Honey Badgers Like to Read Braille!

October is Meet the Blind Month so hello!  November 1st  begins the Braille Readers are Leaders program where adults from all over the country are going to read braille and lots of it! I am on a team called “The Honey Badgers”. We will be reading braille from November 1^st till January 4^th. January 4^th marks the birthday of a fabulous person, Louis Braille, the inventor of Braille. I just happen to share a birthday with this man and we would like to share a challenge for you. All 5 of us below will be reading braille and we hope you will be able to sponsor our pages read. You can donate through Pay Pal on the right of this page with any amount you choose.

We are raising money for braille literacy and the money we raise will go to the BELL Program. It is a program in many states that works to foster braille literacy in children through a summer program.

Why are we doing this?

Currently 75% of the nation’s blind are unemployed. Only 10% of the nation’s blind are reading braille. Out of those employed 90% read braille. Coincidence? I think not!! Braille is a tool for literacy and ultimately success! Yet there are so many misconceptions about what it is and can do. It is not hard to learn, and benefits kids and adults in numerous ways. And since we are Honey Badgers, we do what we want! 

And the Honey Badgers are...

Ivan "reading braille nonstop" Walker

 

  Ivan is currently a blind chef in Mobile, Alabama. He graduated from The Art Institute of Atlanta with a degree in Culinary Arts. Ivan worked as Executive Chef at The W Hotel Atlanta for 11 years. He now has his own catering business in Mobile, where he specializes in southern style cuisine. He graduated from the Louisiana Center for the Blind in 2010. Ivan also completed The Randolph Sheppard Program in 2011. The program is designed to develop business enterprising nationwide, and offers an opportunity for blind business owners to own and operate their own businesses on federal property. Ivan is also a member of Alabama's NFB Affiliate, and Alabama's National Association of Blind Merchants Division. He attributes his independence and success to his training at Louisiana Center for the Blind. Ivan uses Braille as an important tool in his professional life, and his favorite quote is "just because you are blind, it doesn't mean you can't do."

Danielle "braille fingers" Fernandez

 

Danielle is a student at Louisiana Tech University working on a  degree in communications. When she was in the third grade she was taught braille but since she had some vision she didn’t use braille and her teachers did not encourage it. Everything changed when she lost her vision in 2002. She still remembered how to read contracted braille but she was a very slow reader. Then in 2010 she attended the Louisiana Center for the Blind. When she first got there she was clocked in at reading 26 words per minute, but when she left she was up to 90 words per minute. “To read is to achieve.”

 

Liz "the braille wiz" Graves

 

Even though Liz was born blind, she didn’t learn Braille until she was much older. She got a handful of lessons on a Perkins when she was 19, learned the alphabet and numbers, and later taught herself some of the contractions before attending the Louisiana Center for the Blind. Liz didn’t really read Braille until she attended LCB. While there, she got her reading speed up to 80 words a minute. Liz had also never used a long cane until LCB. She liked cane travel so much that she decided to enroll in the Louisiana Tech O&M master’s program where she is in her last quarter of the program, and works for the Lincoln Parish school district teaching blind children cane travel. Liz does not have much free time right now between school and the Lincoln kids, but in her free time she enjoys hanging out with friends, shopping, and eating sushi. “I’ll finally be able to get my reading on with this Braille challenge!”

Alex "the braille bandido" Castillo

 

Alex currently resides in Lincoln NE
and is an orientation counselor at the Nebraska Center for the Blind
and Visually Impaired. He has served as a former president of the
New York association of Blind Students and is a proud graduate of the
Louisiana Center for the Blind, where he received Braille training. He
holds a BA in Political Science and Psychology from Hunter College in
New York, and has been involved and started several disability
advocacy projects in New York City. Alex states "Braille is literacy".

 

Conchita "the mean braille reader" Hernandez

 

Conchita Hernandez resides in Lincoln Nebraska and works at The Commission for the Blind and Visually Impaired as a rehabilitation counselor. She attended Louisiana Tech University where she earned a mastersdegree in Teaching Blind Students and Saint Mary’s College of California where she earned her bachelor’s degree in International Studies and Spanish. Conchita holds a National Certification in Literary Braille. She received her blindness training from the Nebraska Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired where she was introduced to braille for the first time. And she states, “It is vital for low vision children to learn braille in order to become confident, competent adults.”

So please join us in raising awareness about braille literacy and helping us raise money for such a great cause!

Nebraska NFB State Convention

So today is Monday and I am barely recuperating from a convention put on by the National Federation of the Blind of Nebraska. The convention is an annual meeting to discuss points movig forward, educate all people on blindness and to meet blind people for support and networking. It was a great convention and here are some highlights.

The above picture was from banquet.

There is a banquet where everyone dresses up and hears great speeches. Banquet was a big success.. The Keynote speaker was Jim Gashel from the national office. He spoke about change and how it needs to be more than words. We need to change what it means to be blind. He mentioned how we do not always make the best decisions for ourselves and other blind individuals, but as we grow we learn and have the collective power for real change.
At Banquet we played a game using ducks and you lost your ducks as the game went on. I think I am a good photographer at times and this is what I did.

Lets be real, the banquet  also gives us an excuse to get all dressed up, and who doesn't love that?

A huge part of convention is the socializing aspect and hangng out with people that you normaly do not see.

This year Nabs idol was a huge success. It is an event put on by the students to raise money. Antonieta pictured below put on a great performance telling jokes and playing the cuatro. The cuatro is an instrument from Venezeula that is like a guitar but only has four strings.
 

Once Nabs idol was over, a small group of us stayed up past the early hours of the next day playing guitars and singing. I do not play the guitar and my singing skills are not exceptional, but I try to follow along.

Of course the winners of the show were the kids (as usual) who spoke about participating in Project Innovation in Baltimore Maryland. They had an awesome experience.

I taught a class entitled  "Looking Good Without Looking. " Basically we went over how to apply makeup using alternative techniques. We had a lot of fun and it was all hands on!
Keeping with my post, here are some misconceptions that were proven false at this event:

1. The blind need to be led by sighted people: False. This is completely false as we need and want to make our own decisions. The whole event was put on by blind people and you can only hold an office if you are blind.

2. Charity is a great way to help the blind: False. Charity is the little demon that dresses up cute and seeks to help. Because of charity many people see the blind and other people with disabilities as helpless and in need of saving by the dominant culture. We want to set our own path, and the money we do raise is through fundraising and promoting a positive belief in the blind

3. All blind people are musically inclined. False. If you would have attended our after Nabs Idol party you would have heard me singing along and that stereotype would have been broken pretty fast. Blind people are not any more or less musically inclined than any other group of people.

4. People with low vision do  not need braille they can read print. False. We had a presentation from the BELL program which seeks to promote braille. Many kids in the program are not getting braille  in school because they have some vision. This causes difficulty with reading, being behind in school and poor grammer and spelling. Braille is vital for low vision people to be literate!

5. Blind people have super hearing abilities. False. Most blind people cannot hear any better than anyone else, they just learn to pay attention. During the convention we had some sound problems and there were plenty of blind people who could not hear what was gong on.

So there you have it. Blind people coming together changing what it means to be blind and having fun at the same time.