, and wisely using
impairment-related work expenses to offset earnings from employment on your
income tax returns, working gainfully might be more lucrative and less
painful than you think. To find a Work Incentives Planning and Assistance
program that serves your area or an employment network with a benefits
counselor, call the Ticket to Work Help Line at 866-968-7842 or for TTY
users 866-833-2967 Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Eastern Time.
If I'm disabled, even if I have prosperous people in my family who
could contribute to my standard of living, I must remain destitute, or else
I lose eligibility for SSI, SSDI, Medicare, or Medicaid. Not necessarily
true. You would do well to remember a couple of facts that many miss.
First, if it is Social Security Disability Income (SSDI) that you receive,
"there is no limit to the amount of assets, cash, or resources you own."
SSI and Medicaid do impose strict limits on the value of cash or investment
assets that may be held in your name directly. But, thanks to the Achieving
a Better Life Experience Act, signed into law in 2014, disabled Americans
now have access to the ABLE account. This account, which can receive
contributions from many different sources, is a place where money can grow
through tax-favored capital gains, dividends, and interest income. Then, it
may be used for your benefit without jeopardizing your eligibility for
government programs. How may this money be used? For "qualified disability
expenses" related to the individual's disability or blindness and made for
his/her benefit in maintaining or improving health, independence, or
quality of life, including:
. Education
. Housing
. Transportation
. Employment training and support
. Assistive technology and related services
. Personal support services
. Health, prevention, and wellness
. Financial management and administrative services
. Legal fees
. Expenses for oversight and monitoring
. Funeral and burial expenses
. Basic living expenses
. Other expenses approved by the Secretary of the Treasury under
regulations consistent with the purpose of the program and/or
published in future guidance published in the Internal Revenue
Bulletin.
So take heart. Living with a disability can be challenging on many
levels. But don't let the fear of enforced impoverishment stop you from
taking risks, gaining skills, and working toward a productive and affluent
future. Do your homework, seek the advice of legal and financial
professionals, and-above all-don't let the fearful things some people say
stop you before you start.
References:
Taken from SSI Spotlight on Impairment-Related Work Expenses, published by
the Social Security Administration.
See Money Mondays: Wage Reporting - Myths, Tips and Ticket to Work,
published on May 15, 2017, by the Social Security Administration.
Quoted from Is There a Social Security Disability Asset Limit? |
DisabilitySecrets.
Taken from Promoting Access and Inclusion in ABLE Programs: New
Opportunities for Saving, Financial Inclusion, and Economic Security for
Individuals with Disabilities and Their Families, published by the ABLE
National Resource Center.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Terry Rupp running in the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in Las
Vegas]
Las Vegas Calls to the Members of the National Federation of the Blind
by Terri Rupp
From the Editor: Terri Rupp is the energetic president of the
National Federation of the Blind of Nevada. The Nevada and Idaho affiliates
are our hosts for the 2019 National Convention, and here is how Terri
tempts those of us who will join her in Las Vegas:
We all waited anxiously for the big announcement last July revealing
where the 2019 NFB National Convention would be held. I had my suspicions,
but I would not confirm them to anyone. At the end of the national board
meeting, when the final reveal was made, the crowd erupted with whoops of
excitement. During the week of July 7 through 12, 2019, our Federation
family will gather at the Mandalay Bay Resort in fabulous Las Vegas.
The first recognizable thoughts to make it out of my head from the
news that the national convention was coming to my hometown were, "This is
going to be great! Vegas isn't going to be the same after #NFB19. Talk
about an amazing opportunity: I get to welcome my Federation family to my
hometown."
It wasn't until the excitement fizzled just a bit that the words of
the worried ones reached my ears. As blind people, we are all too familiar
with the common myths and misconceptions that surround blindness. The same
goes for Las Vegas. When I asked my friends and family in Facebook-land
what their first thoughts were when they thought of Las Vegas, I heard the
typical things like: the Strip, casinos, shows, crowds, etc. Then there
were these other responses: endless desert beauty, great healthy food
choices everywhere, family, community, home.
We all have our expectations of what something might be like based on
things we may have heard from others or watched in movies. Before my first
trip to Las Vegas, I had those same thoughts. I had no idea that the city
was more like a large, spread-out suburb. I naively thought the famous Las
Vegas Strip sat in the middle of a sandy desert. I paid no attention to who
those people might be that worked in those big fancy casinos. Those people
who clean the rooms, prepare and serve the food, perform in the shows:
those people are people just like you and me. They go home to families,
take their kids to school, spend time outdoors in the gorgeous hills that
our valley is nestled in, and go on vacations to national parks, Disney
World, and other typical tourist attractions. These people are part of what
make up my community. The community where my children were born, the
community that came together and healed together after tragedy struck our
loved ones on October 1, 2017. This is the city I am proud to call home.
If you are wondering what an NFB National Convention will be like in
Las Vegas, you are not alone. We have grown quite accustomed to planning
our convention week in Orlando. It's about time for some change. For
instance, travel to Las Vegas is extremely inexpensive by air and can
easily be made by road from our neighboring states of Arizona, California,
Utah, Idaho, and Oregon. We will no longer be limited to the same food
choices we've been eating. Get your taste buds ready to experience an
explosion of flavors from simple quick-service food to extravagant fine
dining prepared by famous chefs. Are you wondering if convention in Vegas
will be family-friendly? I'd like to point out that I have two young
children myself. This convention, like every other convention, is an event
for the entire family, from the young to the old. Just like the Federation
has something to offer for everyone of all ages, so does Las Vegas. When
you're not busy soaking up what you can in our seminars and workshops, when
you're not in general session with a few thousand fellow Federationists,
soak up the sun in the lazy river or wave pool at the Mandalay Bay. Just be
sure to remember the sunscreen and stay hydrated. Not a fan of the heat? No
problem. I actually highly recommend keeping a sweater with you at all
times because the hotels are kept quite cold. You can spend your down time
with the kids touching sting rays and sitting inside a sunken ship with
sharks swimming around you at the Mandalay Bay Shark Reef Aquarium. Want to
venture off the resort property? Your choices are endless. Take Uber or
Lyft to get up Las Vegas Boulevard to downtown where you'll find famous
Fremont Street, and hop on one of the double decker busses known as the
Deuce. Many hotels are connected by sky bridges and a monorail as well.
Whatever your pleasure, just be mindful that you're not the only tourist.
Most people you encounter on the Strip will most likely be visitors just
like you and won't know where they are going either.
As you make your plans for the 2019 NFB National Convention, I
suggest planning an extra day for your stay for play. Lastly: don't forget
the sunscreen.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Dan Burke]
I Voted Twice
by Dan Burke
From the Editor: Dan Burke served as the president of the NFB of
Montana for nine years and on the NFB board of directors for five years.
Currently he is the public relations specialist at the Colorado Center for
the Blind and teaches a college prep class there for students headed for
higher education. Dan describes how despite electronic voting machines
being physically available for Colorado voters, their actual functionality
for blind voters was less than we have the right to expect. Here is what he
says:
I wore a sticker on Election Day that said "I Voted," but it should
have said "I Voted Twice!" I know a handful of other blind Coloradans who
also voted two, sometimes three times.
Maybe a sticker saying, "I voted-again and again ..."?
This isn't about voter fraud. This is about the failure of equal
access to our right to vote privately and independently. This is about
blind voters standing firm in the face of this failure.
You see, our first times through the ballot were not recorded. The
problem, and the reason we all voted again, was that the electronic voting
system deployed across Colorado that the law requires to ensure our right
to vote privately and independently failed us. Once, twice, and in at least
one case three times it failed individual blind voters in Arapahoe County.
And it happened in at least four different polling locations. One blind
voter tried two times, and the system crashed each time. Finally,
frustrated and worn out, he made the unhappy choice to revert to the dark
age of voting for the blind-he told a poll judge what his votes were and
trusted that they would be recorded accurately.
Those days should be behind us. As of 2006, all polling places were
required by the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) to have electronic voting
machines. That was in response to dimpled, pregnant, and hanging chads in
Florida 2000. But the law also required that those machines-or at least
some of them in every polling place-would be accessible to voters with
disabilities, including blind voters. We in the National Federation of the
Blind made sure that last was true, that a blind person could vote
privately and independently with nonvisual access. That is the America we
envisioned. And it's almost come true.
Frustratingly, it's only almost. It's only sometimes.
For years Colorado left the choice of accessible voting systems up to
each county. In 2015 it decided to pick one vendor and have all the
counties use that same system. That's how we got the present Dominion
voting system. The trouble with the selection process was that blind people
weren't at the table. We didn't even get a call until the field testing of
the four finalists. On a day or two's notice, the NFB of Colorado was asked
to send testers to three of the four locations testing individual systems.
Another blind person had been found to test the system tested in Denver
County. As it happens, that was the machine that was chosen. But blind
people were just an afterthought. Not actually at the table, we were tossed
table scraps. And then Colorado's Secretary of State made an eight-year
agreement with Dominion.
Some counties just rolled out their Dominion systems this election,
but Arapahoe deployed it in 2016. So far, I only know of Arapahoe County
problems in 2018, which seems counter-intuitive. But the fact is that Julie
and I voted in the primary in June without incident. The Wednesday before
election day we went to a nearby polling place, and the judges couldn't get
the system to the first contest, even with two phone calls to the elections
help desk. We left after forty-five minutes without voting. Monday, the day
before election day, we went to another polling place. We sat side-by-side
at different machines. Julie's machine worked fine. Mine crashed after I
completed all forty-five contests. By crashed I mean it reset itself. The
poll supervisor was like an ER doctor trying to resuscitate an accident
victim--valiant, but no hope. In Colorado our ballots are not recorded
electronically. There is nothing to count until the ballot has printed, and
you can drop it in the slot. For me, and all of my friends who voted more
than once, the system crashed before we ever got to the point of printing
the ballot. They too had to vote again. And maybe again.
In the twelve years since HAVA put accessible voting machines into
polling places, I think I have experienced problems in voting as many as
half the times I've been to the polls. And I go to the polls for every
election. So this means the past five years since I moved to Colorado, and
the preceding seven years in Missoula County, Montana. This just isn't good
enough, and I hope by now you, dear reader, have the feeling that I'm mad
as hell.
It only took a few swipes through my Facebook feed on election day to
see that things are much the same with blind voters across the country.
Many experienced flawless access, voting privately and independently. Many
others experienced barriers. Nationwide, it seems, the promise of private,
independent access for the blind is not yet fully realized.
I know we can work with our county clerk and recorder to figure out
where the problems are and take steps to fix things that are within the
county's control. But this is a statewide system, so we also need to
contact Secretary-elect Jena Griswold. Dominion, the company who has our
Colorado contract for six more years needs to step up. We want and deserve
a system that does more than go "clunk" half the time. And one of the ways
to ensure that is to have blind people testing and evaluating the system
and modifications long before they hit our polling places.
We need to fix this, because we're not going away. All of us blind
Colorado voters whose franchise was jacked around this week kept coming
back, kept voting until it counted. That's because we count, and we will be
counted. And I'll be damned if I report my vote to someone else to mark
down ever again.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Neil Romano]
Leading with Conviction: Making Equality for People with Disabilities a
Priority for the United States of America
by Neil Romano
From the Editor: Saturday afternoon President Riccobono opened the
session, and our first presenter was the honorable Neil Romano. Here is how
the President introduced him:
"Our first speaker this afternoon is chair of the National Council on
Disability, an independent, non-partisan federal agency that advises the
president, Congress, and other federal agencies on disability policy. He
was appointed to NCD [National Council on Disability] by Congress in 2015,
and he's now in his second term. He has dedicated his career to the
marketing of ideas and messages to help save lives and promote public
policy, and he's been successful in a variety of endeavors. You may know
him from his previous work. In 2007 he was nominated by President George W.
Bush to be the assistant secretary of labor for disability policy and was
unanimously confirmed by the US Senate. In that position he led disability
employment policy initiatives across the federal agencies. And on February
26, 2018, the president of the United States appointed him the chair of
NCD. He didn't waste any time on making it clear what his priorities would
be. He has many priorities, but there's one that he's pursuing more
doggedly than any of the others, and it is the complete elimination of
14(c) of the Fair Labor Standards Act. [applause] Here to address us in his
hometown of Orlando is Neil Romano:"
Thank you very much, President Riccobono. I have to tell you it's
rare that I'm in a room that is so alive, holy smokes. [cheers] I was
saying to Congressman Soto before I got up here: I just keep waiting for
someone to say, "The great state of Tennessee gives fifteen votes to
president . . ." This is an amazing convention! Congratulations to the
planning committee and all the folks who do this. What this means when a
person comes to something like this, is that there's great leadership and
great cause and great purpose that we are looking for here.
Obviously I'm delighted to be here to address the National Federation
of the Blind for a lot of reasons, but I'd also like to take an opportunity
to say thank you. Over the last so many years, every time it seems that I'm
up for some appointment or other in the federal government-you know, no one
ever knows how you get these things, it's some kind of magic, all of a
sudden your name appears on a list. And then all of a sudden on that list
you either rise or fall. You get really embarrassed. It shows up in the
newspaper, and no one's ever heard of you. No one understands the alchemy
or the magic of how it all happens, but I have to tell you, over the last
number of years the NFB has consistently supported me in my efforts. I want
to thank you for that, [applause] and I have to say that I am going to do
everything that I can to make you happy and proud that you supported me.
[applause, cheers] Oddly, it's not just because I want to make you guys
happy. It's because I know that with the NFB, if I'm doing something that
makes you happy, I am doing something that is good for people with
disabilities and Americans. [applause] So thank you.
President Riccobono's responsibility is to give you an introduction
of me; he has to say something about me. I don't come with the cache of a
congressman. You know who that is. You know what he does. You know how hard
he worked to get there. But who is this guy? He has to give you some
background on me because the planning committee doesn't want you to think
they just picked me up in the hallway to fill fifteen minutes. So you get
this image of a person, and they tell you things like I was the director of
communications for President Reagan, I served as assistant secretary of
labor and on and on, and you heard all of that. But I have to tell you,
hearing what I did doesn't necessarily communicate who I am, and more
importantly, why I believe what I believe, and why you can understand that
I will be consistent and hard-working for you as the chairman of NCD.
So I'm now going to tell you a little about me, as briefly as I can.
You are hearing from a person who has suffered-I wouldn't say
suffered-but who has serious dyslexia and spent much of his life ashamed of
his limited ability to read and write and truly understands the crushing
weight of low expectations. I'm going to stop and tell you something funny-
oh my God, he just killed his dramatic line. Well I've got a couple more;
don't worry about it. I've got a couple of real nasty barbs too-I come from
a working-class Italian-American family back in Brooklyn. [cheers] Let's
hear it Brooklyn, let's hear it New York, New Jersey-thank you guys.
When I was selected to be the assistant secretary of labor for the
United states, it was shocking to me. I was in a store buying CDs, and I
got a call on my cell phone. The person on the other side of the call said
the president would like to talk to you, and I said, "Yes, of course I'll
speak to the president of the United States." I think the woman behind me
thought it was just the most amazing pickup line I was making up.
He said, "Neil, you know you've been complaining and moaning and
going around the country talking about this 14(c) thing that you hate and
all these other things. How'd you like to put your money where your mouth
is and be my assistant secretary?"
I said, "Well, Mr. President, when you put it that way, what can I
say? Of course."
So what did I do? I hung up, and what would any good Italian kid from
Brooklyn do? I picked up the phone and called my mom. I said, "Mom, I just
got off the phone with the president, and he's asked me to be the assistant
secretary of labor." My God, we're printers, my family. My mother was
extraordinarily quiet, quiet to the point where I thought she'd fainted. I
thought, oh my mother in Brooklyn is laying on the floor; this is awful. I
finally said, "Mom, are you okay?"
She said, "Yeah, I'm fine. But does the president know you can't
spell?" [laughter]
Sometimes low expectations are just inherent, and they're not always
mean. It's just what people believe. You also don't know that I was raised
with a cousin with Down syndrome my entire life. She taught me that her
hopes, her dreams, her desires were not the slightest bit different from
mine. [cheers, applause] And she had within herself the most pronounced
idea of freedom I have ever known. Which makes it interesting when I hear
people say to me, "Well, they don't really know what they want. They don't
really want to make money."
That's not their expectations. I guess you need to know that my
father's best friend his entire life until the day he died was a blind
evangelist who some of you may have heard of. He was from here in Florida,
and his name was Ralph Montanus. We never marveled at the fact of what he
could do as a blind man. We marveled at the fact that a man who's dedicated
to other people could really affect the lives of millions of people
worldwide. My understanding of blind people is based on an executive who
worked very, very hard and achieved. I have a brother who recently passed
who was a Vietnam veteran who was a quadriplegic from the war. And I got to
see what love means in a family that makes people in bad situations do
better. But I also saw the obstacles caused by bureaucracy that often make
the care of loved ones a full-time and lonely job.
Finally, my resum� doesn't give you any indication at all that
standing before you is an older man who grapples with the daily effects of
leukemia and now faces the unexpected physical and often emotional changes
of knowing the name of what will take him.
I tell you all of this because you need to know that as your chairman-
your chairman-of NCD, I'm not someone who's learned my lessons from things
I've read. I'm not someone who's taken the time to learn things from books,
and I have no constituency besides you. I have no constituency besides us!
[applause]
Let me talk a little bit about-you know, I'm running out of time
already, which is shocking. They're probably saying, "When the heck is he
getting to the NCD stuff?" Well, eventually. But John [Par�] already took
away my 14(c) piece; what's next? Anyway, at NCD we have a series of
priorities, and I'm going to run through them. We have many of them, but
I'm just going to highlight four that mean a great deal to us. One of them
is-it's funny, I have an intro what 14(c) is, but I don't think I need it
in this room, do I? Can you imagine, for one moment, a law which allows
Americans with disabilities to be paid less than minimum wage? Can anyone
imagine any other group in America that would allow that and that there
would not be civil war? Can you imagine if one day there was a law that
said that women under the height of 5' 1" could not work in America, or if
they hadn't achieved a certain weight couldn't do something? It would be a
war, and rightfully so, because it's unfair. But we have a codification, a
law, that indeed says it is so, there are people who cannot do productive
work. I do not accept that, and neither do you. [applause]
NCD will be redoubling our efforts to eliminate this practice by
answering the often-deceptive claims and scare tactics of the lobbyists who
slither their way through our halls of Congress offering their dogma of
gloom. This year NCD will visit the six states and numerous programs that
have voluntarily eliminated their 14(c) certificates and have not
experienced the dire consequences predicted by those merchants of
hopelessness. NCD will also continue its much, much, much appreciated
partnership with this organization as we continue to do things like
congressional briefings and strategy meetings, which are more often than
not led by some of the people in this room, including my good friend over
here, John Par�. [applause]
Another priority that NCD is going to be looking at has to do with
what we call cradle-to-grave bioethic issues. These are issues that
generally don't get talked about. These are issues that people are
sometimes quite afraid of. These are issues that as we talk about
healthcare in America for people with disabilities don't often get raised,
but they have the most significant impact emotionally and ethically on some
of those decisions. We're going to ask the question is it acceptable to use
genetic testing as a tool to eliminate entire categories of people with
genetic differences and have the audacity to call that a cure? [applause]
Do we agree with the medical model that sometimes considers some lives less
worthy of life because of the potential of a disability? Is it possible
that this very mindset is one of the reasons why people still have negative
attitudes about people with disabilities in America?
You know, I have to say something, and I'm just going to say it. I
have literally heard people say, "Can you believe that that person had that
child, even though they knew he would be born blind?" I'm sure some of you
have heard it. And is there anything more terrifying than someone making a
statement like that? Should we be having a debate in 2018 about whether
people with disabilities should be allowed organ transplants? And is it
acceptable under any condition for the words "guardianship" and "assisted
suicide" to be spoken in the sentence-ever?
We move to transportation-and I'm moving along quickly-but frankly
this is a real simple one. NCD has been one of the leaders in the field of
autonomous vehicles because we understand a simple thing: if you can't get
to work, you can't work. [applause] I mean, there isn't a lot more that you
can say about that. If you can't get around, it makes your experience and
your ability to find happiness and financial support and security almost
impossible. So we're working with the United States Department of
Transportation on almost a daily basis to make sure that your views and the
views of people with disabilities across this country are represented in
the private meetings and in the conference rooms where things like
autonomous vehicles are being discussed.
And finally, I'm just going to touch very briefly on parental rights.
NCD recently issued a report on the abuse of parental rights for people
with disabilities. I asked my team to put together a brief summary that
tells me what the problems are, even though I worked on the survey, and
what some of our solutions were. You know what: after they sent me this
nice forty-page paper, I decided to sum it up this way: no parent should
ever have a child taken away from them simply because they have a
disability. Period. [applause, cheers] Disability is not a crime. Period.
[applause] And I'll be darned if I am going to accept some judge somewhere
who makes a decision that they have a better idea what to do with our
children than the love of a parent. [applause]
In closing, I just want to say that these are fundamentals to us as
Americans. You know that we have the Constitution, but the Declaration of
Independence says that we are "endowed by the Creator with certain
unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness." Everything we talked about today has to do with that statement,
and it's our responsibility-everyone in this audience, everyone at NCD, my
friends in Congress, all of us-to remember daily that it's our
responsibility as citizens to pay forward the promise of liberty and to
make America more inclusive and more equal for every human being. Thank
you. [applause]
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Curtis Chong]
New JAWS and ZoomText Annual Home Licenses Now Available
through the Freedom Scientific eStore
by Curtis Chong
From the Editor: Curtis Chong has a long history of advocacy for
blind people, holding many offices in the Federation, working as our
director of technology at the Jernigan Institute, and working for several
state agencies in roles involving the purchase of or training in
technology. He has now retired and has moved to Colorado. "For all the free
time I'm supposed to have, I still find myself incredibly busy," he says.
One of the major problems for blind people wanting to use computers
has been the initial and ongoing cost of screen-reading software. Just as
the software industry is changing to become subscription-based rather than
purchasing and upgrading, so too is the assistive technology industry. Here
is Curtis's announcement about Vispero and the way it is now marketing its
assistive software products:
I am pleased to pass along some exciting information about new annual
licenses for JAWS and ZoomText that are now available from Freedom
Scientific. With these new annual licenses, blind or low-vision computer
users in the United States can now purchase ZoomText Magnifier/Reader or
JAWS for as little as $80 or $90 (respectively) per year without paying
hundreds of dollars up front. Instead of spending $400 for ZoomText, $600
for ZoomText Reader/Magnifier, or $900 for JAWS, you can now shop online
and pay as little as $80 a year for ZoomText Magnifier with Speech or $90 a
year for JAWS. You have the option of purchasing options for one, three, or
five years, and as long as your license is current, you will always receive
the most up-to-date version. You will not have to pay any more to obtain
new versions of ZoomText Reader/Magnifier or JAWS as they are released.
Moreover, you will be able to run these programs on up to three of the
computers you use, and if needed, you can remove the license from one
computer and activate it on the computer of a friend or family member whom
you may happen to be visiting.
The ZoomText or JAWS annual home licenses are currently available
only through the Freedom Scientific eStore at
https://store.freedomscientific.com/. Here, you can search either for
"ZoomText Magnifier/Reader Home Annual License" or "JAWS Home Annual
License."
Admittedly, this may not be a big deal for those of us who have
already spent the money to purchase ZoomText or JAWS licenses; it is
certainly not of any interest to people who need the ZoomText or JAWS
professional licenses because they use these programs in an employment
situation. However, for blind people who have not purchased JAWS or
ZoomText because of the hundreds of dollars that they cannot afford to
spend, or for people who have avoided paying maintenance charges to keep
their JAWS or ZoomText licenses current, this is a really big deal.
I have had some conversations with the folks at Freedom Scientific,
and it is clear to me that the long-term plan is to have this subscription
model available for both the home and professional user licenses. For now,
I think that Freedom Scientific should be commended for taking this first
cost-saving step to reduce the cost for JAWS and ZoomText.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Nancy Burns]
This is Not a Stick
by Nancy Burns
From the Editor: Often in these pages we talk about the history of
blind people. Very often it is concrete and can be documented. Sometimes it
is speculative, and what we relate is more parable than literal. Thus is
the case with this piece by Nancy Burns.
Nancy is a longtime leader in the National Federation of the Blind,
and she quarrels with the idea that some will call the long white cane a
stick. I appreciate her position while at the same time supporting a
fundraiser done by the National Federation of the Blind of Missouri in
which we sell shirts that say, "I drive a stick." They have been popular at
the national convention, and many people who see them when we travel
appreciate the humor and the fact that we are functioning quite
independently on our own. For all of the magic that the long white cane has
performed in my life, I could easily advertise it as a wand, but let me not
confuse the message of our author. Here's what she says:
Long, long ago, in a land far away lived a young cave dweller. One
morning as he cautiously slipped out of the safety of his cave for his
morning walk, he unfortunately met up with a baby T-Rex and was knocked to
the ground. This adventurous cave dweller escaped with his life, but he
lost the sight in both eyes. He managed to return to the security of his
cave and sat down and gave up all of his previous activities. One day while
seated, his foot bumped against a stick which he picked up and used to
explore the cave. He found that his stick could be used to keep him from
bumping into the cave walls and from tripping over rocks. His stick gave
him security. He regained independence and could once again explore his
surroundings with confidence.
As the centuries rolled around to more modern times, the "stick"
became longer and a little more sophisticated. It became recognized as a
useful tool for foot travel for blind people during the 1800s. In 1944 long-
cane mobility techniques were taught at the Valley Forge Army hospital.
During the 1900s several training centers sprang up throughout the
United States. Unfortunately, the belief was that only sighted people could
teach these mobility techniques. However, through advocacy and the
demonstrated competency of the blind, it became more common for blind
people to teach others who were blind. The long white cane became the
preferred tool for use by active and mobile blind people. Once they learned
the basics of cane travel, blind travelers took these basic skills and
began exploring unfamiliar neighborhoods. The sense of hearing was
recognized as extremely important so that the blind person could listen for
traffic and other sounds. Using additional clues, such as the location of
the sun or the direction of the wind, blind travelers became more confident
and competent and were actually using what is now known as the Structured
Discovery method. Although the method had been used for decades, it was not
officially recognized until 1995. In the United States three NFB training
centers for the blind have been created. The administrators and the
majority of staff members are highly qualified blind people.
As is often the case with the sighted public, some attitudes about
blindness remain back in the dark ages. The long white cane has far
surpassed the efficiency of the primitive stick, but some continue to call
our cane a "stick."
The National Federation of the Blind advances the philosophy that the
long white cane is a tool of independence. It allows us to live the life we
want. It is challenging to bring the attitudes of the public forward and to
encourage them to think of the cane in this manner. As Federationists we
have come a long way but have a long way to go in the education of the
sighted public and in the eradication of misconceptions that linger.
In speaking with other friends who happen to be blind, it is apparent
that well educated individuals in such fields as education, health care,
law, and religion may not be educated in the fact that our white cane is no
longer called a stick. The New Mexico Legislature passed the White Cane Law
in 1967. This law protects the rights of blind citizens who use the long
white cane or guide dog. The passage of this legislation is a continuation
of the efforts of the Federation to protect the rights of blind
pedestrians. The long white cane has truly become a symbol of our
independence and allows us to move about and to live the life we want.
Editor's Note: In support of Nancy's conclusion, and in defense of
those who appreciate and have benefited from our educational system, unless
the public has direct contact with someone who uses the long white cane and
refers to it with this language, they might be hard-pressed to arrive at
our terminology without thinking it offensive or inaccurate. Just for fun
we looked at several dictionary definitions. According to the Cambridge
English Dictionary online, the definition of cane is as follows: "The long,
hollow stems of particular plants such as bamboo: A cane is also a walking
stick with a curved handle, used to help someone walk." The Meriam Webster
Dictionary says: "2: a stick typically of wood or metal with a usually
curved handle at one end that is grasped to provide stability in walking or
standing."
From the foregoing definitions one can easily see that the cane is
primarily thought of as a tool that allows someone who cannot move to be
ambulatory. Therefore a sighted person might think it rude to refer to the
tool clearly used by the blind as a sensory supplement with the same term
and imply a greater physical impairment.
After our back and forth on all of this, Nancy concludes: This
article was originally intended to just point out the lack of information
certain professionals, especially in the medical field, thought about the
cane. I sort of wondered off into a different direction. I really did not
want to preach, but I think it did come out a little preachy. Anyway, it
was fun to write.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: C. Edwin Vaughan]
Are We Handicapped, Disabled, or Something Else?
by C. Edwin Vaughan
From the Editor: What is in a word? We have long debated whether
words create our reality or reality creates our words. If the former is
true, the word we use can be limiting and even devaluing.
We know that we are blind. Some of us can't see at all; others of us
see so little that we primarily use the techniques of blindness to be
productive. But beyond blind, what are we? Are we handicapped, disabled,
differently abled, or are we "people with sight loss" or "people with
visual limitations"? Though we have had thoughtful essays on the subject,
we still lack clarity.
Dr. C. Edwin Vaughan is a former professor of sociology at the
University of Missouri, Columbia. He is good at making us look at these
hard questions, often pointing the way to what is wrong, but leaving to us
the task of figuring out what is right. Here is what he says about the
history of the words we use to describe us and their not-so-subtle
implications:
For more than two decades the NFB has stressed that we are changing
what it means to be blind. All blind people internalize notions about
blindness acquired from parents, teachers, rehab workers, and the general
public. The most significant barriers to our being integrated into the
wider community come from the way blindness and vision loss are framed or
portrayed in the wider community. Blindness is viewed as a characteristic
that creates a large gulf between the sighted and people with lesser
degrees of vision. Since examples of the framing of blindness come from
the widespread use of the words "handicapped" and "disabled" as general
descriptions of blindness, it is helpful to understand the origin of these
two words.
John Simpson is one of the editors of the Oxford English Dictionary.
He is also the author of a delightful new book, The Word Detective:
Searching for the Meaning of It All at the Oxford English Dictionary (Basic
Books, New York 2001). He has researched the history of a great many
commonly used words and phrases. The words "handicap" and "disability"
specifically caught his attention because his second daughter Ellie has
Angelman Syndrome, "A rare genetic disorder causing severe mental
disability and characterized by ataxia, creating a person who is
affectionate and cheerful but blissfully unaware of many things, most
especially the need for speech." (P. 191) Simpson then applied his
lexicographic skills to analyze some of the words used to describe people
such as his daughter. Here is what he says:
Ability is another of those words that entered English in the
Middle Ages from France. But the French didn't give us disability. We
had to work that one out for ourselves. Our first record of the term
dates from 1545, in the general sense "lack of ability (to do
something)."
But the specific application of the word to a person's mental or
physical incapacity also comes from around the same period: it was
first noted in 1561, and contrasts strongly with many of the other
words used at the time (such as imbecility, dumbness, etc.) for
personal-disability terms which are now no longer regarded as
acceptable. We might be surprised that a "neutral" word was so
prevalent in the sixteenth century... Why did disability become the
more acceptable term? The word handicap dates from the seventeenth
century, over a century after disability. It comes from a time when
the English enjoyed experimenting with new vocabulary. But at first
the term had nothing to do with disability. In the beginning, handicap
was a game. As the OED [Oxford English Dictionary] says, it was "a
game in which one person claims an article belonging to another and
offers something in exchange, an umpire being chosen to decide the
difference of value between the two articles, to be made up in money
by the owner of the less valuable one." The handicap, then, is the
difference between the value of two items, or the value you have to
add to one to make it equivalent to the other...
By the eighteenth century, the word handicap attached itself to
horse-racing, on the same logic. An official decided the extra weight
to be carried by a horse to equalize its chances of winning.
Originally the agreement was conducted between two principals with a
cap, as in the game, but later bureaucracy took over. The meaning
seeped into various sports in the eighteen and nineteenth centuries.
It wasn't until around 1888 that the handicap was first applied
to physical or mental disability. The earliest records for this come
from the United States. At first it was regarded as a perfectly
normal expression-an acknowledgement of the difference in ability
between two people. But, by the later twentieth century, handicap had
come to be considered generally unacceptable: an unfamiliar-looking
word implying too marked and dismissive a distinction between the able
and the disabled. Maybe the expression also seemed to imply going
"cap in hand" to beg for public assistance (Simpson, 188-190).
Although the label "handicap" is out of favor we have
institutionalized the concept of disability throughout the general culture.
One of the most visible examples is the Americans with Disabilities Act.
In his 2018 banquet address at the NFB National Convention President
Mark Riccobono observed that blindness has always been observed as a
characteristic that distinguishes someone who lacks ability (speech as
published in the August-September 2018 Braille Monitor). Are we making a
mistake by accepting without questioning the concept of disability as it is
generally applied to blind people? "Dis" is a negative prefix. No one likes
to be dissed; why should we like to be disabled?
What does it mean to be able? Is every person with average vision
able to do everything? Obviously not-sighted people are as variable as
people with limited sight. Sighted people demonstrate an enormous range of
what individuals can accomplish. Yet we apply this concept in a most
general way to all individuals who are blind or have limited vision. For
the general public ability is individualized: everyone is different.
However, as a group all blind people are disabled.
How can we as a social movement change the way our individuality is
portrayed? Clearly words like differently abled buy into the same general
problem. What concept can focus on our potential as individuals? If these
ideas have merit, perhaps they can be developed and better analyzed in the
many philosophic discussions that occur in chapter meetings and at our
three national centers.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Chris Danielsen]
Building the Federation Brand Part 4: A Second Look at Our Brand Values
by Chris Danielsen
From the Editor: Chris Danielsen is our director of public relations
and was one of the people who served a critical function in helping us
arrive at and articulate our branding messages. Who better than Chris to
help explain these further. Here is what he says:
In the May 2018 Braille Monitor, we discussed how one of the critical
pieces of our brand architecture is a set of brand values. As we said, just
as with personal values, brand values make up the code by which the
organization lives. Our brand values define the principles upon which our
staff, leadership, and members act and make decisions. They are the heart
and soul of the organization and do not change very much over time.
The National Federation of the Blind lives by six carefully
considered brand values: courage, respect, love, full participation,
democracy, and collective action. Back in May we talked about the values of
courage, respect, and love and gave examples of how they work in our
movement. In this article we'll consider the values of full participation,
democracy, and collective action.
Full Participation
We assert that blind people have a right to live fully and equally in
the world, and from this flows our expectation that society will not
artificially prevent blind people from full participation. The world is
better off when all its people can contribute all that they have to offer.
In his 1957 banquet speech "Cross of Blindness," our founder, Dr.
Jacobus tenBroek, laid out the rationale for organizing and growing the
National Federation of the Blind. He listed sixteen incidents in which
blind people encountered discrimination or barriers to full participation
in society. Some of these examples are much rarer today than they were when
he made the speech, if they exist at all. It's unusual today for a bank to
flatly deny a blind person a safety deposit box or for an airline to deny
us a plane ticket. Most of these barriers have all but disappeared because
of the National Federation of the Blind. But other barriers still exist,
and there are new ones. The inaccessibility of websites, apps, and other
technologies comes to mind. So does the proliferation of household
appliances that we can no longer easily label and use. As at our founding
and in 1957, our goal is the full participation of blind people in society,
and that means the removal of all the artificial barriers that stand in the
way of that goal.
Democracy
The National Federation of the Blind is the original and largest
organization of the blind. By virtue of being a democratic organization
open to all blind people, we represent the issues that are important to the
blind openly and fairly. National, state, and local officers are elected by
the membership of the NFB to ensure a representative form of government and
democratic decision-making practices. Our membership-driven structure
ensures that blind people can determine our own future rather than relying
on others to advocate for us.
Understanding our commitment to democracy involves understanding how
our leaders are chosen and how we arrive at decisions. The Constitution of
the National Federation of the Blind was last amended at the 2014 National
Convention. The national convention is the Federation's supreme authority,
so our constitution can only be amended there. The amended constitution
was published in the January 2015 issue of the Braille Monitor and is
available online at
https://nfb.org/images/nfb/publications/bm/bm15/bm1501/bm150111.htm.
Because the constitution lays out all our democratic processes, it's useful
for members to read and review it. Understanding how our organization is
structured, how we elect our leaders, and how we make decisions helps all
of us to more fully participate in our movement.
Collective Action
The primary purpose of the National Federation of the Blind is "to
serve as a vehicle for collective action by the blind," as stated in our
above-referenced constitution. A core belief is that the blind can and will
speak for ourselves. Embodied in this self-determination is the
understanding that progress comes from blind people working together,
sharing individual dreams, and speaking with a more powerful, unified voice
than any one person could on his/her own.
Our democratic processes allow us to arrive at organizational
decisions, either through the actions of our elected leaders or through
direct votes by the convention (for example, on resolutions). Collective
action encompasses the things we do in order to put those decisions into
effect. For example, if we decide to support proposed legislation, then we
tell Congress about our support for it-in person during Washington Seminar
and through letters, emails, phone calls, and social media posts throughout
the rest of the year. Sometimes we organize informational protests to
inform policymakers, businesses, or government agencies that we believe
that their practices or policies are unhelpful to blind people. Social
media campaigns can do the same thing. We successfully put a stop to the
Foundation Fighting Blindness's misguided #HowEyeSeeIt campaign almost
entirely through social media action. The key to collective action, whether
direct or virtual, is that we all convey and amplify the same message. That
is what gives our movement its power and influence.
What other examples come to mind when you think about these values,
or any other aspects of the brand that we have discussed? Share them with
us by sending an email to communicationsteam at nfb.org.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Ronza Othman hugs a stuffed minion from the movie
Despicable Me.]
The Future Is Ours
by Ronza Othman
From the Editor: Ronza Othman was just elected as the president of
the National Federation of the Blind of Maryland. She is a motivated person
who has a very distinguished career within the Federation. Where Ronza is,
activity lives and flourishes. Here is a speech that she gave at the
National Federation of the Blind of Maryland's 2018 convention:
"I am blind." Those words are three of the most liberating words in
the English language. But for many of us, they are some of the scariest
words in the English language. Some of us need to hear them hundreds of
times before we realize those words apply to us. Some of us need to
literally fall in a hole, and we still won't realize they apply to us. But
thanks to the National Federation of the Blind, those words are liberating-
an anthem of freedom that pierces the anxiety and frustration of trying to
do things the sighted way when you have little or no sight.
I'd like to tell you a little about me, if I may. I was one of those
who was slow to accept my blindness and slower to use the words. I always
thought I was unique-my family immigrated to the United States from
Palestine just days before I was born. I spoke almost no English when I
started school, and I was the sixth of seven kids. My family is loud,
funny, and each and every one of them is a Type-A personality-except me.
#Sarcasm. My mom figured out when I was a toddler that I had "vision
issues," and like most parents she took me from doctor to doctor seeking a
diagnosis, a reason, and a fix.
In the Middle East and many other parts of the world, cultural and
political norms cause families of the blind to hide their disabilities and
sometimes to hide the family members who have disabilities. The word
"blind" has very negative connotations, and resources don't exist, or if
they do they are inadequate. Fortunately much has changed in the last
quarter-century in much of the world. But for most refugees and
immigrants, who are already trying so hard to "blend" and be unnoticed in
American society, having a child with a disability such as blindness is an
additional challenge. Having said that, though the Middle Eastern culture
used to hide its blind, my mother rebelled against that notion from day
one. So my unwillingness to use the word "blind" though perhaps had some
societal cause, was in no way perpetuated by my mother or immediate family.
Yet English was my second language, and I was notoriously bad at it-I
kept trying to add English endings to Arabic words, which as a little kid
just sounds bizarre. You'll still hear my accent come out when I'm tired,
sad, or angry. Anyway, I went to kindergarten at my local public school,
where I have fond memories of playing with blocks. That is all I remember
about mainstream kindergarten.
I remember a test-I was five so I also remember really wanting the
juice box they promised me if I finished the test-and they showed me three
pictures: an umbrella, an apple, and a house. I knew the words in Arabic,
but I didn't know them in English. I told the juice box people what items
were in the pictures, but I did it in the wrong language-no one but me
spoke Arabic. And off to a resource school for the blind I went-oh and I
got to repeat kindergarten too. And to add insult to injury, the juice box
wasn't even that good.
The resource school taught me to read, write, and speak English
first. But they wouldn't teach me more than rudimentary Braille or cane
travel because I "had enough vision to get by without them." They gave me
large print books, and I believe that is when my need for a chiropractor
originally began; a six-year-old shouldn't be carrying such heavy books. I
was mainstreamed into the "regular" classrooms within a few months of
getting there, which made me wonder even at age six why I had to commute
ninety minutes each way each day to just do what I would have done at my
neighborhood school. I did ask that question-in English, I was precocious-
but I never got a satisfactory answer.
I remember a particular time when I got behind my regular class in
reading, and I worked out that my classmates were using context clues from
the pictures in the book to learn words. Large print books in my day
looked like over-sized coloring books, and for a blind kid, all I saw were
a bunch of wavy lines-rather disorienting. I asked my "vision" teacher if
someone could color in my book like the other kids so I could have usable
pictures too, and I'm sure that was the most fun task one vision aide
probably ever had, coloring my first-grade reader. I have fond memories of
See Frog Jump as a result.
I went back to my neighborhood school after second grade and attended
a religious parochial school for junior high and high school. I got the
occasional visit from my vision itinerant, but mostly those were excuses to
skip a math quiz or visit Taco Bell. It took me longer than most to finish
my homework, and I slept very little in high school in order to keep up
with the required reading. Oh, and I was a total nerd, complete with the
public aid glasses-you know them, the ones that are huge plastic frames
with bifocals-and my mother insisted I wear them on a string so I didn't
lose them. I didn't go out alone at night, and I only went if I absolutely
trusted the person whom I was with. I realize now that the people I was
with were giving me nonvisual cues, but it was clear to everyone but me
that I was blind.
All this time, when people asked me-and mind you they absolutely had
to ask, I never volunteered or self-identified-I would say I was "visually
impaired."
When I went to college, I began figuring out something was different
about me. I realized I was the only one working so hard to complete
assignments. I got a job on campus I really liked but wasn't brought back
after freshmen year because I was "too slow in reading documents." I
realized Scantron Test Sheets were everywhere (they are the devil), and my
absolute loathing for them was disproportionate from my fellow classmates.
I fell in a hole-literally. Walking one night I jumped out of the way of a
speeding car and ended up in a construction ditch. I hadn't even known it
was there, and had I used blindness techniques or mobility skills, I'd have
known of its existence before I fell in it. I broke my ankle and two ribs.
But I insisted to anyone who would listen that I fell because of a
speeding car, not because I "couldn't see well." My vernacular was
changing.
I applied for scholarships with the National Federation of the Blind,
and I wish so fervently that someone had contacted me for more than the
annual interview. My college experience would have been so different, and
I may have avoided that hole. I finally did receive a state scholarship in
Illinois when I was a first-year law student, and that state convention was
my first exposure to adults who were blind and who were fine with their
blindness. In fact, they were thriving.
I showed up at the convention fully planning to take the scholarship
money and run-law school is expensive and really intense. But when I got
to the hotel, I saw about 100 blind people who were laughing, talking,
walking, navigating the hotel and parking lot on their own, and doing what
many of us think of as basic things. But for me, this was all new. I
thought I was doing great as a "low vision" person, but surrounded by
people who had much less usable vision than I did, I felt like I was
missing something fundamental.
At that convention, I met people like Patti Chang, Debbie Stein, Fred
Schroeder, and Ryan Strunk. Fred Schroeder kept calling me "Runza," and it
took me three days to figure out he was teasing me by calling me the name
of his favorite Nebraska sandwich. Then he talked to me about my own as
well as cultural misconceptions about blindness-this was the beginning of a
life-long conversation the two of us have been having about blindness and
NFB philosophy. Ryan Strunk kept asking me annoying questions like "But
how do you read?" and "How do you travel?" I got defensive because my
answers didn't satisfy him . . . or, I realized, me. I later thought long
and hard about his questions and viewed them as a challenge to learn how to
work smarter, not harder, and that meant learning blindness skills. Patti
Chang showed me that lawyering could be done as a blind person quite
competently-which was something I was very anxious about-and she took me
under her wing (whether I liked it or not) and brought me into her family.
Patti gave me one of my first jobs as a law clerk, and she worked me as
hard as every sighted employee she had-I think she worked me harder. She
taught me through words and actions what blind people could do in their
lives, what blind lawyers could do, what I could do. Debbie Stein gave me
the gift of literacy; she too grabbed hold of me and wouldn't let go. I
tried to take the money and run, but Patti and Debbie wouldn't allow it,
and Debbie taught me to read Braille.
I've been fortunate to meet thousands of Federationists since that
state convention, and I've learned a great deal from so many of them. A
Federationist, Nathanael Wales, put a long white cane in my hand for the
first time and taught me how to use it. I had to lose a bet to do it, but
some of us are slow learners. Federationists taught me cooking techniques.
Federationists showed me that independent air travel is not only possible
but easy. Federationists helped give me the confidence to move, alone,
across the country to Maryland. They showed me what technology is out
there. A Federationist, Joanne Wilson, helped me get my first federal job.
Melissa Riccobono was the first friend I made when I moved to
Maryland a decade ago. I learned from Melissa to be myself, that it is OK
to make mistakes, and to never stop learning. The incomparable Sharon
Maneki has influenced my life in so many ways. I've learned that I am
capable of so much more than I thought I was. I learned that no one's
brain can store as much information as Sharon's, but I like the challenge
of trying to mine that brain. Sharon is also one of the funniest people
I've ever known, but her humor is so unexpected that it takes you a minute
to realize she made a joke. I'm so grateful for her faith in me as a
leader, and I'm more grateful than I can ever express for her friendship
and for her love.
These incredible Federationists and others helped shape me into the
person I am. They taught me self-confidence and that the word "blind" is
not negative but freeing. I hope to share the gift they've given to me
with those who come after me. They showed me that with the proper skills
and attitude, the future is ours. Because of them, because of you, my
fellow Federationists, I can say with pride and confidence: My name is
Ronza Othman, and I am blind.
----------
Why We Question the Wisdom that Leads to Low Expectations for the Blind
by Gary Wunder
At the 2018 National Convention, President Riccobono flatteringly
introduced Suman Kanuganti, the cofounder and chief executive officer of
Aira, as a disruptive force in the field of blindness technology. There is
no question that Aira is pushing the bounds of technology by asking a lot
from the cellular networks in delivering real-time audio and video to give
blind people another way to get visual information. In the Federation we
are also disruptive, doing anything we can to raise expectations of blind
people so that blindness is not the characteristic that defines them or
their future. It is our observation that the traditions supporting low
expectations have not been based on the real experience of blind people but
on the perceptions that our society has unknowingly perpetuated. These low
expectations have not been conscious or deliberate, but they are real.
History is worth knowing and traditions are beneficial, but sometimes we
need to look beyond them as we do our best to think outside the box and
create the kind of future we want.
Some of my service on the National Federation of the Blind's Board of
Directors took place while Dr. Jernigan was an active and inspirational
leader. I treasure having had that experience. One day he began after a
brief coffee break with this poem. I hope it sparks in you both the
amusement and the reflection it sparks in me:
The Calf-Path
by Samuel Walter Foss
One day through the primeval wood
A calf walked home as good calves should;
But made a trail all bent askew,
A crooked trail as all calves do.
Since then three hundred years have fled,
And I infer the calf is dead.
But still he left behind his trail,
And thereby hangs my moral tale.
The trail was taken up next day,
By a lone dog that passed that way;
And then a wise bellwether sheep
Pursued the trail o'er vale and steep,
And drew the flock behind him, too,
As good bellwethers always do.
And from that day, o'er hill and glade
Through those old woods a path was made.
And many men wound in and out,
And dodged, and turned, and bent about,
And uttered words of righteous wrath,
Because 'twas such a crooked path;
But still they followed-do not laugh-
The first migrations of that calf,
And through this winding wood-way stalked
Because he wobbled when he walked.
This forest path became a lane,
that bent and turned and turned again;
This crooked lane became a road,
Where many a poor horse with his load
Toiled on beneath the burning sun,
And traveled some three miles in one.
And thus a century and a half
They trod the footsteps of that calf.
The years passed on in swiftness fleet,
The road became a village street;
And this, before men were aware,
A city's crowded thoroughfare.
And soon the central street was this
Of a renowned metropolis;
And men two centuries and a half,
Trod in the footsteps of that calf.
Each day a hundred thousand rout
Followed the zigzag calf about
And o'er his crooked journey went
The traffic of a continent.
A hundred thousand men were led,
By one calf near three centuries dead.
They followed still his crooked way,
And lost one hundred years a day;
For thus such reverence is lent,
To well-established precedent.
A moral lesson this might teach
Were I ordained and called to preach;
For men are prone to go it blind
Along the calf-paths of the mind,
And work away from sun to sun,
To do what other men have done.
They follow in the beaten track,
And out and in, and forth and back,
And still their devious course pursue,
To keep the path that others do.
They keep the path a sacred groove,
Along which all their lives they move.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Karl Smith]
Of Elvis and Structured Discovery
by Karl Smith
From the Editor: Karl Smith is a longtime member of the National
Federation of the Blind, is a major pillar in our Utah Affiliate, and runs
a successful business selling assistive technology. Karl loves to discuss
history and philosophy, and this month he treats Monitor readers to
reflections that combine those and some rather interesting personal
experiences while on a trip. Here is what he says:
In recent years Federationists have become quite familiar with the
term Structured Discovery. It is the method used by each of our three
training centers in Louisiana, Colorado, and Minnesota. At these centers
blind students are taught skills that help them familiarize themselves with
their environment and through careful inspection learn to navigate and
function fully in normal activities of daily life such as cane travel,
shopping, holding a job, and more. The roots of Structured Discovery run
deep throughout the history of our movement back to Dr. tenBroek, Dr.
Jernigan, and many other early leaders.
Today highly qualified blind instructors routinely teach cane travel,
cooking, and woodshop, along with other skills using the Structured
Discovery method. It hasn't always been so. In the early 1980s a young
student named Fred Schroeder was refused certification as a travel
instructor by the AER (Association for the Education and Rehabilitation for
the Blind) even though he had completed his university studies and was in
every way qualified. Why? Because he was blind, and of course the
professionals knew that it was dangerous for a blind person to teach
another blind person cane travel.
As foreign as this attitude is to those of us who received training
from highly skilled blind instructors, it is still very prevalent among the
so-called professionals in the field including both teachers and
administrators. They seem unable or unwilling to be convinced despite the
evidence to the contrary that Structured Discovery taught by a teacher,
blind or sighted, results in the most consistent long-term positive
outcomes.
Imagine my pleasant surprise when I witnessed a real-world example of
Structured Discovery used by someone who had likely never heard the term.
It was during an extended international trip through New Zealand and
Australia with my family along with Harold and Joanne Wilson. It happened
on Christmas day of 2009 in of all places Christchurch, New Zealand, at the
International Antarctic Center, a scientific complex and museum funded by a
number of nations including the US. It is from here that most Antarctic
expeditions leave for the South Pole and its environs. The museum features
a lot of interesting and fun activities. These included a ride in a
H�gglund, a large, tracked vehicle used to drive over the Antarctic ice.
It can climb up and down hills at up to a forty-five-degree angle and tip
from left to right up to thirty-five degrees. It can also float if
necessary, as it did during part of the ride. The water actually came up
above the windows at one point before we drove up the opposite side of the
river. There is also a very large deep freeze with 50,000 tons of snow and
ice inside where you can go and be blasted by an Antarctic storm. This
room also features an igloo, a big slide made of ice, and a wind chill
machine capable of producing temperatures of 50 below zero. Joanne and I
did go down the slide, and fortunately I believe the incriminating pictures
no longer exist. My two daughters hid inside the igloo during the storm.
The exhibit which made the greatest impression on me was the
penguins. These are known as second chance penguins because they have been
rescued after sustaining injuries from predators, being hit by cars, or
being cut up by boat propellers. These are the lucky ones who would not
have lived long in the wild in their condition. One of these penguins,
Elvis, was blinded by a predator. His handler told us that he uses his beak
as a cane, checking out his location and using his sense of smell to find
things. She also said that as soon as he hears the rattle of the fish
bucket he knows it's feeding time and will come out of his burrow for
dinner.
On this day Elvis decided not to come out when he heard the bucket.
Someone asked if the handler would take the food to him. Her answer was
very interesting: she said that she wouldn't take the food to him because
it is best for penguins to eat in the water. If she took the food to him
rather than requiring him to find his way out to it, he wouldn't learn to
be independent.
How about that-naturally teaching the Structured Discovery method of
orientation and mobility to a penguin. She thought it was just common
sense. Wouldn't it be nice if this sort of sensible thinking was the norm
throughout the blindness system? Wouldn't it be refreshing to know that
the professionals knew that blind people are at least as smart as penguins?
I say, go Elvis!
----------
Recipes
Every summer, many NFB chapters hold a picnic. Since this would be
difficult for those of us in the NFB of Minnesota At-Large Chapter, we
decided to hold a "virtual picnic" at our August meeting. Below are some of
the recipes presented - along with a couple more from other affiliate
members. It is nineteen degrees as I am writing this ... so a picnic sounds
good!
[PHOTO CAPTION: Rocky Hart]
Puppy Chow
by Rocky Hart
Rocky Hart, who is fifteen years old and in the tenth grade, attends
the Minnesota State Academy for the Blind and is the secretary of the At-
Large Chapter. We suspect he may be the youngest chapter officer in the
NFB. We are benefiting from his enthusiasm, energy, and new ideas.
Ingredients:
9 cups Chex cereal, any type
1 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
1-1/2 cups powdered sugar
Method: Put the cereal into a large bowl, set aside. One twelve-ounce
box yields just over 9 cups. In a one-quart microwavable bowl heat
chocolate chips, peanut butter, and butter uncovered on high for one minute
and stir. Microwave about thirty seconds longer or until mixture can be
stirred smooth. Add vanilla and stir. Pour mixture over cereal, gently
mixing until evenly coated. Pour into a two-gallon resealable food-storage
plastic bag. Add powdered sugar. Seal bag; shake until well coated. Spread
on waxed paper to cool. Store in airtight container in refrigerator. A
paper grocery bag can be used instead of a large plastic bag. If you only
have one-gallon plastic bags, put 1/2 cup powdered sugar and 1/3 of the
cereal in each bag, seal and shake. Spread onto waxed paper to cool.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Jan Bailey]
Cauliflower Salad
by Jan Bailey
Jan Bailey is a long-time Federationist and president of our
Rochester Chapter.
Ingredients:
1 medium head cauliflower, cut up and steamed for about two minutes and
then cooled
4 to 5 green onions
1 small can sliced olives
5 or 6 sliced fresh mushrooms
1/3 to 1/2 cup each sour cream and mayonnaise, mixed together
salt and pepper to taste
Method: Mix all ingredients. Marinate a while before serving.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Joyce Scanlan]
Baked Beans and Pineapple
by Joyce Scanlan
Joyce Scanlan is a long-time Federationist who served as president of
the NFB of Minnesota for many years, as well as founding and serving as
executive director of BLIND, Inc.
Ingredients:
1/4 pound bacon, diced
1 small onion, chopped (1/4 cup)
1/2 green pepper, chopped (1/2 cup)
1/2 to 1 cup pineapple chunks, drained
1 20-ounce can pork and beans
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1 cup catsup
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
Method: Fry bacon until crisp. Stir in onion, pepper, and pineapple.
Cook and stir until onion is tender. Stir in remaining ingredients. Pour
into bean pot or large casserole. Bake uncovered at 300 degrees for two
hours. Makes six to eight servings.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: Ryan Strunk]
Nut Goodies
by Ryan Strunk
Ryan is the president of the NFB of Minnesota. He says: "While not
strictly a picnic recipe, this one is very Minnesotan."
Ingredients:
1 12-ounce package chocolate chips
1 12-ounce package butterscotch chips
1 package miniature marshmallows
1 pound salted peanuts
1 cup peanut butter
Method: Melt chocolate and butterscotch chips in microwave. Add
peanut butter and keep heating until you can stir the mixture smooth. Add
peanuts and marshmallows. After it is mixed well, pour into greased twelve-
by-thirteen-inch pan. Let sit until hardened. Cut into bars.
----------
Jan's Crockpot Calico Beans
by Jan Bailey
Ingredients:
1 pound ground beef
1 medium onion, peeled and chopped
1 package fully cooked bacon, chopped
1 large can Bush's original baked beans, drained
1 small can Bush's original baked beans, drained
1 can baby lima beans, drained
1 can dark red kidney beans, drained
2/3 cup ketchup
1/4 cup mustard
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon molasses, optional
Method: Brown the hamburger and chopped onions together, and drain if
needed. Place in six-quart crockpot, add all other ingredients, and stir
thoroughly. Cook on high for four hours or on low for six hours.
----------
[PHOTO CAPTION: David Andrews]
Summer Vegetable Pesto Ribbon Salad
by David Andrews
David Andrews is the president of the NFB of Minnesota At-Large
Chapter. He has lived and worked in many states, including serving as the
first director of the International Braille and Technology Center for the
Blind at the national headquarters in Baltimore.
Ingredients:
Salad:
2 zucchinis
2 yellow squashes
2 carrots, peeled
2 cups grape tomatoes
olive oil, for drizzling
salt, to taste
pepper, to taste
Pesto Dressing:
2 cups fresh basil
1 cup fresh parsley
2/3 cup cashews
1 clove garlic
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 cup olive oil
Methods:
For the salad: Cut the ends off the zucchini, squash, and carrots. With a
vegetable peeler, shave off as many thin slices as possible from
vegetables, making a pile of thin ribbons. Transfer ribbons to a large
bowl. Use a sharp knife to slice the tomatoes in half and add to the bowl
with the shaved vegetables. Drizzle olive oil over the vegetables, and
season with salt and pepper. Toss to combine.
For the pesto dressing: Add the basil, parsley, cashews, garlic, salt,
pepper, lemon juice, and olive oil to a food processor and process until
smooth. Spoon the pesto onto the shaved vegetables and mix well with tongs
until fully coated and serve. This is a good picnic recipe because it
contains no mayonnaise.
----------
Monitor Miniatures
News from the Federation Family
Notices and information in this section may be of interest to Monitor
readers. We are not responsible for the accuracy of the information; we
have edited only for space and clarity.
Small Braille Books:
We have available for sale little Whittle Braille Books. These 3 by 5
inch books include UEB literary Braille. This is a great way to help new
Braille learners of all ages to quiz themselves on the Braille code or for
teachers and parents to quickly review Braille contractions. These come in
either Braille or print. They are also great gifts for regular classroom
teachers, grandparents, siblings, friends, or classroom peers! Several BELL
Academy programs have furnished these to help reinforce the code to their
participants. Each book is $10, and orders can be placed online at
http://www.nbpcb.org/pages/whittle-pocket-reference-book.php.
Please help us get the word out by letting everyone on your social
media contact lists know about them. All profits go towards children's
literacy programs!
For questions you can contact us at braille at nbpcb.org.
----------
Monitor Mart
The notices in this section have been edited for clarity, but we can
pass along only the information we were given. We are not responsible for
the accuracy of the statements made or the quality of the products for
sale.
For Sale:
. One VarioUltra Braille display, only used twice. It is in excellent
condition. I am asking $1,500.
. iRead Now OCR software with document camera in excellent condition. I
am asking $500.
. One Shipper talking postal scale in excellent condition. I am asking
$75.
Please email connie at conniedavid.com or call 612-695-6991 for
information about the above three items.
----------
NFB Pledge
I pledge to participate actively in the efforts of the National
Federation of the Blind to achieve equality, opportunity, and security for
the blind; to support the policies and programs of the Federation; and to
abide by its constitution.
-------------- next part --------------
An embedded and charset-unspecified text was scrubbed...
Name: ATT00113.txt
URL: <http://nfbnet.org/pipermail/nfbnj_nfbnet.org/attachments/20190102/ecf6b0df/attachment.txt>
-------------- next part --------------
An embedded and charset-unspecified text was scrubbed...
Name: ATT00115.txt
URL: <http://nfbnet.org/pipermail/nfbnj_nfbnet.org/attachments/20190102/ecf6b0df/attachment-0001.txt>
More information about the NFBNJ
mailing list