From freethaught at gmail.com Thu Oct 25 18:56:27 2012 From: freethaught at gmail.com (Antonio Guimaraes) Date: Thu, 25 Oct 2012 14:56:27 -0400 Subject: [Sd-talk] Petition to preserve the nemeth Uniform Braille system Message-ID: Dear reader, I would like to bring your attention to a petition concerning changes to the Braille system in the United States. The Braille Authority of North America will vote to adopt the Unified English Braille this November. The body will likely retain the Nemeth code for use in math and the sciences, but will change Braille in this country to reflect adoption of the Unified English Braille used in other countries. BANA has given little effort and thoughtful consideration to Dr. Abraham Nemeth’s most recent \work to make American Braille uniform. It is my opinion that BANA is more concerned with unification of Braille with other English-speaking countries than the impact changes will have on education of all blind people who will study math and science. However, uniformity is vastly more important than unification. This is especially true considering that the Nemeth code is unique to the United States, and enables blind children to excel in their chosen career paths in the hard sciences. The Nemeth Uniform Braille System, NUBS, is the most up-to-date revision to the Nemeth code in use today. It makes American Braille usage uniform, and incorporates changes to the Nemeth code revision of 40 years ago. BANA is moving towards adopting an older, outdated version of the Nemeth code available. Please sign a petition to preserve NUBS, and move blindness education on a path to excellence. Let’s bring the Nemeth system into the 21st century. Let’s give blind people a competitive edge. Let’s move together towards one Braille system for all Americans. Let’s preserve NUBS. The petition is available here: http://www.change.org/petitions/braille-authority-of-north-america-adopt-a-braille-code-that-supports-general-and-technical-readers Sincerely, Antonio Guimaraes