[Quietcars] Woman's fight to enter Iowa Department TrainingCenter Accepted, but no dogs allowed!

Sat Feb 21 16:53:31 UTC 2009

Dear All,

This is as it should be.  If you can use a cane to get around, you are fully 
using your skills of blindness and no other living party is helping you.
If you can use a cane, it is just you and your skills of O an M that are 
being used.
If you were allowed to use a guide dog the question is how much of the 
ability is attributed to your skills and how much is the dogs?
If you can use a guide dog, Why not a sighted guide?  Then just how 
independent are you?  Using a guide dog is akin to using a sighted guide to 
get you around.  How many of us could afford that?
The use of "sleep shade" training is used to ensure that all blindness 
skills that are being taught are being learned without the possibility of 
anyone using or depending upon any remaining vision.  This ensures the 
sharpest skill sets, greater confidence in one's skills and true 
independence.
If after training is finished, anyone can use a guide dog or sighted guide 
of their choice, but they will have the cane skills to do without either 
also.
It is "boot camp" for the blind.  They don't mollycoddle you in the military 
either, but break down the individual to strip away all of the old 
conceptions and then replace them with new ones that build a person's self 
confidence, resourcefulness and self reliance.
Too many state programs have a "revolving door" where blind people come for 
training and are allowed to use their remaining vision.  This lets them 
"fudge" on their skills and then when their vision changes and they lose 
more, they come back again to learn all over again.
I have seen it happen and know people who look forward to their next trip to 
the training center to see their friends and live on the state's dime.
Rehab teachers that don't challenge these people are not doing them any 
service and communicate their low expectation of and to the blind students 
they serve.
Tell me how you can assess the blindness skills if you are letting someone 
use their remaining vision?  How can you ensure that someone is using their 
O and M skills if they are using a sighted guide of some type.
Guide dogs have their place, but only after someone has maximized their cane 
skills, which most guide dog schools, worth their salt, require you to have 
before getting a dog.  If they don't, they are not worth a bag of dog poop 
in my opinion.
I have very good cane skills and know that I can get around anywhere I need 
to go with just my cane.  I am applying for a guide dog right now to take 
advantage of the benefits that a dog can provide.
They learn routes very well and can therefore travel a little faster.  They 
can recognize common objects like doors, stairs, curbs and things that would 
take me and my cane a little longer to locate.
They can be an aid in crossing streets, but I still need to be the one in 
charge, not the dog.
Many sighted people think that the dog knows where you want to go, how to 
get there and does your thinking for you.
I even saw a man trying to give directions to a guy's guide dog on how to 
find the Metro station in Washington once.
He was drawing maps on the ground and telling the dog he needed to keep to 
the right at a certain place and look for the stairs going down, just as if 
the dog was the smart one of the two.
It was funny to me, but this guy was serious and followed the guy for over 
half a block still yelling directions to the dog.  The guide dog user and I 
had a good laugh about it later, but it shows just how misunderstood we 
still are by the sighted public.
If someone doesn't like the way

.

things are taught at a center, they can choose to go somewhere else.  It is 
there choice.

Sorry for this off topic response

David Evans NFBF
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jennifer Applegate" <jlastar at comcast.net>
To: "'Discussion of new quiet cars and pedestrian safety'" 
<quietcars at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Friday, February 20, 2009 10:29 PM
Subject: Re: [Quietcars] Woman's fight to enter Iowa Department 
TrainingCenter Accepted, but no dogs allowed!

>I am not sure that I fully understand this.  I know that at Blind Inc. 
>there
> were some students with guide dogs.  They didn't use them during school, 
> but
> they came and left from the school with them.  If the woman was using the
> dog instead of the cain then that's wrong.  Most people who get a dog have
> to be really good at mobility with a cane outside before the can get a
> seeing eye dog.  A person has to be confident in there mobility, because 
> the
> dog doesn't know where you want to go.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: quietcars-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:quietcars-bounces at nfbnet.org] 
> On
> Behalf Of michael townsend
> Sent: Friday, February 20, 2009 8:18 PM
> To: seeingeye-l at list.web.net
> Subject: [Quietcars] Woman's fight to enter Iowa Department Training 
> Center
> Accepted, but no dogs allowed!
> Sensitivity: Personal
>
> Another view on this story.
>
> Mike T
>
>
> desmoinesregister.com
> February 20, 2009
>
> Woman's bid to take dog to classes rejected
>
> By GRANT SCHULTE and MOLLY HOTTLE
> gschulte at dmreg.com
>
> Stephanie Dohmen's six-year fight to take a guide dog to training classes 
> at
> the Iowa Department for the Blind suffered a setback Thursday in Polk 
> County
> District Court.
>
> Jurors rejected the Des Moines woman's discrimination lawsuit and sided 
> with
> a department policy that bans the use of visual aids, including seeing-eye
> dogs, in the program.
>
> Dohmen and her dog, Lilly, were caught in a decades-old argument that has
> divided blind Americans into distinct camps: those who prefer guide dogs 
> and
> those who consider the animals a poor substitute for learning to function
> with only a directional cane.
>
> Dohmen, who is legally blind, could not be reached for comment Thursday. 
> Her
> lawyer, Roy Irish, declined to comment about the verdict.
>
> Supporters of the state program who testified at Dohmen's trial praised 
> the
> verdict and defended the ban on guide dogs.
>
> "Iowa's orientation program profoundly changed lives," said Joanne Wilson, 
> a
> former commissioner of the U.S. Rehabilitation Services Administration,
> which oversees programs for the blind nationwide. "It works. It's a
> cutting-edge program and a model for other states."
>
> Another former commissioner, Frederic Schroeder, said training programs 
> for
> the blind should accommodate participants when possible, but "cannot be
> required to alter the fundamentals of the program."
>
> Dohmen, whose blindness was caused by a medical condition several years 
> ago,
> attended the training program for several months in September 2000 and 
> then
> was turned away when she tried to re-enter with Lilly in June 2002.
>
> "They shouldn't even ask me if I use a cane or a dog," Dohmen, a certified
> nursing assistant, said at the time. "They said that having a dog, I
> wouldn't know what blindness was like. But this is my choice. Lilly is my
> cane."
>
> The department, represented by the Iowa attorney general, argued that
> training without assistance of a dog or other aids is the most effective 
> way
> for the blind to learn new skills.
>
> Grinnell lawyer Peggy Elliot said she expected a jury to side against
> Dohmen.
>
> "It's been dragged on and on and on because people are feeling sorry for
> her, when she really just doesn't have a case," Elliot said.
>
> Elliot, who is blind, said people should instead focus on the fact that 
> the
> department initially offered Dohmen services. Students with partial vision
> are required to wear eyeshades to limit any visual cues.
>
> The six-month program teaches students how to cane-walk on public streets,
> read Braille, use computers and handle everyday tasks.
>
> Additional Facts
>
> Dog controversy
>
> LEGAL OPINION: A 1981 opinion from the Iowa attorney general said the
> Commission for the Blind can set certain conditions for the purpose of
> training.
> FAIRNESS: According to the opinion: "The commission's rule does not limit
> such access; rather it represents the commission's policy that students
> participating in the commission's training program shall not have the
> assistance of guide dogs."
> POSTSCRIPT: "We, of course, take no view with respect to the wisdom of 
> this
> policy," the opinion concluded. "That is a question that the Legislature 
> has
> left in the sound discretion of the commission."
>
> Mike Townsend and Seeing Eye dog Brent
> Dunellen, New Jersey  08812
> emails:  mrtownsend at optonline.net;
> michael.townsend54 at gmail.com
> Home Phone:  732  200-5643
> Cellular:  732  718-9480
>
>
>
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