[nfb-talk] NY Times Article on Gov. Paterson and Braille

Mike Freeman k7uij at panix.com
Wed Dec 29 04:04:29 UTC 2010


Joe:

Anyone who always says "never" is a fool.  I will therefore not do that. 
However, I believe that public service campaigns, mentoring efforts, 
seminars and conferences and other collective efforts, while useful, miss 
the mark.  It has been our experience out here in Washington state (and I 
believe some of the team at the Jernigan Institute is beginning to realize 
this also) is that in order to reform the views of the educational 
establishment regarding the use of braile and other alternative techniques 
of blindness, one must gain the trust of educators and rehabilitators of the 
blind, one at a time.  The educational and rehabilitation establishment is 
not going away anytime soon even if some of the more radical among us would 
wish it otherwise.  So we out West have found that what works is to actually 
get to know the teachers of the visually impaired and show them that we do 
not have horns and show them by example that positive attitudes and 
alternative techniques of blindness actually work in the real world and are 
not just Federation propaganda.

In this connection, the Jernigan Institute effort to actually hold workshops 
for future teachers of the blind and visually impaired is a giant step in 
the right direction.

I'm not saying organized efforts dont help.  But of immensely more efficacy 
are personal, one-on-one efforts to get to know TVI's and to prove to them 
that what we preach makes sense.  This shouldn't be too surprising since 
even to increase membership, friendship works the best!

Mike Freeman

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Joe Orozco" <jsorozco at gmail.com>
To: "'NFB Talk Mailing List'" <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Tuesday, December 28, 2010 8:56 AM
Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] NY Times Article on Gov. Paterson and Braille


> Steve,
>
> Reaching out to the education and rehab establishments and influencing
> parents is certainly the right idea.  What I'm interested to know is how 
> we
> as individuals go about doing this.  We can't count on all blind people
> going into the fields to change the system, so how do chapters run
> successful campaigns to change public perceptions?  How do affiliates
> collaborate with the national office to make tangible differences in the
> rehabilitation centers and school districts in their states?  It may 
> appear
> as though I am trying to beat blood out of a stone.  In reality, I hope to
> shortly be working with various NFB groups on starting and funding 
> community
> projects through my company, and while I have my own notions of how this 
> can
> be accomplished, I am interested to hear some concrete examples from 
> others
> of what the average person can do to minimize the number of Patersons who
> feel their lot in life is a dismal one.  I don't know if Braille penpals 
> are
> the answer.  I don't know if more mentorship is the ticket.  Perhaps 
> better
> public service announcements?  Maybe the first step is a national survey 
> to
> determine exactly what the issues are in the education system that later
> roll over to rehabilitation that eventually translate to poor skills and
> less job opportunities.  It seems the consumer groups are doing a lot to
> improve access to resources, but I wonder how much is being done to meet 
> the
> fundamental issue of attitudes and proper training.  Or perhaps a better
> question:  I wonder how much is feasibly doable?
>
> Regards,
>
> Joe
>
> "Hard work spotlights the character of people: some turn up their sleeves,
> some turn up their noses, and some don't turn up at all."--Sam Ewing
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Steve Jacobson [mailto:steve.jacobson at visi.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, December 28, 2010 11:18 AM
> To: jsorozco at gmail.com; NFB Talk Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] NY Times Article on Gov. Paterson and Braille
>
> While there is certainly some blame that needs to be assigned
> to the parents, I don't think that we can ignore the role
> that our own rehabilitation and educational systems play.  I
> have seen enough low vision people who benefit from
> effectively using braille to believe that braille does provide
> a useful option.  I have also seen people with a good bit of
> remaining vision who can read print effectively but who still
> could use alternative techniques to better handle other
> aspects of their lives.  I don't think there has been adequate
> research into when print is not effective as the primary
> means of reading, and while we could do more with this than we
> have, perhaps, the educational and rehabilitation
> system doesn't want to look at this at all in my experience.
> In most cases, it seems that those in special education
> believe that if you can see shapes, you can read print, and it
> is as simple as that.  Magnification technology and the
> ability to enhance images has probably made this issue more
> complicated, but there seems to me to be a point where
> the eye strain and the amount of magnification becomes an issue
> that should not be ignored but often is.
>
> Going beyond reading, when I was a child in the 1950's, my
> parents expectations were tempered by the rehabilitation
> establishment.  Frankly, the American Foundation for the Blind
> played a role in this with some of what they published,
> but they were not alone.  They were made to expect that I would
> take longer to walk, that they were awful for thinking
> they could rearrange furniture, and such.  Fortunately, my
> parents tended not to believe what they were told.  The
> Governor's parents would have been exposed to much of the same
> thinking, and frankly, much of this thinking is still a
> part of the establishment.
>
> Therefore, we do need to think about how to make the process of
> learning alternative techniques more attractive, but
> I think we need to be careful how much we beat up on ourselves
> for this.  We are making progress, but we need the
> education establishment to be more realistic in terms of how
> kids balance the use of remaining vision and alternative
> techniques including braille.  We need to continue trying to
> reach out to parents to explain to them that one needs to
> look at all of a child's abilities not just how much vision
> they have.  We need to continue trying to influence the rehab
> establishment to see that complete training in the use of
> alternative techniques will increase the liklihood of successful
> outcomes as some studies seem to indicate.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Steve Jacobson
>
> On Tue, 28 Dec 2010 09:18:37 -0500, Joe Orozco wrote:
>
>>Hi Alicia,
>
>>Agreed on all points.  I just don't know how to take what we know, and
>>perhaps take for granted, and share this with the people that
> need it.  I
>>stop short of saying we should try to make Braille fun for
> people to learn.
>>After all, these are adults, and come on, do you want to be
> independent or
>>do you want to be reliant on other people to read/transcribe
> your materials,
>>but perhaps there is something to making Braille, orientation
> and mobility,
>>technology and basic independent living more appealing?  After
> all, it's not
>>enough to tell someone they need to do something.  The person
> needs to want
>>to do it for themselves, otherwise the training is for
> nothing.  Anyway,
>>more thoughts welcomed.
>
>>Joe
>
>>"Hard work spotlights the character of people: some turn up
> their sleeves,
>>some turn up their noses, and some don't turn up at all."--Sam Ewing
>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: Alicia Richards [mailto:alicianfb at gmail.com]
>>Sent: Tuesday, December 28, 2010 4:18 AM
>>To: jsorozco at gmail.com; NFB Talk Mailing List
>>Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] NY Times Article on Gov. Paterson and Braille
>
>>Joe, I do see the point you are driving at.  For a long time I
> wouldn't
>>have, but I do have more compassion for people with partial
>>vision who are
>>caught in the middle.  I'm not trying to jump on any bandwagon,
>>but here are
>>my thoughts.
>
>>One of my primary questions is this. If Paterson's parents were
>>so worried
>>about him standing out, or getting a stigma attached to him,
>>carrying around
>>big Braille books, etc, then why not think of the other
> issues?  Did it
>>never occur to them that large print books are pretty big,
> too?  Did it
>>never occur to them that he would not look normal, having to
>>press his face
>>so close to the page, when the other students did not have to
>>do this?  Or
>>standing by the board to read the print, when others did not
>>have to?  At
>>least when reading Braille, one can still look up at those
> around them,
>>which in my opinion, looks far more normal than the
>>alternative.  The things
>>parents will do, or worse, make their child do or sacrifice in
>>the name of
>>so-called normality are unbelievable to me sometimes. and just
>>because he
>>might have learned Braille does not mean he couldn't have been
>>mainstreamed
>>at the same time. Then again, I guess he grew up in a different
>>era, when
>>mainstreaming was far less common, and that must be taken into account.
>
>>It is true that Braille has limitations, but I feel he's using
>>that as an
>>excuse. With the advancement of technology, such as scanners,
>>OCR software,
>>and refreshable Braille displays, more is available in Braille
>>than ever
>>before, and it is more convenient to use than before. And don't
>>even try to
>>tell me that the man could not have afforded such technology.
>>For exampel ,
>>I imagine that  much of what Governor Paterson relied on his
>>aides to read
>>could have been scanned on a computer, to be read with a screen
>>reader, or
>>put into a Braille note-taker. Then, no reliance would have
> been needed.
>
>>The part about where his mother told him he could not take
>>risks like other
>>boys infuriates me to no end!  What child should not take risks? I was
>>allowed to take the same risks as my sighted sisters when I was
>>a child,
>>thank God, and would advocate that any other should do the same. Now,
>>genuine risks to safety should not be taken by any child,
> regardless of
>>disability. But to say he shouldn't have as a result of blindness is
>>appalling to me.
>
>>Just had to voice all that, for whatever it is worth.
>
>>Alicia
>
>
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