FUTURE REFLECTIONS THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLInd MAGAZINE FOR PARENTS OF BLIND CHILDREN Barbara Cheadle, Editor Published by the national Federation of the Blind 1800 Johnson Street Baltimore, MD 21230 (410) 659-9314 ISSN 0883-3419 Future Reflections Winter, 1993 NATIONAL PARENTS SEMINAR AND 1993 NFB CONVENTION: TEXAS BECKONS It is once more time to begin planning to attend the most exciting, stimulating, and informative Federation event of the year--the Annual Convention of the National Federation of the Blind. For parents and educators of blind children, this is an unparalleled opportunity to see and meet more blind people in one week (up to 2,500) than most parents, children, or teachers would ever be able to meet otherwise in a lifetime. At convention you will have the chance to hear from national experts in the education and rehabilitation of the blind; meet other active, knowledgeable parents (and teachers) of blind children; browse for hours in one of the year's largest exhibits of technology and aids for the blind; sit in on deliberations about issues which will affect the education, employment, and civil rights of the blind for generations to come; meet the top blind college students from around the country; and socialize with blind persons of every age and from every segment of our society. It is a unique opportunity to learn about blindness from the real experts on blindness--the blind themselves. In 1993 we will return to the Dallas-Fort Worth Hyatt Regency, where our spectacular fiftieth anniversary convention was held in 1990. Those who attended the 1990 convention will remember the lively 1950's atmosphere of Sullivan O'Shaughnessy's Restaurant, the tasty barbecue at Bear Creek, and the memorable Texas hospitality. NFB of Texas president Glenn Crosby promises that 1990 was only an opener for the 1993 extravaganza. As usual, our hotel rates are the envy of all who know about them. For the 1993 convention they are: singles, $31; doubles and twins, $35; triples, $38; and quads, $40. In addition to the room rates there will be a tax, which at present is twelve percent. There will be no charge for children in the room with parents as long as no extra bed is requested. In recent years we have sometimes taken hotel reservations through the National Office, but for the 1993 convention you should write directly to: Hyatt-Regency DFW, Post Office Box 619014, International Parkway, Dallas-Fort Worth Airport, Texas 75261, or call (214) 453-1234. Hyatt has a national toll-free number, but do not (we emphasize not) use it. Reservations made through this national number will not be valid. They must be made directly with the hotel. The hotel will want a deposit of $40 or a credit card number. If a credit card is used, the deposit will be charged against your card immediately, just as would be the case with a $40 check. If a reservation is canceled prior to June 20, 1993, $20 of the $40 deposit will be returned. Otherwise, refunds will not be made. The Hyatt Regency DFW is actually located on the property of the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, and the airport people-mover train makes a stop at the hotel. The facility's 1,300 rooms are divided between two towers connected by a quarter-mile-long corridor. Many of us found that walking between the two towers provided welcome exercise, but if walking is a problem, electric carts are always available to carry guests back and forth. There are four excellent and very different restaurants within the hotel: Il Nonno's, an Italian trattoria, which specializes in northern Italian cuisine and has servers who sing to diners; Sullivan O'Shaughnessy's, which has already been mentioned; and two other fine restaurants. In addition, the bar in the East Tower serves sandwiches and snacks during most of the day. Convention activities this year begin on Saturday, July 3, with an all-day seminar for parents of blind children. The theme of this year's seminar is: Meeting the Needs of the Blind Youngster. Registration for the seminar will begin at 8:00 a.m.; and the seminar will start at 9:00 a.m. A general session with speakers and panels will be scheduled in the morning, and small group workshops will be conducted in the afternoon after a two-hour lunch break. The afternoon workshops will adjourn at 5:00 p.m. The afternoon workshop topics will include: Developing an Appropriate Individualized Education Program (IEP); Networking Support for Parents and Professionals of the Blind Multiple Handicapped Child; The Needs of the Deaf-Blind Child; Promoting Good Travel Skills (Mobility); Integrating Braille into the Classroom and Everyday Life; Teaching Daily Living Skills: Who, When, and How?; Alternative Techniques for the Junior, Middle, and High School Blind Student; Teaching Responsibility: When and How Should Blind Children Take Charge of Their Own Education and Daily Living Needs? Another workshop option in the afternoon is the Job Opportunities for the Blind (JOB) workshop. The JOB workshop is designed to inform, educate, and encourage blind job seekers and blind students in transition from school to work. The JOB workshop can help answer general questions about jobs and careers, as well as specific blindness-related concerns, such as how you handle telling a prospective employer that you are blind or how one gets the adaptive equipment needed for a particular job. Blind teenagers and their parents should seriously consider attending the JOB workshop Saturday afternoon. There is no registration fee this year for the Parents Seminar. A packet of literature and materials will be available for those who want it for a fee of $5.00. Also on the day of the Parent Seminar (Saturday, July 3) the Parents of Blind Children Division will sponsor a program of organized fun and learning experiences for children ages 5 to 12. (We encourage older youth to attend the seminar with their parents or other NFB workshops on that day--such as the half-day Job Opportunities for the Blind (JOB) Seminar.) This year the children's program will be organized and led by Mrs. Carla McQuillan. President of the Oregon affiliate of the National Federation of the Blind, Carla is an experienced educator with extensive experience as a teacher, administrator, and independent day care provider. This year's program will be a day trip to a nearby dude ranch which features, among other things, a huge petting zoo, a playground, hiking areas, and, for the older children, opportunities for horseback riding and learning about how to groom and care for horses. The grooming portion of the program will be conducted by volunteer members of the NFB Agriculture/Equestrian Group who work with horses either professionally or as a hobby. Since the number of children who can be accommodated for this trip is limited by space available on the bus, and by the ratio of volunteer workers to children, we urge you to use the form at the end of this article and pre-register your children for the Saturday, July 3, day-trip. Children will be accepted on a first-come, first-served basis. Please contact Carla McQuillan if you have any questions about the day-trip, or if you have a child with special needs. The fee for the trip is $12 for the 5 - 8 age group and $16 for the 9 - 12 age group. This fee includes the cost of transportation, fees for the dude ranch activities, and lunch. Child care for infants, toddlers, and those who choose not to participate in the Saturday, July 3, children's day-trip activity, will also be available. The volunteer director of child care services is Mary Willows. Mrs. Willows is an experienced educator, the mother of two children, and a long-time blind leader in the Federation in her home state of California. This volunteer job is a major undertaking! It takes a tremendous amount of volunteer time from many Federation parents who care deeply about making the NFB Convention an enjoyable and enriching experience for every member of the family who attends. Child care is not only provided during the parent seminar on Saturday, July 3, 1993, but during the convention sessions, the banquet, and other special meeting times as resources will allow. Parents are asked to make these donations for child care: $50 for the week (including the banquet) for the first child and $25 for each additional child; or $10 per child per day, and $10 per child for the banquet night if you do not need the full week of day care. (Parents who cannot contribute the suggested donation should contact Mary Willows to discuss what donation they wish to make. Mary will be available in the child care room before and after sessions, or you may contact her in advance at: 3934 Kern Court, Pleasanton, California 94588; (510) 462-8575. Since the suggested donation does not cover all expenses, other donations from individuals and groups are much appreciated.) But the Parent seminar on Saturday is not the only activity of interest to parents or the only chance to meet other parents. Saturday evening, from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m., the NFB Parent and Student Divisions will co-sponsor a Hospitality Night for parents. Everyone is invited, including children, to this informal event. Toys will be available for the young children to play with, and older youth will have a chance to mingle with each other and with slightly older college students who are members of the NFB Student Division. The NFB Parents of Blind Children Division Annual Meeting is held on Monday afternoon of the convention (July 5). At this meeting we get an opportunity to meet and hear from our parent groups from all over the country. We discuss local and national projects (such as our annual Braille Readers Are Leaders Contest), elect officers, listen to a presentation from the 1993 Educator of Blind Children award winner, accept committee reports, and discuss activities of our state and regional parent divisions and chapters. The following day, Tuesday, July 6, Claudell Stocker will once again conduct a special three-hour Introductory Braille Workshop for parents who want to learn Braille. She conducted this workshop at our convention last year, and it was one of the most sought-after, successful seminars of the convention! If you have been considering learning Braille or struggling to learn it on your own but not making much progress, you will not want to miss this workshop! It will be an intensive hands-on learning experience. The goal is for everyone to leave the workshop able to read and write some Braille. Space will be limited to 25 persons, so be sure to send in your registration form (see page 5 in this issue) right away! In regard to other activities, there are so many special interest committees and divisions that you are bound to find something up your alley. Here is a partial list: Parental Concerns Committee, Committee on Concerns of the Deaf-Blind, Music Division, National Association to Promote the Use of Braille, Diabetic Division, Writers Division, National Association of Blind Lawyers, National Federation of the Blind in Computer Science, and the Student Division. The general convention sessions, which begin Tuesday morning, always feature speakers of interest to parents--from blind adults talking about their interesting or unique careers (one year we had a blind horse trader, another year a blind pharmacist) to people of power and influence in the political and governmental arena as well as in the field of education and rehabilitation for the blind. Other events and meetings parents are invited--and encouraged--to attend are the Monday morning National Board meeting (the scholarship winners are introduced at this meeting, and other exciting announcements and reports are made at this time as well); the resolutions committee meetings, and the Thursday evening banquet--considered by many to be the highlight of the convention. To wrap up this convention article, here are some answers to questions parents often have about convention. If you have other questions or concerns about the convention, please contact: Barbara Cheadle, President, Parents of Blind Children Division of the NFB, 1800 Johnson Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21230; POBC number: (410) 747-3358; or NFB National Office: (410) 659-9314. Q.: You mentioned an exhibit hall. Where and when will that be available at the convention? A.: The exhibit hall will be open all day on Sunday, July 4, and at various other times throughout the convention. Location of the exhibits and a complete schedule of hours will be listed in your convention agenda, which you will get when you register for the convention. Q.: Speaking of registration, when and how do I register for the National Federation of the Blind convention, how much will it cost, and what do I get for my registration fee? A.: Registration for the NFB convention will begin the morning of Sunday, July 4. The fee is $5.00 per person. You may also purchase banquet tickets at the same time. (The banquet is an exciting and lively affair at NFB conventions, and is considered by many to be the highlight of the convention.) The banquet is on Friday evening, July 3. The cost of a banquet ticket will be in the neighborhood of $22 to $24. The convention agenda (in print or Braille) is given out at the time of registration. Those who register are eligible for hundreds of great door prizes which are given away throughout the convention general sessions and the banquet. All door prizes are worth at least $25, and many are straight cash. But, most importantly, registration entitles you to receive our unbelievably low convention room rates. Those who attend but do not register for the convention will be asked to pay the considerably higher regular room rates. Q.: Our family would like to meet some compatible blind adults and students. How can we do that at the convention? A.: About the only way you can avoid meeting blind people at the convention is if you come and hole up in your hotel room for the week. Step onto the elevator and say "hello." Chat with your neighbor in the convention or hotel registration line. Talk to the blind parents you see as you drop off or pick up your child from child care (child care, by the way, is a great place for your children to meet other children and adults--both sighted and blind). Attend division and committee meetings, ask a question or introduce yourself to the group or to the person next to you. There are so many different types of divisions and committees to choose between that you are bound to find at least one that interests you. Attend the general convention sessions and sit with your NFB state affiliate (each state has a seating section clearly marked with a large state sign). Blind people from your state will be particularly pleased to meet you, answer your questions, and introduce you to others. There are also many social functions at the convention where you can meet others. For example, at our New Orleans Convention we had a concert by Pete Fountain, a dance, a fashion show, a music contest sponsored by the Music Division, a reception for NFB scholarship winners, a casino night fund raiser sponsored by the Student Division, and numerous tours on the half-day set aside for this activity. There will be numerous similar social activities at the 1993 convention! So, whether it be in the elevator, in a meeting room, in child care, in a line, over a meal, or over a beer, there is no lack of opportunity for meeting interesting, cordial, and compatible blind people at an NFB National Convention. The National Federation of the Blind National Convention is truly an educational experience in blindness. Nowhere else will you see so many blind people from so many different walks of life. Nowhere else will you hear the same kind of debates and discussions regarding crucial issues affecting the blind. And nowhere else will you find the same mix of knowledge about blindness, an upbeat spirit, a warm camaraderie, and a fierce dedication to achieving the goal of equality and equal opportunity for the blind. Come, join us in Dallas for our 1993 National Convention! PRE-REGISTRATION: CHILDREN'S DAY TRIP Saturday, July 3, 1993 Parent(s) Name(s): Address: City: State: Zip: Home/Work Phone: As you fill out the following information, please include the child's last name if it is different from parents' last name. Also include a description of any characteristics which may require medical or other considerations on the trip. Please note that although we will keep the ratio of volunteer adult workers to children low, we do not have the capacity to assign one adult to one child. The fees for the day trip are: $12 for children ages 5--8; $16 for children ages 9--12. CHILDREN: 1. Name Age Grade Blind or sighted 2.Name Age Grade Blind or sighted 3. Name Age Grade Blind or sighted Total Fee Enclosed: $_________ Please make checks payable to: NFB Parents of Blind Children. Mail by June 1, 1993, to: Carla McQuillan, P.O. Box 020, Thurston, OR 97482 For more information call Mrs. McQuillan at: NFB of Oregon: (503) 726-6924 DISTINGUISHED EDUCATOR OF BLIND CHILDREN AWARD 1993 APPLICATION Name: Home address: City: State: Zip: Day phone: Evening phone: School: Address: City: State: Zip: List your degrees, the institutions from which they were received, and your major area or areas of study. How long and in what programs have you taught blind children? In what setting do you teach? Itinerant program Residential school classroom Special education classroom Other, Please explain How many students do you teach regularly this year? What subjects do you teach? How many of your students read and write primarily using: Braille large print closed circuit television recorded materials small print Please complete this application and attach your letter of nomination; one additional recommendation, written by someone who knows your work and philosophy of teaching; and a personal letter discussing your beliefs and approach to teaching blind students. You may wish to include such topics as the following: * What are your views on the importance to your students of Braille, large print, and magnification devices, and what issues do you consider when making recommendations about learning media for your students? * When do you recommend that your students begin the following: reading Braille, writing with a slate and stylus, using a Braille writer, learning to travel independently with a white cane? * How should one determine which children should learn cane travel and which should not? * When should typing be introduced and when should a child be expected to hand in typed assignments? Send all material by May 1, 1993, to Sharon Maneki, Chairman, Teacher Award Committee, 9736 Basket Ring Road, Columbia, Maryland 21045; telephone: (410) 992-9608. 1993 DISTINGUISHED EDUCATOR OF BLIND CHILDREN AWARD by Sharon Maneki Editor's Note: Sharon Maneki is President of the National Federation of the Blind of Maryland. She also chairs the committee to select the Distinguished Educator of Blind Children for 1993. The National Federation of the Blind will recognize an outstanding teacher of blind children at our 1993 convention July 3 to July 9, in Dallas, Texas. The winner of this award will receive an expense-paid trip to the convention, a check for $500, an appropriate plaque at the banquet, and an opportunity to make a presentation about the education of blind children to the National Federation of the Blind Parents of Blind Children Division early in the convention. Anyone who is currently teaching or counseling blind children or administering a program for blind children is eligible to receive this award. It is not necessary to be a member of the National Federation of the Blind to apply. However, the winner must attend the National Convention. Teachers may be nominated by colleagues, supervisors, or friends. The letter of nomination should explain why the teacher is being recommended for this award. The education of blind children is one of our most important concerns. Attendance at a National Federation of the Blind convention will enrich a teacher's experience by affording the opportunity to meet other teachers who work with blind children, to meet parents, and to meet blind adults who have had experiences in a variety of educational programs. Help us recognize a distinguished teacher by distributing this form and encouraging teachers to submit their credentials. We are pleased to offer this award and look forward to applications from many well-qualified educators. PROBLEMS OF PLACEMENT AND RESPONSIBILITY: MAINSTREAMING REVISITED by Fred Schroeder Editor's Note: On Friday afternoon, July 3, Fred Schroeder, Director of the New Mexico Commission for the Blind and a member of the Board of Directors of the National Federation of the Blind, delivered an address to the 1992 NFB convention. Because of his many years of teaching and administrative experience in the education of blind children, Mr. Schroeder is an expert in this field, so his remarks on the modern inclusion movement--"Mainstreaming Revisited"--and its impact on the education of blind children, should be taken seriously by everyone with an interest in the subject. In 1940 when the National Federation of the Blind was founded, a mechanism was created by which blind people could at last guide their own destinies. The achievement of the past fifty years has not been the product of good fortune or happenstance, but rather the just and inevitable outcome of concerted action. As our organization has grown, we have increasingly come to recognize that it is our shared philosophy about blindness that enables us to keep our energies focused and our goals clearly in view. During Dr. Jernigan's tenure as President of our organization, he articulated our philosophy in clearly defined principles. He taught us that, given proper training and opportunity, blind people can compete on terms of real equality with their sighted peers. The truth of this statement is recognized by all of us and forms a cornerstone upon which policy and political action are built. Our shared philosophy makes us strong, coordinating individual effort in collective action. We believe that, given training and opportunity, blind people can compete on terms of equality. It naturally follows that, for blind children to be successfully integrated into society, they too need training and opportunity. Early residential schools for the blind started with an assumption that, if blind children mastered fundamental literacy skills through Braille, they were capable of becoming well-educated. Many schools for the blind practiced mainstreaming long before the term became fashionable. I remember Lawrence "Muzzy" Marcelino, a long-time leader in our organization, telling me that in the 1920's and 1930's high school students at the California School for the Blind would attend public school classes armed with a slate and stylus and a portable typewriter. These students were expected to compete and had the training to make that expectation a reality. After World War II, with the advent of the RLF generation, schools for the blind found themselves overcrowded, and hence the practice of integrating blind children into regular school programs became more and more widespread. Yet a curious thing began to happen. Blind students educated away from the residential school experienced difficulty receiving training, particularly in Braille reading and writing, and therefore found themselves educated under a substandard, watered-down curriculum. Gone were the expectations that came with real literacy. Instead, blind children encountered a conception of blindness which expected, and even rewarded, inferior performance. In the late 1970's, with the implementation of Public Law 94-142, the integration of disabled children was popularized under the concept of mainstreaming. This movement was premised on the belief that blind and other disabled children should be educated in the least restrictive environment, alongside non-disabled children in regular classes. The missing element from the mainstreaming movement was an examination of expectations for blind children. When I attended graduate school, we were told that blind children educated in isolation had numerous social problems, making them ill-equipped to function in a sighted world. The clear focus of mainstreaming was social integration, with substandard academic performance tacitly accepted. Today there is a resurgence in the mainstreaming movement with an even more radical view of integration. Modern-day mainstreaming, which goes by the name of inclusion or the regular education initiative, asserts that all disabled children should be educated in regular classes, eliminating pull-out programs altogether. Proponents of inclusion argue that differences in people are found throughout society and therefore artificial distinctions which label and categorize are unnecessary and undesirable in our educational system. They believe that regular classroom teachers should be able to educate all children, regardless of their needs for specialized training. However, as with the mainstreaming movement, the modern-day inclusion movement fails to address academic achievement as an essential element of public education. On its face the concept of inclusion appears both common sense and morally correct. The practice of labeling children--and with it the implied stigma of dysfunctionality--seems contrary to the spirit of American democracy. I am concerned, however, about the impact of inclusion on the education of blind children. For the blind child successful mainstreaming is dependent on the child's ability to compete with his or her sighted peers. Braille reading and writing constitute an alternative to print reading and writing. Similarly, use of the abacus allows the blind child to perform mathematical computations quickly and efficiently. The typewriter and, more recently, the computer, while not special devices for the blind, are vital tools by which the blind child can communicate with the sighted. For the blind child to function competitively, it is also necessary that he or she be able to get around with the same degree of independence as his or her sighted peers. Thus competence in the use of the white cane for independent travel is essential. These techniques, representing a separate and distinct set of skills, are not inferior, but simply alternative. Under the concept of inclusion, integrating blind children from kindergarten on may deny them the opportunity fully to master the skills needed to keep up with their classmates. Blind children are subject to the same social conditioning about blindness as the public at large. Myths and misconceptions about blindness are rampant. The blind child exposed to prevailing attitudes about blindness will inevitably internalize at least some of these attitudes and question his or her own competence. The child may come to feel that because of blindness he or she is automatically inferior to his or her classmates and unable to perform comparable work. Conversely the well-trained blind child possessing the alternative techniques needed for full participation will find that he or she can function on an equal footing with his or her sighted peers. The application of alternative techniques serves to strengthen the blind child's confidence in his or her ability to function competitively. In this way the blind child can begin to tear down his or her own misconceptions about blindness and become convinced that he or she will be able to be a fully participating, contributing member of society. Under today's special education system, the alternatives for blind children are very few. Parents are faced with the real problem of getting the existing service-delivery systems to respond to their children's needs for training in Braille, cane travel, and the other skills of blindness. It is not likely that this situation will be improved by a push for a widespread desegregation of blind children. Rather than achieving meaningful integration, blind children would be faced with having to compete without having the opportunity to acquire the skills necessary to be successful. The end result would be diminished educational opportunities for blind children while making them erroneously believe that they are unable to compete because of blindness. A distinction should be made between segregation for segregation's sake and specialized services for the purpose of providing the training necessary for meaningful integration. A young woman I know attended our state's residential school for the blind for her elementary school training. The academic and social skills she acquired enabled her to return to a public school setting for the balance of her education. Without this early mastery of fundamental literacy skills through Braille reading and writing, along with the other skills she acquired, it is doubtful that she would have had either the confidence or the ability to achieve true integration. Rather than isolating her from society, her experience at the school for the blind gave her the ability to function successfully in society. Today this woman works as a personnel specialist for the Los Alamos National Labs and is married and raising two young children. She is living a normal life, in large part because of the opportunities she received through specialized training. The process of integration should not be confused with desegregation. Placing blind children with sighted children may desegregate them, yet integration is an active process which blind children can only initiate if they have the confidence and tools to make it happen. Inclusion is, of course, the most desirable outcome, but, as with integration, it cannot be accomplished merely through a process of desegregation. To my way of thinking, inclusion for blind children must, by necessity, start with a substantial period of specialized training. This training may take place in a regular class, a resource room or itinerant program, or a residential school for the blind. The question, therefore, is not whether the regular class is preferable to the resource room or school for the blind, but rather which setting offers the best prospect for blind children to acquire training and confidence. If we believe that blind children can compete on terms of real equality, then our expectations for them will be driven by this belief. Children must be challenged to achieve and challenged to compete, and by so doing, they will experience inclusion in the true meaning of the word. Blind children and their parents need the encouragement of adult role models who can help them expand their conception of blindness and their belief in the ability of blind people. Blind children and their parents need the National Federation of the Blind and the philosophy that comes with it. We as blind people comprise a minority, and as such we are subject to public misunderstanding. Yet we have learned that through the National Federation of the Blind we have a vehicle for collective action directed by a shared philosophy about blindness which gives us determination, strength, and the prospect of real equality. THE PITFALLS OF COMPLACENCY by Curtis Chong Reprinted from the October, 1992, Braille Monitor. From the Editor: Your high school ninth-grade son's IEP states that he will take the state's required writing competency test with a computer. It does not, however, address these questions: Whose responsibility is it to see that the computer is one that your son knows how to use? That it is set up and ready to use on the day of the test? Who decides if he will take it in the same testing room with the other kids, or in a separate room by himself and a proctor? The parents? The teacher of the visually impaired? The student? The principal? This is not, by the way, a hypothetical situation. This example is from our son's IEP for the 1992-93 school year. As my husband and I saw it, these arrangements were our son's responsibility. No, he did not physically place the computer in the room, but he--not I--arranged to be oriented to the computer he would use; he--not I--requested that he be allowed to take the test in the same room with his peers; and he--not I--reminded his teacher to transfer the computer to the testing room the day before the test. Taking on this task was neither frightening nor frustrating for our son. Beginning in the elementary grades, my husband and I have insisted that our son take on increasing responsibility for ordering his own reading books from the Library for the Blind; negotiating with his classroom teachers about adaptations he wanted for test-taking, using the overhead projector, working with maps, etc; working out adaptations or alternatives with his P.E. teacher in gym class; and so forth. Today, I am largely unaware of the numerous adaptations and arrangements he makes in the classroom. For example, if he needs a book on tape or in Braille, he orders it. (Although I do learn when he fails to get an order in on time because that's when Mom, Dad, and even brother or sister are called upon to be readers until his book gets in.) He doesn't always choose the best alternative or use the techniques available to him either effectively or wisely, but with our guidance he is learning and becoming more independent every year. By the time he graduates from high school we expect him to be fully in charge of making all the decisions and arrangements regarding his adaptive needs as a blind student. Unfortunately, many blind high school students have not achieved this goal by the time they enter college. I get many calls from parents who ask me, "What colleges provide special services to blind students?" As I delve a little deeper into what the parents really mean, I invariably discover that the blind students in question have always had someone order their books for them, make all the decisions and adaptations for test-taking, and never had the experience of selecting and supervising a person to read for them. The parents now assume that they must find a college which will continue to provide all these services to their son or daughter. It has never occurred to the students or to the parents that the students could and should do these things for themselves. Curtis Chong, who is the vice president of the National Federation of the Blind of Minnesota and president of the National Federation of the Blind in Computer Science, did think about these issues when he was a college student. He was prepared when he went to college to handle his own academic adaptation needs. However, he encountered a system which actively promoted dependency among blind students on campus. His experience with disabled student services offices is unfortunately not uncommon. In the Spring, 1992, issue of The Student Slate, the publication of the National Association of Blind students, he wrote of his experience and warned his readers of the pitfalls that can befall those who rely unquestioningly on the services of disabled students offices. Although his comments were directed to students, they have a message for parents, too. Here is what he has to say: Many years ago, when I first began attending the University of Hawaii, I came across a program called Kokua. Kokua is a Hawaiian word meaning "help." The espoused purpose of the Kokua program was to help handicapped students attending the University of Hawaii; and, since I was blind, I was eligible to receive the help offered by the program. Kokua maintained a staff of college students who served variously as readers, note takers, and guides. They were paid with rehabilitation funds. Kokua staff, for example, would perform the tedious and frustrating tasks involved in registration. Instead of having to stand in line for hours in a large and crowded gymnasium to register, blind students had merely to provide the helpful Kokua staff with the list of classes they wanted to take, and, presto! they were registered. Much of the time of the Kokua student staff was used recording college textbooks. The service was so efficient that blind students never had to find out during the previous semester what texts were going to be used for the current semester; Kokua had enough student readers available to tape books on demand. Most blind students at the University of Hawaii loved the Kokua program. It did everything for them. They didn't have to plan ahead to have books taped. They never had to hire their own readers. They didn't have to stand in long registration lines. When tests needed to be taken, everything was handled by Kokua. Blind students didn't even have to learn how to travel independently; there was always a guide available to take them from class to class. In short, blind students at the University of Hawaii became complacent, taking the services they received for granted. Perhaps even more tragic, many of them failed to recognize that their complacency was ruining their long-term prospects for a successful and productive future. Consider the hiring of readers. The students employed by the Kokua program were paid for with rehabilitation funds. In fact, by the time I began attending the University of Hawaii, blind students were expressly prohibited from using rehabilitation funds to pay for their own personal readers. They were required to use the services of the Kokua staff. Thus, they were deprived of the invaluable experience of seeking out, hiring, supervising, and occasionally firing personal readers. Many blind students never learned to be independent travelers, preferring instead to depend upon the helpful guides furnished to them by Kokua. Never venturing into unfamiliar territory on their own, they necessarily limited their prospects for future employment. Each and every blind student on the University of Hawaii campus was regarded as a non-entity by most of the professors on campus. When a question came up about how a blind student would take a test, professors would invariably consult with the Kokua office rather than with the blind student. In fact, the Kokua staff members, not blind students, were consulted concerning all problems on campus involving blindness. There were a few blind students on the University of Hawaii campus, including me, who recognized the existence of the problem and tried to deal with it. The system was, however, deeply entrenched, and our efforts were hampered by the fact that we were working in opposition to the basic desires of the many blind students who wanted to have things as easy as possible. Nevertheless, we did manage to achieve a small measure of success. We were able to establish a study area for blind students in one of the university's libraries, independent of the Kokua office. This allowed blind students to study on campus after Kokua staff locked up at 5:00 p.m. Additionally, we were able to prevail upon the state rehabilitation agency for the blind to permit rehabilitation funds to be used to pay for readers hired by individual blind students. Back when I first started going to college, programs like Kokua were in the minority. Today, just about every major college campus in the country has some form of office specifically designed for students with disabilities. Some are more positive than others. It is human nature to take the easy way out and to let such offices do everything: recruit and hire readers, guide students from class to class, determine how tests will be taken, and provide staff to accomplish the tedious activities of course registration. Now as never before, blind students cannot afford to be complacent. For if they rely upon disabled student offices to handle even the most rudimentary aspects of their education, they will be selling themselves short and denying their tremendous potential to achieve true equality with their sighted peers. If you are attending a college or university with an office for disabled students, ask yourself whether or not it is providing its services in a manner calculated to promote true independence. Is it encouraging students to gain invaluable expertise in the management of sighted readers? Are students expected to travel about campus independently? Are college professors encouraged to deal directly with the blind students in their classes instead of going to the office for disabled students? Are blind students expected to handle registration activities for themselves? If these questions cannot be answered in the affirmative, blind students must take immediate action to correct the situation. Blind students cannot afford to permit complacency and the natural desire to take the easy way out to bolster an environment which encourages dependence, laziness, and irresponsibility. In today's corporate world there are no special services available to blind employees. Although my employer, IDS Financial Services, chose to purchase some assistive technology for me once I proved I could do the job of systems programming, company officials would laugh at the suggestion that a staff of readers and guides be made available to a blind employee. I am expected to travel anywhere to obtain technical training, and I am expected to manage my own sighted readers. IDS is not unique in this regard. It is vitally important for college students to develop basic skills in independent travel, management of readers, and execution of their own college affairs; and it is critical that these skills be learned before or during college. Failure to develop these skills at the right time can and often does result in the loss of a paying job. FREE RIDES FOR THE BLIND COST US TOO MUCH by Zach Shore Reprinted from the March, 1990, Braille Monitor. From the Braille Monitor Editor: Blind people must eternally grapple with the question of the free lunch. If, as is obvious to Federationists, it does not exist, what is the price? For the thoughtful blind person, those two-for-one fares, half-price admissions, and cut-rate transit cards for the blind are all charitable programs that give rise to reflection and self-examination. In the October, 1989, issue of the Blind Activist a publication of the National Federation ot the Blind of Pennsylvania, Zach Shore wrote insightfully about his evolving understanding of the matters at stake. Here is what he had to say: I am a blind citizen, and although I once utilized half-fares for public transportation, I would never accept any blind discounts today. In most major cities, blind citizens are permitted to pay half price or discount rates on all forms of public transportation. I am opposed to such demeaning and unnecessary treatment. For many years I carried my public transit half-fare card with me whenever I traveled in Philadelphia and presented it faithfully with my money, generally saving about sixty cents a trip. I believed that, since I could not drive, it was only reasonable that I should not be penalized for this handicap. Since sighted people had the option of driving and I didn't, I reasoned that I was entitled to compensation. "Besides," I used to tell myself, "times are tough. I'm not exactly Donald Trump, and I can't afford not to take advantage of every chance to save money." Only much later did I consider that many sighted people cannot drive for numerous reasons, and they take public transportation as frequently as I do. I began to reassess my basic assumptions about what I could and could not afford. Sigmund Freud noted that there are two desires common to most humans: the desire to be loved and accepted by others, and the yearning to make one's own way in life financially. Certainly this is as true of the blind as it is of any other group. I recognize that this charitable offer of blind discounts is made with only the sincerest and most well-meaning intentions possible, but nevertheless, their effect is extremely detrimental to the blind. Rather than giving us a helping hand, they prevent us from fulfilling the basic human desire for financial independence by encouraging blind people to remain dependent on public handouts. Half or discount fares serve to reinforce the prevailing social myths that the blind are the objects of charity and pity, who exist as social parasites depleting the tax dollars of hard-working citizens. Every time blind people use a half-fare or blind discount, they perpetuate the image of the blind as beggars. The bus driver who is presented with a half-fare card will invariably associate blindness with inequality and inability. How can he think anything else? It is simply not worth the cost. The price we pay in public attitudes far outweighs whatever we might save in the immediate cost of transportation. There is a direct link between blind discounts and our economic and social status. It is no accident that 70% of our nation's working-age blind are unemployed. The majority of the nation's employers view the blind as helpless, dependent charity-seekers, rather than competent, motivated members of the work force and potential employees. Part of being American citizens is sharing in both rights and responsibilities. We can never hope to gain equal status in society if we are not willing to take on our financial obligations, and that means paying our fair share along with everybody else. As long as we shirk our responsibilities, the blind will remain second-class citizens with all the misery which that entails. There are still no free lunches or free rides--not even for the blind. We pay a price for everything we do in life. For the blind as a minority, the price for half-fares is simply too high. MEETING THE NEEDS OF THE BLIND CHILD: WHAT IS THE PARENT'S RESPONSIBILITY? Reprinted from the April, 1990, Braille Monitor. From the Braille Monitor Associate Editor: Surrounded by a landscape littered with federal and state regulations for providing services and education to blind children, and battered by the jargon and expertise of the professionals, parents of today's blind youngsters can hardly be faulted for seeking as much help as possible without expense to themselves. After all, they have been assured that their children require special intervention--intervention which would be very expensive indeed if it were contracted for independently. Persuaded over the years that because they could not provide the vast amount of instruction necessary to make up the child's sensory and experiential deficits, parents have been brainwashed into depending on the professionals to decide what is best at every turn. Parents often feel that, since they have had to give up their right to make decisions, at least they should be excused from paying for the course of action chosen. It is not surprising, then, that we find blind children tucked away in programs that have space for them, whether or not the curriculum meets the child's true needs. When the parent who senses dimly that something is wrong protests, he or she is usually made to feel that the complexities of the child's needs are beyond his or her comprehension. Furthermore, it is hinted that if the parent doesn't like the course of action chosen by the professionals, he or she can find another placement and pay for it, too. Recently the parents of a gifted blind three-year-old wrote to Barbara Cheadle, president of the Parents of Blind Children Division of the National Federation of the Blind. Fortunately, they were at the beginning of this carrot-and-stick spiral of domination by professionals. They are bright, sensible, and deeply committed to providing their daughter with an education worthy of her abilities. But they were confused, so they turned to those with the most experience in working with professionals to meet the real needs of blind children. The exchange of letters is instructive to everyone who is sometimes tempted to relinquish personal responsibility for self or child to those whose expertise is merely professional. Here is the exchange of letters between these parents and Barbara Cheadle: December 18, 1989 Dear Barbara: My wife and I had the pleasure of meeting you in May, 1989, at a seminar for parents of blind children. We told you about our blind daughter Laura and our concern that her preschool education could be affected by state funding cutbacks for the 1989-90 school year. I am writing now to ask your opinion and advice regarding what the law entitles Laura to have in terms of her preschool education. Laura turned three years old in November, 1989. She is performing very well as indicated in the attached Psychological Report, which was completed by the agency here. Her overall diagnosis is that she is totally blind but also gifted. All of this is great news, but we still have remaining concerns about the quality of the education being provided by the educational facility. The agency has provided the assistance of both a pre-Braille skills instructor and a mobility/orientation instructor during the 1988-89 and 1989-90 school years. This aspect of Laura's education has not been affected by any reduced funding. We are very happy with her progress in these areas. Also, both of the instructors are strong advocates of Laura's right to an equal and proper education. The area that we are unhappy with is the general classroom in which Laura has been placed. During the 1988-89 school year Laura attended the local United Cerebral Palsy (UCP) classroom. She interacted a great deal with the other children. Due to reduced funding, Laura has been placed for the 1989-90 school year in a local Project CONNECT classroom that otherwise consists of speech and hearing impaired children. These children provide very little audible stimulation for Laura. Also, Laura is functioning at a much higher level than the rest of the children. The attached psychological report notes that Laura is performing at the 97th percentile compared with sighted children of her age whereas the other children in the classroom are performing at the 4th percentile. In fact, the attached report concludes that Laura would more appropriately be placed in a preschool setting that serves children with average or above average verbal and cognitive skills. We met with the agency staff in October, 1989, to review Laura's situation. At this meeting the responsibility for (1) finding a suitable preschool classroom for Laura and (2) funding the preschool tuition was placed with us. We have recently heard that there is a possibility that the agency may terminate Laura's eligibility for the Project CONNECT classroom she is now attending because there are children with greater needs for the facility. In any case the provision of Laura's pre-Braille skills and mobility/orientation instructors seems secure. We want our daughter to be as prepared as possible for elementary school. We are very pleased that she is doing so well but also realize that she will need continuing special education to maintain her high performance. We look at her needs as absolute rather than what her needs are relative to other children. The agency view on this matter appears to be greatly influenced by its funding constraint. You can help us by answering the following questions: 1. What type of education is the State required to provide for Laura by law? 2. Does the Project CONNECT classroom setting described above meet these requirements? Please take into account the disparity between Laura's functional level and that of her classmates. 3. Would it be within the law to deny Laura the right to attend the Project CONNECT classroom even if such denial is for the purpose of providing room for a child with greater needs? 4. Whereas the agency's evaluation concludes that Laura should be placed in a normal preschool, is it within the law to place the responsibility of finding and funding the appropriate preschool on the parents? 5. How does the law address Laura's situation? Does the law place primary and fundamental emphasis on her needs as a totally blind child, or does it also account for her high functional verbal and cognitive skills? 6. What can we do to insure that our daughter's rights to a proper education are fulfilled? Please note that I have certain information concerning the federal and state laws on this subject. I am seeking an interpretation of the laws as they might apply to Laura's case. I am hoping that you can help me understand the law and that I can therefore be more influential when I deal with the agency in support of Laura. Regretfully, we were unable to attend the recent parents of blind children seminar in our state. We realize that we could have discussed this subject in person at that time. Therefore, we will especially appreciate your assistance in responding to this letter. You may also call me at my work telephone number if it would be more convenient. I could call you back so that I incur the telephone charges. Thank you very much for your support. We hope that you and your family have a happy holiday season. Sincerely, Baltimore, Maryland January 31, 1990 Dear Mr. and Mrs. ----: I have read and re-read your letter many times and have given your situation much thought. You raise some important questions, and you deserve the best answers I can give you. First of all, I don't think the primary issue here is what the law does or does not provide. Sure, you want to know how it applies to your situation, but the fundamental question you have to deal with is that of your daughter's needs. Only then are you ready to deal with how to meet those needs. If the law can be used to support your position, then you'll want to have it enforced vigorously! If the law is silent on the matter or, worse, has provisions you don't want enforced, then you will have to use other means to get what you need--negotiation, compromise, pulling strings, using publicity, etc. Of course, if the provision (or omission) in the law is serious enough, you will also want to get together with others of like mind and work to get it changed. In short, you will want to interpret and use (or not use) the law in a way that will most benefit your daughter. I believe, from the tone and sense of your letter, that you have the capacity and determination to do this. This brings us back to the fundamental question: what does your daughter need? Specifically (and I believe I am accurately reflecting the situation as you have described it in your letter) should your daughter, who is normal in every way except that she is blind and intellectually gifted, remain in a preschool setting with children who are functioning at a level far beneath her? And should the agency which has been paying for this special preschool program find and pay for a regular preschool program (or maybe even a program for gifted preschoolers, if one exists) for your daughter? I do not think from what you have told me that anyone involved believes that your daughter should stay in her current preschool setting. I certainly don't. It is clear that, not only is there no benefit in it for her, but there is a real danger that her current abilities and skills will begin to deteriorate as she unconsciously begins to imitate the children around her. She needs to be with peers who will challenge and stimulate her. The preschool is only muddying the waters by telling you that your daughter should leave the program to make room for a child who needs it more. You are absolutely right that the question of other children's needs should have nothing to do with making a decision about what your daughter needs--including whether the program is right for her. So why did they bring it up? Wouldn't the assessment stand by itself? If it was a strategy to get you to agree to the assessment, it obviously backfired--as it would with just about any parent I know. I think they brought it up for the same reason that in the old fable the scorpion stung the fox. The scorpion had convinced the fox to carry him over the river. Right in the middle he stung the fox. As they both sank to their death the fox asked why he had done it. The scorpion replied, "I couldn't help it. It's in my nature." It seems to be the nature of institutions to be primarily concerned with what's best for the institution. What do you suppose the agency would recommend if the program your daughter is in were in danger of closing its doors for lack of students? Let's suppose that nothing else had changed--your daughter had the same abilities and the same needs--the only difference was the level of demand for the program. Don't you suppose they would find compelling reasons why your daughter should stay in the program for a few more months or maybe even another year? Given the nature of institutions, my question to you is this: Do you really want to give an agency, which has demonstrated that your daughter's needs and welfare are secondary to its own, the power to select a preschool program for her? Think about it. Who cares more about your daughter, you the parents or the professionals? True, you will not always know what is best for her, but neither will the professionals. That's why you should always be in charge. Very often parents of blind children, out of ignorance or insecurity, allow professionals to take over and make decisions that are both the right and the responsibility of the parents. Another way to think about the situation is to ask yourself, "If my daughter were sighted, would I want a governmental agency to have the right, regardless of my desires and best judgment, to select a preschool program for her?" This question is based on the presumption--or philosophy if you will--that the average blind person can live and compete on an equal basis with the sighted, exercising the same rights and responsibilities. If the parents of the average sighted preschooler are expected to select and pay for a preschool program in your state, then so should the parents of an average blind child. If state or federal funds subsidize preschool programs for low-income families, then the blind preschooler of a low-income family has the same right to attend that program as any sighted child who qualifies. (The Headstart program, by the way, has a mandate to serve disabled children. I have known of several low-income blind children who attended Headstart programs successfully.) If a school has a program for gifted and talented children, then the gifted and talented blind child has the same right to participate as his or her sighted peers. The same rule applies for any other public or community program you can think of--YMCA swimming lessons, scouting, school field trips, church choir, and so forth. Blind adults or children should not be excluded just because they are blind, but neither should they expect special favors. I understand that this philosophy is not as simple to implement as I have perhaps made it sound. First of all blind children do have unique needs which require special services. Blind people (for the most part) cannot read print or cannot read it efficiently and therefore need an alternative system for reading and writing. Braille is the answer to that need. But because Braille is not used by the public at large, it requires special instruction from a teacher trained in the method. The same is true for independent travel. Again, the alternative technique (use of the long white cane) should be taught by someone who knows how to travel independently with the cane. There are many other alternative techniques which a blind child needs to learn, such as methods for cooking, shopping for clothes, putting on make-up, doing research in a library, cleaning house, doing the laundry, or fixing a leaking faucet. A few of those skills, such as Braille and, to a lesser extent, cane travel, require specialized instruction. Most are a matter of common sense and will be taught at home just as they are to any other child. The question then is whether the use of alternative techniques changes our expectations of blind people. Does it alter our philosophy regarding the normality and equality of the blind? History has demonstrated that it does not. This philosophy, as articulated by the National Federation of the Blind, has been tested by thousands of blind people over several decades now, and it works. The blind have found that the means by which a blind child or adult accomplishes something may be different, but the end result should measure up to what we would expect from the sighted. "The Pros and Cons of Preferential Treatment for the Blind," by Dr. Jacobus tenBroek, is one of the best articles I have ever read on the subject of the rights, responsibilities, and special needs of the blind. Although this article was written some years ago and much has changed in the meantime, the principles he laid down then are as relevant today as they were at the time of their writing. With this letter, I am enclosing that article as well as a speech by Dr. Kenneth Jernigan, "Blindness--The Pattern of Freedom." Dr. tenBroek was the founder of the National Federation of the Blind, and Dr. Jernigan is the current Executive Director of our organization. Let me now go back for a moment to the question you raise in your letter about who should find and pay for a regular preschool for your daughter--the agency or the parents. Basically I believe that parents of blind children should do whatever is expected of other parents. For most regular preschool programs that means digging into our own pockets. I have three children, two sighted and one blind. We selected and paid the fees for preschool programs for all three of them. Our blind son attended a private Montessori program because we thought it would be more challenging for him. (He is also considered gifted and currently takes special classes offered to all gifted sixth graders at the public school he now attends.) By the way, I do concede that there may be situations in which an agency should pay for the average blind child to attend a regular preschool. Even so, parents should always carefully weigh the costs, and I don't just mean dollars and cents. We have all heard the adages about purse strings and power and how nothing in life is free. That doesn't mean we should never accept services and materials for our children that are needed and are available--especially if they are from public programs supported by our tax dollars--only that we should always be aware of the full price we are paying. I have one more comment to make about blindness and the education of blind children. In your letter you say that "[we] realize that [Laura] will need continuing special education to maintain her high performance." If you mean by this that your daughter needs instruction in the alternative techniques of blindness and the means of getting materials in a form she can use (such as Braille and taped textbooks), that is certainly true--but only up to a point. Eventually she will no longer need Braille instruction or orientation and mobility. At least by the time she enters college, she will no longer need anyone else to order her Braille and taped books or run interference with a skeptical teacher or professor. She will do it herself. She will know how to find and train her own readers and get wherever she needs to go without the help of parents or professionals. She will do her own laundry, cook her own meals, manage her own career, pay her own taxes, and probably raise some grandchildren for you. There are those, however, who believe that the disability of blindness is so profound and pervasive that a blind person must rely upon lifelong assistance from professionals in order to achieve maximum independence. A great many professionals believe this; members of the public believe it; and, though their numbers are decreasing, there are blind people who believe it. Parents of young blind children are especially vulnerable to this false philosophy. It is easy for us to become dependent upon the professionals who are there when we most need someone to provide us with help, hope, and guidance. Not only do we become dependent upon them, but we develop a distorted perspective about how and why our children learn. We often discount the role we play as the child's natural teacher and overlook the part played by his or her own innate will and drive to learn. Instead, we begin to believe that only the professionals can hold the key to the blind child's success in life, but that just isn't the way it works! I think most people fall somewhere between these two philosophies of blindness. I know I do. But since everything in the world is constantly changing, parents will not stay in one place on that spectrum. We will be moving toward either one view or the other. We will either come to believe more and more in the normality and equality of the blind, or we will become more convinced that blindness is a profound limitation. As I look again at your letter, I realize that I have probably not answered your questions in the way that you expected, but I have given you, as I promised, the best answers I could. Please get in touch with me if you have questions or want to discuss any part of this letter. You can call me at home or at the National Federation of the Blind office, (410) 659-9314. Cordially yours, Barbara Cheadle, Editor Future Reflections National Federation of the Blind PARENT LEADS THE WAY IN ORGANIZING LOCAL NFB CHAPTER From the Editor: In the winter of 1983 the Cheadle family moved from Missouri to Idaho. We took two infants with us; our nine-month-old daughter, Anna Katherine Roberts Cheadle, and a thriving one-year-old publication, Future Reflections. Both continued to grow and flourish for the two years we lived in Idaho. It was also while we lived in Idaho--July of 1983 to be precise--that the Parents of Blind Children Division of the National Federation of the Blind was organized at our National Convention. We (the National Federation of the Blind of Idaho) did our part to help our new national parent division grow. We worked diligently to locate parents of blind children in the state. The National Federation of the Blind offers so much to parents; a positive philosophy about blindness that really works, support, information, advocacy, role models, etc.; but all this doesn't mean much unless parents know about us. Anyway, we never organized a parent group in Idaho, but we began to be known and recognized by parents not only as the expert in blindness, but as an organization that really cares. All of this is by way of introduction to the following article which appeared in the April 1, 1992, Mountain Home News, Mountain Home, Idaho. The original title (which is rather typical of the sentimental human interest slant journalists tend to give to any story about blindness) does not do the content of the article justice. (The newspaper title is: "A Light In The Darkness. 4-year-old girl's smile lights up a world she can't see.") As I read the article, I was reminded of a young blind college student I had met when we lived in Idaho. The student had explained to me why he had joined the Federation and why he was particularly interested in being active in the parents division. His reason was basically selfish, he said. He wanted a better life for himself, and the Federation was opening doors and creating opportunities that would make that possible. And his interest in helping parents came from his own experiences as a blind child. Though he loved his parents, and knew that they had done the best they could, his life then and now, he explained, could have been so much different if only his parents had known about the Federation. He couldn't go back in time and change his own childhood, but he could tell parents of blind children today about the National Federation of the Blind. Now, almost ten years later as reported in this local newspaper, an Idaho parent of a blind child is reaching out in her community to tell blind persons of all ages about the National Federation of the Blind. What goes around, as they say, comes around. Both of these people--the blind college student and the mother in the following article--exhibit one of the characteristics of a Federationist: enlightened self-interest. Federationists understand that it is only in a climate of equal opportunity and social acceptance for all blind persons that any one individual blind person can ever truly succeed. Because of Joann Grimmett the blind of Idaho, and yes, the blind of the nation, have a brighter future. Through the National Federation of the Blind, individual efforts can make a difference! Here is the article from Mountain Home, Idaho: She twisted her curly blonde hair with her small hands and wiggled in her mom's lap, worried about when she was going to get to go to school. Four-year-old Marian Grimmett's shy smile became a broad grin as she reached over and stroked the beard of the reporter questioning her. "She really likes men with beards," her mother, Joann Grimmett, said. Without reaching out to feel it, however, Marian would not have known it was there. The small white cane in her hand explained why. Marian is blind. When she was two months old she was diagnosed as having cancer of the eyes. At the age of four months, surgery took one eye from her. The other was subjected to extensive radiation treatments. Today, she can see at 20 feet what others can see at 800 feet. She is legally and practically blind. "You wind up verbalizing everything to her, that's probably why I rattle on so much when I talk," Mrs. Grimmett said. "For her to get a picture of anything, you have to describe it." Yet, to this point in her life, Marian says she's missed nothing. She has scores of friends at Children's House Montessori School in Mountain Home, where she receives a pre-school education. On the playground, the children line up to play with her, almost fighting over the opportunity to help her. With her small white cane and the heightened senses of awareness the blind develop, however, she rarely needs the help as she heads for her favorite playground equipment. Her smile is quick, her laughter bright. "They treat me like everybody else," Marian says. Her mother smiles. "They treat her like a queen." Supplementing the instruction she receives at Children's House is an itinerant teacher from the Gooding School for the Deaf and Blind, who visits her home on a regular basis. She's already begun to learn her ABCs in Braille and said she enjoys reading with her fingers. Next year, she will enter kindergarten in the Mountain Home School District, becoming the third student with severe vision impairments to be attending the district (the other two are much older). Some district officials admit it will be a challenge for them when Marian enters kindergarten at West Elementary, but they are already preparing to receive her. An aide will be hired and trained to help her visualize some of the things the other students will be seeing (the aide also will be available to the other students in the class) and the Gooding School will translate all of her textbooks into Braille for her. "They (the school district) are trying to do all they can within the limits they've got," Mrs. Grimmett said. But Grimmett also is fighting for the rights of the blind and awareness of their needs. "A totally blind person can do anything except drive," she said, "yet 70 percent of the blind who are capable of working are unemployed." At the recent state convention for the National Federation of the Blind of Idaho, held in Moscow March 20-22, Mrs. Grimmett received the Frank Smith Memorial Award for her efforts "to help the blind in her efforts to achieve their goals." It was the first time the award had ever been given to a sighted person. She said she returned to Mountain Home from the convention with a "new determination to try to organize the blind, visually impaired, and those interested in these people into a local organization. "If we have enough people in Mountain Home that are interested in beginning a local chapter of the NFBI, or who just want some more information, I hope they will show up at a meeting we are having April 20 at 7 p.m. at the Mountain Home Public Library." Ramona Walhof, NFBI president, will be present to speak to those in attendance. For more information about the meeting or for assistance with a ride call her at 587-4002 in the evenings. "One of the reasons I want to start this group, is so Marian can have older blind people around her, as role models, more than she would have just going with me to conventions." Mrs. Grimmett hopes to take Marian to the national NFB convention at the end of June, and will be raising funds to help pay for the trip. Mrs. Grimmett said she has learned a lot about the blind since she began her associations with them, but the one thing that has struck her the most is that "the average sighted person has been taught from early childhood many misconceptions concerning the blind. "Blind people, like sighted people, come in all different shapes, sizes and styles, as do sighted people. And like sighted people they develop their abilities in their own ways. One cannot compare all sighted people into one grouping, nor can they do so for the blind." "Some of the experiences the blind go through, are just appalling," she said, relating a case where, when visiting the BSU Student Union with several blind youths, a guide directed them to a freight elevator to take them to the third-floor conference. "After we got there, we discovered there were regular elevators we could use." She said she was "appalled" to discover that there are no state or federal competency standards for Braille instructors. "Very often, the teacher of a blind student is only one or two lessons ahead of their students. I don't know any sighted children with this kind of teaching situation." She said her goal is to fight the discrimination that exists regarding the blind and to build public awareness of their needs and capabilities. She is trying to build a better world for her daughter and all others like her. Behind her, as she spoke, Marian's giggling laughter could be heard as she headed into class with her fellow students. So far, Marian hasn't seen the barriers ahead of her. WHY I THINK PARENTS SHOULD BE PARTNERS IN THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND by Sandra Jacobson Editor's Note: Why should parents attend the National Convention of the National Federation of the Blind? Over the years I have discovered that the answers to that question are always the same, yet always different and new as each parent encounters the convention experience for the first time. Here is what Sandra Jacobson of Minnesota has to say about what the 1992 NFB Convention meant to her and her son. I am a parent of three beautiful children, one of whom is blind. Blind since birth, Jacob is now fourteen years old. He is attending junior high and is in the eighth grade. When my husband and I were told that our son was blind we knew it would not change our love or our goals for his life. Our plans remained the same. Little did we know that society--including some friends and family members--would not have the same attitude. I could share numerous stories about situations in which we have encountered the misconceptions of blindness held by doctors, teachers, coaches, schools, friends, and even family. Let me share two of those experiences with you. Last summer I arrived early at camp with 22 children who were looking forward to a week of training, singing, swimming, water skiing, boating, etc. Jacob, a normal fourteen-year-old, was looking forward to the week's activities, not as a spectator but as a participant. We were met by the camp director, and he informed us that the "handicap" would be staying in the dorm instead of with his sighted friends in the cabin. I immediately asked Jacob if he wanted to stay in the cabin or in the handicapped dorm. Jacob, of course, wanted to be with his friends. I explained to the director that I had purposely arrived early to give all the children time to orient themselves to the camp and also to give Jacob a chance to orient himself to the necessary buildings. After much embarrassment to all of us, the director reluctantly said he would permit Jacob to stay in the cabin along with the rest of his friends. For the next hour he followed us all around the camp watching Jacob. The time finally came for me to leave. After all the trouble with the camp director, I was an emotional wreck. I constantly worried about Jacob and often wondered throughout the week if he was being treated with fairness and dignity. A few weeks later, I sat with Jacob in the Orthodontic office as he got braces put on his teeth. The assistant called me over to give me instructions on brushing, flossing, and putting on rubber bands, as if I was the one who was getting braces! I had to inform her that Jacob had been taking care of his own teeth since he was five years old. Again, I was angry, frustrated, and full of self-pity for hours after this incident. I understand now that stories like these are the same for all blind individuals, just different places with different people. This is why it is important to be a part of a network of people who have faced challenges and conquered situations that you may also be experiencing. That's why attending the 1992 National Federation of the Blind Convention in North Carolina this past July was just the answer to my prayers. It was a wonderful experience for Jacob. He met new friends, participated in the talent contest, attended many great informative seminars, played games, and attended many social gatherings. But most of all he met many blind successful students and professionals. I would like to say a special "Thanks!" to: Scott LaBarre, Curtis Chong, Brian Buhrow, John Miller, Russell Anderson, Chaz Cheadle, and Ollie Cantos. You gave Jacob a very much-needed confidence in himself. For myself, I believe I received much more than Jacob. For me, the National Convention was an emotional healing. Logically, I can handle the problems that our society puts on Jacob and other blind persons. As described in the stories above, I have always stood up for Jacob and tried to educate people about blindness. But I would always come home from such incidents an emotional mess; angry, crying, and full of doubt, fear, and self-pity. I know that because of these feelings, I did not always come across well in these encounters. I'm sure I was viewed as hostile, strident, and emotional. But I couldn't help it. I was full of fear of the future for my son and doubt that Jacob really could have a chance to live a full life. And the self-pity came from wondering why I always had to be the one to instruct and convince not only the public of Jacob's abilities, but also the professionals. I thought they--the professionals--were here to help us through situations! This is where the National Federation of the Blind came in for me. I discovered I wasn't alone. I witnessed thousands of blind people helping each other and educating the sighted. Everyone there--blind people and parents--had all gone through the same situations our family had encountered. I came home from the Convention well-informed and ready for anything. Most of all, the National Federation of the Blind Convention brought to me a wonderful and much needed faith and encouragement. Now when I run into situations like the two I just described earlier, I do not get angry or cry in frustration. Emotionally, I have accepted the challenge to do my part to educate society to the fact that the blind are normal people who, if given the chance, can lead perfectly normal lives in our society today. This is why I believe every parent of a blind child should become a partner with the National Federation of the Blind. We need to pull together, parents. The NFB and the NFB Parents of Blind Children Division can bring you and your child the emotional support that is necessary to face the demands and challenges of being blind in today's society. I hope to see you in Dallas, Texas, in 1993!!!! A REPORT ON HOMESCHOOLING by Sunny Shain Emerson Editor's Note: I recently received the following letter and report from Sunny Emerson, who is completing her first year homeschooling their son, Adam, who happens to be blind. This is also her first year as chairperson of the Parents of Blind Children Division of the NFB Committee on Homeschooling the Blind Child. Sunny would be glad to share information, answer questions, and generally assist parents of blind children who are homeschooling or are considering doing so. Here is how you may contact her: Mrs. Sunny Shain Emerson, 11951 Burtley Drive, Sterling Heights, Michigan 48313; (313) 739-0014. January 18, 1993 Dear Barbara, I am sending you a copy of Adam's activities for the month of December homeschooling report. We are enrolled in Clonlara Home Based Education Program. They do not tell us what to teach but share with us the requirements needed to graduate from high school. They have Adam's school records from his other schools; thus our state has not questioned why Adam was not in school. Also, before we took Adam out of school we told the special educators of the visually impaired that we no longer needed an IEP. Adam is working on the 9th grade level, and as long as he meets the requirements needed for a diploma, Clonlara will issue one. There are many, many resources for homeschoolers and more activities and things to do than we can possibly fit in. [As chairperson of the POBC Committee on Homeschooling], I have had questions from parents of blind children who want to homeschool their children in the early elementary grades. As this is our first year with Adam and he already has the skills of blindness, these parents need to be in contact with other parents who are successfully home-schooling their blind children. I have told them everything they need to know can be found in the back issues of Future Reflections and our Handbook for Itinerant and Resource Teachers of Blind and Visually Impaired Students. But as you know, nothing beats personal contact with someone who is successful at what you are doing. That is why the National Federation of the Blind has always been a blessing to our family. Our POBC of Michigan is going strong and we have an enthusiastic new president, Dawn Neddo, who brings with her much experience due to her in- volvement with foster parenting. We will be putting out a new newsletter soon, and you will see in it all the good things happening for blind children in our state because of the National Federation of the Blind of Michigan. Our blind adults in the NFB are so supportive to our parents, and they genuinely love our children. See you in Dallas, Sunny Adam Emerson: December, 1992, Monthly Report Since November, 1992, Adam has read 27 books. Some--such as Quarks to Quasars by James Jesperson and Asimov on Chemistry--more than once. We are enclosing a book list of the books he read during November and December. As you will notice Adam has taken quite an interest in electronics recently and is busy trying to collect items to take apart for their electronic components. Adam did a report on Louis Pasteur, a biography on Spurgeon, completed studies on nutrition, and continues his grammar course by mail from Hadley School for the Blind. We may contact the teacher from Hadley anytime between 9 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. on a toll-free phone line. We try to read and write Braille every day even though Adam can now handle print much better with his new telescope glasses. Adam has two slate-mates (Braille pen-pals) in Arizona and in Michigan. He also started a home-school student newspaper group that put out a December edition. Adam has music most every day. He practices vocal solos and piano specials for church on a regular basis. He also conducts a children's group from time to time and leads them in singing while playing the piano. We attend a homeschool group biology class (graciously offered in the home of a very knowledgeable family) every Friday and have many, many hours of homework to do during the week. We also often attend art classes with this very talented family and have many fun field trips. On Tuesday afternoons we attend an Algebra class offered at the home of another homeschool family with a retired Physics professor as instructor. Adam uses the Alge-Blaster computer program, a Milliken workbook and a John Saxon algebra textbook (for tests and a resource) to compliment his regular work in Elementary Algebra, a text by Auvil and Poluga. For Christmas Adam received a new hard drive for his computer and has spent hours installing it while listening to talking book tapes. Adam has a busy social life and enjoyed attending the play "The Greatest Christmas Pageant Ever," a progressive dinner, and two concerts during December. He went roller-skating as well. We also have a large family--four married siblings with children, grandmothers, a great-grandmother, and many aunts, uncles and cousins--with which we visited during the holidays. Adam cut the Christmas tree, washed windows, baked Mom's birthday cake, made ornaments, decorated the house inside and out, wrapped presents, and went to Lakeside Mall to do his shopping by himself. He also helped Dad with the church treasurer's job by doing the computer operations (his Dad knows little about computers). There are probably things I left out, December was such a busy month. POWER--OR EMPOWERMENT? by James H. Omvig Reprinted from News and Views of Blind Arizonans, The NFB of Arizona newsletter, Summer, 1992. News and Views Editor's note: James H. Omvig is an attorney. He was the first blind lawyer ever employed by the National Labor Relations Board. He worked for that agency both in Washington, D. C., and New York City. Later, he became professionally involved in vocational rehabilitation and served as Director of the Iowa Adult Orientation and Adjustment Center for the Blind, the Director of Social Security's Handicapped Employment Program, and finally as the Director of the Alaska Center for the Blind and Deaf, before retiring to Arizona because of chronic ill health. Recently I was putting together some information and ideas while preparing for a training presentation I was invited to make to the staff of the New Mexico Commission for the Blind. As I was thinking about the question of how best the staff of that agency could serve its consumers to make sure that they could reasonably expect to experience quality lives, I was struck by the thought that I might have a clear contradiction in my own notions about service providers. To set up the situation exactly as it was when I was troubled by my own thoughts, let me give you this additional piece of information: We in Arizona have been working for three years, now, on the issue of literacy for our blind children. At the very time I was preparing for the New Mexico presentation, we were working with the Arizona School for the Deaf and Blind on a policy regarding Braille literacy. Some of the "professionals" from this state had shown up en masse to oppose the proposed policy. These were the type of professionals the blind have come to know all too well--those who exude arrogance and condescension toward the blind and who belong to that elite corps of specialists who vehemently tell us, "Don't trouble us with the facts; we know what is best for you!" These are the people who have actually convinced themselves that there is a new, complicated and very sophisticated science involved in the routine tasks of work with the blind. It seems virtually to be a disease which runs rampant among them. "We know what is best for you." It was this tiresome and oppressive concept, then, which was on my mind as I was developing the presentation for the New Mexico agency staff. And then the apparent contradiction struck me: The good agencies or the good educational institutions or the good specialists for the blind really DO know what is best for the client or student--they have to. For the student or client who is new to the system has no reason to know and truly has no idea what kind of service or training is needed. Think about it! The new student or client doesn't know about the wide range of possibilities which exist for the blind who have had proper training. He or she must be taught and often persuaded by someone who does know. The new client or student doesn't know why it is so very important in the adjustment process to use the word "blind" rather than some inane and injurious word or phrase such as sightless, unsighted, hard of seeing, or visually impaired. He or she must be persuaded by someone who truly knows and understands the importance of the client's acceptance of blindness. The newly blinded adult doesn't know that prevocational training in a residential orientation center is always preferable to training in a daytime-only program. This blind individual who is new to the system does not know why it is important to use the long, white cane; why sleepshades are necessary for the partially blind person during training; or why Braille and other alternative techniques are so important. Someone who really knows and cares must convince the blind person of these and a myriad of other facts and truths. All of the foregoing is the way that it is. And often, of course, all of this persuasion and convincing must be accomplished in spite of the stubborn resistance of the blind student or rehabilitant involved. So there you have the apparent conflict. What is the difference between the proper action I have described here and the attitude of the professionals who say, "We know what is best for you?" Clearly there IS a difference--an enormous difference! As I wrestled with this question, I came up with two explanations. I decided, though, to put it on hold and to raise the question with the New Mexico staff as a part of the training presentation. We had quite a discussion. We decided first of all that one factor in the difference had to do with the source of the information which was being provided to the blind student or client. The ideas about training which work most effectively are those which have been developed and tested by the blind themselves. Therefore, we agreed that these concepts would tend to have much more validity than those conjured up in some university laboratory and that it is proper to present these ideas forcefully to the client or student. We finally agreed, though, that the major ingredient involved in the difference has to do with the actual motive of the educator or rehabilitator. If the intention of the specialist is truly and solely to help the blind individual achieve success, then the action or attitude is proper. It was Dick Davis of the New Mexico Commission for the Blind who put it all into perspective for us. "It has to do with the difference between power and empowerment," explained Mr. Davis. This statement made it all come crystal clear. When the pseudo-scientists who like to call themselves "professionals" exercise their "we know what is best for you" attitude, they do so for the sole purpose of exerting power over the blind and maintaining intact their superiority and new-found science. They could care less what actually happens to the blind person. On the other hand, when the good educator or rehabilitator works vigorously to convince the blind person to get involved in proper training and positive thinking, he or she is acting correctly where the effort is for the sole purpose of empowering the blind person. I checked the dictionary for the meaning of empowerment, and I wasn't totally satisfied with what I found. It says, "To give power or authority to." This is all right as far as it goes, but I believe that in today's usage the meaning is broader. I think that, for the blind, the meaning would probably be something like this: A service provider may be said to "empower" the blind individual to the extent that that person is equipped with the tools--the knowledge, the skills, the motivation and the self-confidence--which are necessary to enable him or her to take charge and to make sound judgments and decisions based upon fact, skill and ability so that the blind person can be the best that he or she is capable of becoming. The quality program knows what it takes, and it also knows how properly to involve the blind individual. In trying to achieve this desired objective, if the specialist approaches the blind only for the purpose of exercising power, then this is always wrong no matter what the outcome. On the other hand, if the specialist does what he or she does honestly for the sole purpose of empowering the blind person, then it is always right no matter what happens. The New Mexico agency is on the mark and, as a result, blind people in that state are on the move. I earnestly hope that we are approaching that day when the vast majority of those in work with the blind will truly act only for the purpose of empowerment--no axes to grind, no pseudo-science to which to give validity, no wounded pride to protect. All persons who are blind should have not only the right but also the essential tools with which to take charge. The quality agency or school knows how to make all of this happen. No, there is no contradiction in thinking about the role of quality service providers. But there surely is a monumental difference between those who would exercise power and those who seek to empower. 1991-1992 BRAILLE READERS ARE LEADERS CONTEST WINNERS The following students were top winners in the 1991-1992 National Federation of the Blind Braille Readers are Leaders Contest. This nationwide contest recognizes the reading accomplishments of Braille students from kindergarten through 12th grades throughout the nation. Students who enter the contest compete for cash prizes and a special contest T-shirt. All contestants receive a ribbon and a certificate in recognition of their efforts in the contest. The number of pages read by the following winners is a testament to what Braille students can achieve when they have the enthusiasm and motivation to read. Long after their prize money has been spent, their T-shirts outgrown or outworn, their ribbons tucked away forgotten in a scrapbook, they will still be reading. This skill will continue to open doors of opportunity and pleasure throughout their lives. Kindergarten-First Grade First place: Cassie Lucarelli, Madison, WI; 4,539 pages. Second place: Gabriela Gonzalez, Las Vegas, NV; 3,231 pages. Third place: Arielle Silverman, Scottsdale, AZ; 2,701 pages. Second-Fourth Grade First place: James Konechne, White Lake, SD; 8,838 pages. Second place: Jennifer Espinoza, Albuquerque, NM; 7,623 pages. Third place: Blake Earl Roberts, Felton, DE; 7,405 pages. Fifth-Eighth Grade First place: Travis Roth, Dorchester, NE; 6,056 pages. Second place: David Mehler, Uniontown, OH; 5,896 pages. Third place: Wes Derby, Scotts Bluff, AZ; 5,602 pages. Ninth-Twelfth Grade First place: April Swaim, Arlington, TX; 10,013 pages. Second place: Chastity Morse, Coon Rapids, MN 6,715 pages. Third place: Jennifer Baker, Rockville, MD; 5,416 pages. Print-to-Braille First place: Joshua Jungwirth, Ishpeming, MI; 1,475 pages. Second place: Heidi Ward, Hanson, MA; 1,297 pages. Third place: Gina Bunting, Fort Meade, MD; 1,264 pages. Most Improved Winners: The intent of this award is to recognize those who have shown the greatest improvement in Braille reading from their performance in the previous year's contest. The top five (excluding those who qualify as winners in the other categories) are selected as the Most Improved Winners. Karen Johnson, Muskegon, MI. Rebecca Hart, Springfield, VA. Annette Harvey, Baltimore, MD. Melissa Keys, Stephenville, TX. Paul Jackson, Baltimore, MD. Note: The 1992-1993 contest ended in February. The final judging and selection of winners for the contest will occur in late April, 1993. The 1993 -1994 Braille Readers are Leaders contest form will be published in Future Reflections this coming Fall. VBTI'S STORYBOOK PROJECT by Mary Ann Damm From the Editor: Over ten years ago when the Parents of Blind Children Division and the National Association to Promote the Use of Braille were discussing the possibility of co-sponsoring a national Braille reading contest, one problem was raised: the lack of reading material for very young blind children. The board debated whether, for this reason, children in kindergarten through second grade should be included in the contest. We finally decided that we had to include them. We knew getting books would be a problem, but perhaps this would help educate parents, teachers, and others about the urgent need for more Braille books for beginning readers. If more people in the right places were made aware of the problem, perhaps we could get more Braille books for youngsters. Today, thanks to a number of public and private national programs and dozens of state and local efforts, we do have more Braille books for beginning Braille readers than ever before. I believe that our contest has helped make that possible, but the connection is not always direct or easily identified. I was delighted, then, when I came across this article in the Fall, 1992, (volume 28, number 3) NBA Bulletin, a publication of the National Braille Association, Inc. No longer do we need to speculate about the impact the Braille contest has had on the increase of Braille books for children, not in Wisconsin anyway. Here is the article: Three factors led to the initiation of The Storybook Project at Volunteer Braillists and Tapists, Inc., (VBTI) Madison, Wisconsin. First, while working as a Braillist in the public schools, I observed the difficulty that the students encountered in getting books while competing in the National Federation of the Blind's (NFB) annual reading contest. Second, Connie Risjord and I attended a meeting at the State's Department of Public Instruction (DPI) where we learned that there were over 200 visually impaired pre-schoolers in Wisconsin. Finally, while at the NBA meetings in Atlanta and Lansing, I attended Susan Christensen's storybook workshops. Since VBTI already had a lending library, I went through our files to see what children's books were available. To my surprise, there were over 250 titles. Unfortunately, they seemed to be a secret not only to me, but also to parents and teachers. I updated the list, dividing it into categories of children's fiction, children's non-fiction, and teenager's books. New descriptions were written, and a catalog was compiled. DPI was contacted, and agreed to copy and send the catalog to parents of visually impaired students in Wisconsin. I also attended a meeting of the Wisconsin chapter of AER (Association for Eduction and Rehabilitation of the Blind and Visually Impaired) in order to reach the teachers to tell them about our lending library and about our willingness to put their materials into Braille and/or tape. The Wisconsin Council for the Blind, as well as the National Library Service Regional Library in Milwaukee and the state school in Janesville publicized our efforts, as did the local TV stations. Our group set a goal of putting 100 new titles into Braille and tape in the first year. Print/Braille and Braille/tape books were to be given priority. I held workshops using Susan's handouts. Many of the Braillists who had "burned out" or found other interests eagerly returned to transcribe the children's books. A monthly Library Hour, when visually impaired children could visit our offices for a morning of reading and games, was suggested and implemented. This became an excellent way to see what the children were reading and what they wanted to read. Since its beginning in the fall of 1990, almost 200 books have been added to the library. At Christmas, we offer fifteen to twenty books for sale at minimal cost. And if parents bring in a print book of their own, we will add the Braille labels to the book for only the cost of the labeling material. Although initially set up for children who are Braille readers or potential Braille readers, another group that really appreciates the service is blind parents of pre-school children. They want to read to their children as early as sighted parents do. As one parent wrote: "As a blind parent, I am always on the lookout for read-aloud books...the idea of Braille books to accompany recorded tapes is a terrific idea for beginning Braille readers. Kids who read print have had tapes and books for years." An attorney in New York City wanted One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish done quickly so that she could take it with her when she visited her godson in Alabama. (In fact, we had to send it to Alabama so it would be there when she arrived.) These personal contacts have energized our organization. These books are great short-term projects--a welcome respite from longer and heavier assignments. It is gratifying to be able to finish a book in an evening, especially when one knows a child is eagerly awaiting its completion. Besides these psychological benefits, there are others. Our recruitment numbers are up dramatically. Twelve students are currently working on their manuscripts, and twenty-one are signed up for the fall class. We have also trained twenty more tapists. We attribute this increase to the fact that we are better known in the community because of the publicity that this project has generated. There are even financial rewards. The local chapter of the Telephone Pioneers has "adopted" us and started by giving us $1,000 to buy print books. They also purchased Hot Dots software to be used with their word processors at work. During their breaks and lunch hours, several volunteers type/transcribe books for older children, ages ten and up. Other groups have donated computers and even a used thermofax machine so that we can make encapsulated paper tactile graphics. Certainly the greatest benefit of all is the contact with the children themselves. The Library Hour is very popular. We have made three books of our own with original tactiles done by the children--Christmas trees, creepy critters, and activities for the summer. And, one of our "regulars" won the national NFB reading contest this year. I personally hate to tear myself away from the children's books in order to do my Nemeth assignments. Actually, one of these assignments--a kindergarten math workbook--was easier to structure because of my experience with the tactile graphics done for the children's books. As you can see, The Storybook Project has been a success for our organization. Thanks, Susan and NBA for your help in getting it off the ground! THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND 1993 SCHOLARSHIP PROGRAM by Barbara Pierce If you were a college or graduate student, what could you do with $10,000, or even $2,000? Tuition, books, rent, adaptive equipment: the demands are endless, and the money one has available never stretches far enough. As the parent of three students, I know how unbalanced the equation can be that arranges demands on one side and resources on the other. And all of us know just how many more expenses blind students have than most others. That is why the National Federation of the Blind established a scholarship program many years ago and why we expanded it in 1984. For the most part, people do not believe that blind post-secondary students who have the same dreams as their sighted counterparts are quite right in the head. If they are so foolish as to pursue such fields as international relations, electrical engineering, or medicine, they are dismissed immediately as "out of touch with reality." Even if they major in education, counseling, or computer science but do not express a burning desire to "help blind people live more satisfying lives," obstacles are still often placed in their paths. We in the National Federation of the Blind begin with the premise that blind students have as much right as anybody else to try to fulfill their dreams, and we believe that blindness as such is no reason to assume that a given individual cannot do a designated job or enter a particular profession. The individual may not have the intelligence, dexterity, stamina, creativity, or alternative skills to do the work successfully, and some of these limitations may well prove insurmountable; but blindness, which is so often held up as the obvious explanation, is not really the culprit. The National Federation of the Blind's 1993 scholarship program seeks to find the twenty-six most outstanding blind post-secondary students in the United States today and honor them for their ground-breaking work. We want to help them on their way as much as we can. These twenty-six students will be selected on the basis of academic excellence, service to the community, and financial need (recipients of Federation scholarships need not be members of the National Federation of the Blind.) We will present the 1993 winners with awards ranging in value from $2,000 to $10,000, and we will bring them as our guests to the 1993 convention of the National Federation of the Blind to experience first-hand the excitement and stimulation of a gathering of the largest and most dynamic organization of blind people in the country today. Anyone can order scholarship forms from the Materials Center, National Federation of the Blind, 1800 Johnson Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21230. NFB State Presidents and members of the 1993 Scholarship Committee will also have scholarship forms. These may be copied as long as both sides of the form are reproduced. Send completed applications to: Miss Peggy Pinder, Chairman, National Federation of the Blind Scholarship Committee, 814 - 4th Avenue, Suite 200, Grinnell, Iowa 50112; (515) 236-3366. The completed form must be received by March 31, 1993. The hard-working 1993 Scholarship Committee will gather in the spring to evaluate hundreds of scholarship applications. They will also work closely with the scholarship winners during the convention in Dallas, Texas. The following people have been appointed to serve on the 1993 Scholarship Committee: Peggy Pinder, Iowa, Chairman; Adrienne Asch, New York; Steve Benson, Illinois; Charles Brown, Virginia; Sharon Buchan, Alaska; Douglas Elliott, Nevada; Priscilla Ferris, Massachusetts; Michael Gosse, Pennsylvania; John Halverson, Missouri; Allen Harris, Michigan; David Hyde, Oregon; Bill Isaacs, Illinois; Carl Jacobson, New York; Kristen Jocums, Utah; Susan Jones, Indiana; Tami Dodd Jones, Michigan; Kathy Kannenberg, North Carolina; Scott LaBarre, Minnesota; Melissa Lagroue, Alabama; Reggie Lindsey, Tennessee; Sharon Maneki, Maryland; John Miller, California; Maria Morais, New Mexico; Homer Page, Colorado; Barbara Pierce, Ohio; Ben Prows, Washington; Eileen Rivera, Maryland; Fred Schroeder, New Mexico; Larry Streeter, Nebraska; C. Edwin Vaughan, Missouri; Ramona Walhof, Idaho; Jim Willows, California; Joanne Wilson, Louisiana; Gary Wunder, Missouri; Robin Zook, Utah. Scholarships to be given at the National Convention in 1993 are listed here with any special restrictions noted: 1. Ezra Davis Memorial Scholarship; $10,000; endowed by Ezra Davis and given by the American Brotherhood for the Blind, a nonprofit organization which works to assist blind persons. No additional restrictions. 2. National Federation of the Blind Scholarships; sixteen to be given: two for $4,000; five for $2,500; nine for $2,000. No additional restrictions. 3. Anne Pekar Memorial Scholarship; $4,000; given in loving memory of Anne Pekar by her parents, who say "The purpose of the scholarship is to help others as Anne had tried to do in her various volunteer endeavors....It is our hope that this small gesture in her name will remind us of the wonderful things about Anne and, in particular, her concern about other people and her desire to help." Winner must be a woman between the ages of 17 and 25. 4. Melva T. Owen Memorial Scholarship; $3,000; given in memory of Melva T. Owen, who was widely known and loved among the blind. She and her husband Charles Owen became acquainted with increasing numbers of blind people through their work in the "Voicepondence" Club. Charles Owen says: "There shall be no limitation as to field of study, except that it shall be directed towards attaining financial independence and shall exclude religion and those seeking only to further general or cultural education." 5. Howard Brown Rickard Scholarship; $2,500; winner must be studying or planning to study in the fields of law, medicine, engineering, architecture, or the natural sciences. 6. Frank Walton Horn Memorial Scholarship; $2,500; given by Mr. and Mrs. Charles E. Barnum, the mother and stepfather of Catherine Horn Randall. No additional restrictions, but preference will be given to those studying architecture or engineering. 7. National Federation of the Blind Humanities Scholarship; $2,500; winner must be studying in the traditional Humanities such as art, English, foreign languages, history, philosophy, or religion. 8. National Federation of the Blind Educator of Tomorrow Award; $2,500; winner must be planning a career in elementary, secondary, or post-secondary teaching. 9. Hermione Grant Calhoun Scholarship; $2,000; Dr. Isabelle Grant endowed this scholarship in memory of her daughter. Winner must be a woman. 10. Kuchler-Killian Memorial Scholarship; $2,000; given in loving memory of her parents, Charles Albert Kuchler and Alice Helen Kuchler, by Junerose Killian, dedicated member of the National Federation of the Blind of Connecticut. No additional restrictions. 11. Ellen Setterfield Memorial Scholarship; $2,000; given in memory of Ellen Setterfield by Roy Landstrom, who says: "During the course of her life, she gave of herself to defend the dignity and self-respect of those around her." Winner must be studying social sciences at the graduate level. PEOPLE WHO ARE BLIND: 1993 LEGISLATIVE PRIORITIES From the Editor: Every year for many years now, members of the National Federation of the Blind have descended upon Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., by the hundreds. The purpose of this activity (which we call the "Washington Seminar") is to educate senators and members of the House of Representatives about the legislative needs and priorities of the blind of the nation. Once again, in February of 1993, the tapping of hundreds of white canes echoed in the halls of Congress as Federationists scurried to appointments with congressmen and congresswomen. This year we also had a record number of parents of blind children among our D.C. seminarians. A special parent leadership seminar was conducted at the National Center for the Blind in Baltimore the Friday and Saturday preceding the Sunday, January 31, kick-off of the Washington Seminar. Half of the dozen parents attending the leadership seminar stayed over for the D.C. event. On Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday they joined some 300 blind Federationists from 44 states in buttonholing their legislators about the priorities for the blind as described in the following memo, which was distributed to every legislator or his/her staff. Of course, this event was only the beginning of the push for implementation of these priorities. Much more work needs to be done, and parents can help make a difference. If you have questions about the priorities and/or want to know what you can do to help, contact your local affiliate of the National Federation of the Blind. If you do not know how to get in touch with your local NFB chapter or state affiliate, you can get this information by contacting: National Federation of the Blind 1800 Johnson Street Baltimore, Maryland 21230 (410) 659-9314. LEGISLATIVE AGENDA 1993 From: Members of the National Federation of the Blind To: Members of the 103rd Congress Re: People Who Are Blind: Legislative Priorities for the 103rd Congress, First Session Public policies and laws affecting people who are blind have a profound impact throughout our society. Most people know someone who is blind. It may be a friend, a family member, or a co-worker on the job. The blind population in the U. S. is estimated to exceed 700,000. Fifty thousand Americans become blind each year. By themselves these numbers may not seem large, but the social and economic consequences of blindness directly touch the lives of millions. Less directly, blindness affects us all. People who are blind as a group share a unique struggle. More than being a matter of physical disability, the real problems of blindness are lack of good training, lack of opportunities, and lack of correct information about blindness among employers and members of the public at large. If a person who is blind has proper training and opportunity, the physical loss of eyesight itself can be reduced to the level of a mere nuisance. Public policies and laws that result from misconceptions about blindness or lack of information are often more limiting to people who are blind than loss of eyesight itself. This is why we have formed the National Federation of the Blind. The Federation is a private-sector resource of knowledge, encouragement, and support for people who are blind and for anyone (blind or not) who wants to join in the effort we are making to win understanding and opportunity. People who are blind are well-organized at the community and grassroots levels throughout the United States. Our policy positions are developed and determined by vote of the blind themselves. This is why the Federation is known by lawmakers and the public as the "voice of the nation's blind." Our priorities for the first session of the 103rd Congress express our assessment of issues requiring action by Congress on behalf of people who are blind this year. (1) Congress should amend Title II of the Social Security Act to modify or eliminate the limitation on earnings imposed by the retirement test and apply the modified exempt earnings policy to persons of working age who are blind as well as to retirees. This proposal seeks to improve the work incentives provided to Social Security beneficiaries. Under a 1977 amendment to the Social Security Act, the same exempt earnings amount--$880.00 monthly, or $10,560.00 annually--is allowed for people of working age who are blind as well as for those who retire at age 65. This proposal calls for increasing the exempt amount or eliminating the limitation on earnings altogether. People of working age who are blind must not be forgotten as Congress continues to debate whether changes should be made in the Social Security retirement test. A significant relaxation of the present earnings limitation would encourage thousands of beneficiaries to increase their work attempts. Those who successfully find full- or part-time work will pay taxes rather than simply drawing benefits. The results of their greater efforts to be productive will positively affect the Social Security system, as well as benefiting the individuals and families involved. A complete removal of the earnings limitation would provide beneficiaries with the maximum incentive to work. In any case, the statutory linkage which ties the exempt earnings amounts for retirees and working age people who are blind together should not be broken and must be consciously kept in mind as the debate over the future of the earnings test for Social Security eligibility proceeds. For more details and an explanation of the need for this legislation, see the fact sheet entitled "How Persons Of Working Age Who Are Blind Would Be Affected By Changes In The Social Security Retirement Earnings Test." (2) Congress should Enact the Americans With Disabilities Business Development Act. This proposal seeks amendments to the Small Business Act so that programs authorized to assist minority-owned small businesses, conducted under Section 8 (a) of the Act, will be open to persons with disabilities. The Section 8 (a) program is designed to foster business ownership by individuals who are both socially and economically disadvantaged and to promote the competitive viability of businesses owned and operated by them. To achieve these goals, Section 8 (a) authorizes the Small Business Administration (SBA) to enter into all types of contracts with government departments and agencies for supply, service, construction, and research and development. Small business concerns owned and controlled by socially and economically disadvantaged persons can be eligible to receive subcontracts to fulfill SBA's procurement obligations. Technical assistance is also made available to minority small business concerns. This proposal is simply the recognition of disability as a condition of minority status for participation in SBA's targeted efforts to provide economic and technical assistance to members of minority groups. The social and economic disadvantages which accompany disabilities are well-known and beyond dispute. The problem for SBA has been to define disability and the extent of the class of individuals included. To resolve that issue, The Americans with Disabilities Business Development Act excludes minor or perceived disabilities from the term "disability," as it is defined in the bill. Another problem has been SBA's lack of legal authority to presume that people with disabilities are socially disadvantaged in the absence of a clear legislative mandate. The Americans with Disabilities Business Development Act will provide that mandate. For more details and an explanation of the need for this legislation, see the fact sheet entitled "Americans With Disabilities Business Development Act: A Proposal For Business Ownership And Jobs For People With Disabilities." (3) Congress should control and stabilize postage rates for nonprofit organizations such as NFB. This request seeks sufficient appropriations and support for a permanent legislative remedy to meet the costs of the United States Postal Service for qualified free or reduced-rate mailings. Under existing law and appropriations levels, nonprofit postage rates could be increased from 11.1 cents per piece for items of letter size to more than 19 cents per piece. An increase of this magnitude would cost the National Federation of the Blind over $1 million in a single year. This cost could not be met by the Federation. Nothing can be more critical to a voluntary, private sector group of citizens than to have affordable, stable postage rates for mass communications. Paying the postal service's commercial rates for necessary use of the mails would force the National Federation of the Blind to dismantle many programs or to cease operations altogether. Survival for many other groups of importance in our society would also be threatened. If communications with persons who are blind and the public at large are cut, a time bomb is created, since fewer people will understand anything about blindness and even fewer will know of the continuing need to help. Then the downward spiral is in motion, with fewer people helped and even fewer people helping. Soon the benefits are gone. This does not overstate how vulnerable we are to the postal rate crisis if Congress fails to approve adequate funding. The fact sheet entitled "Crisis In Nonprofit Mail Rates Means Serious Harm To People Who Are Blind" explains the current situation and gives details on how members of the 103rd Congress can help. People who are blind are asking for your help in securing positive action by Congress in the areas outlined here. Legislative proposals will be offered to achieve each of our specific objectives. Many priorities confront this session of Congress, but the needs of the nation's people who are blind must not be overlooked. We of the National Federation of the Blind stand ready to assist our Representatives and Senators to understand our needs and to take meaningful action to address them. In partnership with the National Federation of the Blind, each member of Congress can help build better lives for people who are blind both today and in the years ahead. PROS AND CONS OF PREFERENTIAL TREATMENT OF BLIND PERSONS Address by Professor Jacobus tenBroek AAWB Convention, Quebec, June 19, 1955 The topic of this discussion immediately suggests the ambivalence, if not the outright hostility, aroused in most of us by the idea of preferential treatment. If it implies unwarranted favors and advantages, as it sometimes seems to, how is such treatment to be justified with reference to the blind, or, for that matter, with reference to any group? If the blind are normal, as they claim, why do they need to be treated differently? If their objective is really social equality and integration, is it not true that preferential treatment serves to perpetuate special status, with all its connotations of inequality and inferiority? Is there anything about the problems of the blind or of blindness which makes necessary or desirable some form of preferential treatment? "Any class," wrote one blind man, "which demands special privileges soon finds itself a dependent class" and "the blind of America have developed a progressive disease--that of dependency." We espouse the principle, wrote another blind man, "that the blind are normal and competent people, capable of making their own way, on a basis of equality." Yet at the same time, we ask "special concessions and privileges on the basis that we are helpless and unequal." "We cannot have our cake and eat it too and such measures and propaganda stressing the inequality of the blind are bound to have a most damaging effect upon our primary goal of equality." Let us begin our analysis of the pros and cons of preferential treatment of the blind at the beginning, that is, by defining the terms used. Preferential treatment of the blind is treatment which singles out the blind for special favors, advantages, or benefits. In short, it is any special treatment. Preferential treatment may be based on an irrational whim, prejudice, or taste--as when one prefers strawberries instead of blueberries, or as when it is said "gentlemen prefer blondes." On the other hand, preferential or special treatment may be based on the possession by the group receiving it of some distinctive talents or unique qualities or peculiar needs having a relationship to a proper public policy or socially desirable objective. There are no pros, there are only cons, with regard to the preferential treatment of the blind, which is founded in irrational whim, prejudice, or taste; and the blind cannot rightly claim, nor do they generally want, mere favoritism, public or private, any more than they claim or want the opposite: discriminatory disadvantage, guilt-or-shame-motivated rejection, kindness-inspired overprotection, or unthinking exclusion. The pros and cons of preferential treatment founded in special qualities or needs of the group depend in each individual instance upon three factors: (1) upon a faithful determination and accurate evaluation of the special qualities or needs of the blind; (2) upon a correct appraisal of the public policy or social objective sought to be achieved by the particular preferential treatment; and (3) upon the adaptation of means to ends, that is, upon whether the means are proper and there is a close and substantial relationship between the special qualities and needs of the blind, on the one hand, and the policy or objective on the other. The other term that must be defined is "the blind." Who are the blind? What is blindness? The term blindness in its literal denotative sense means loss of eyesight; the absence of visual acuity. It refers to a strictly physical condition. The blind, then, are simply those who cannot see. Nothing more, nothing less! The term blindness, however, also has a wider connotative sense. In this sense, it refers to restricted social and economic contact, opportunity and activity. To be stripped of eyesight is to be shorn of full-fledged membership in society. The difference between the denotative and connotative meanings of blindness is exactly that between disability and handicap. Disability refers to a physical deprivation; handicap to the social consequences of that deprivation. The distinction may be seen in the fact that there are many disabilities which carry little or no handicap, such as the chronic laryngitis of Andy Devine, the undersize of jockeys, or the oversize of basketball players. Likewise, there are handicaps with no disability, such as the black skin of American Negroes or the religion of the Jews in Nazi Germany. Disability is properly the concern of medical science. We can do little about the physical fact of blindness except to cure it or live with it. But it is not blindness alone that we live with. We live with the other people, which is to say we live in society. It is society which creates and imposes the handicap of blindness, for it consists of the misconceptions of the sighted about the nature of the physical disability. The principal misconception, the one that embodies and epitomizes all the rest, is that blindness means helplessness--social and economic incapacity; the destruction of the productive powers; the obliteration of the ability to contribute to or benefit from normal community participation; in short, the lingering image of the helpless blind man. Three comments about the social handicap of blindness are particularly in order: (1) To place responsibility for it upon the sighted is not to speak in terms of blame or recrimination. Far from it! The misconceptions are sanctioned by a society motivated mainly by benevolence, wishing above all else to be kind and helpful. (2) Wherever, as happens with increasing frequency, an individual blind person breaks through the social barriers, his success is likely to be attributed to his possession of special genius or compensatory powers either superhuman or supernatural which leave the overall image of blindness intact. (3) Public attitudes about the blind inevitably become the attitudes of the blind. The blind see themselves as others see them. They accept the public view of their limitations and thus do much to make them a reality. Most people exaggerate the physical and underemphasize the social aspect of blindness. Our distinguished and able chairman, Father Carroll, has defined blindness in terms of twenty lacks and losses. I am one of Father Carroll's numerous admirers. But I admire him more for his willingness to prepare a list than for the list he has prepared. It seems to me that he falls prey to the common fallacy. Note what a large percentage of the items on the list refers to the physical fact of blindness and its immediate physical and personal consequences; what a small percentage refers to the broadly social. What may be known hereafter as Father Carroll's Lacks and Losses reads as follows: 1) loss of physical integrity; 2) loss of confidence in the remaining senses; 3) loss of reality contact; 4) loss of visual background; 5) loss of "light"; 6) loss of mobility; 7) loss of visual perception: beautiful; 8) loss of visual perception: pleasurable; 9) loss of ease of written communication; 10) loss of ease of spoken communication; 11) loss of means for informational progress; 12) loss of recreation; 13) loss of technique, daily living; 14) loss of career: vocation; goal; job opportunity; 15) loss of financial security; 16) loss of personal independence; 17) loss of social adequacy; 18) loss of obscurity, anonymity; 19) loss of self-esteem; 20) loss of total personality organization. I would not have you believe that I under-assess the importance of the physical disability. Without sight, the range of perception is narrowed. Objects which can be seen from afar must be near at hand to be discernible by other senses. And the blind person who has not scuffed his shins on low-lying implements and toys carelessly left on the sidewalk or stumbled over a curb, or bumped his head on an overhanging awning or branch has never left his armchair. These are undeniably embarrassing or uncomfortable experiences; but they are properly to be classified as minor annoyances or distractive nuisances like shaving in the morning or removing your glass eyes at night. In my experience, blind people who are willing to move and put one foot out in front of the other always somehow get where they want to go. In any event, the main point is that the real affliction of blindness is not the physical disability or its immediate consequences but the social handicap. It therefore becomes most important to analyze the precise nature of the handicap. Of what does it consist? What are the elements which compose it? What does it mean to be excluded from society? What are the rights of membership of which the blind are thus deprived? To answer these questions one must identify the main features of American society, for it is denial of participation in these which constitutes the handicap of blindness. The process of answering the questions therefore is one of re-surveying American social and political thought and constitution ideals, one of restating the principles, doctrines, and concepts that are contained therein. The task of restating American social and political assumptions and goals is complicated by a number of facts and factors. Major American social and political principles, such as the dignity of the individual, liberty, equality, and private property, are so intermingled and overlapping that it is difficult to separate any one of them out for single treatment. Emphasis on the various elements has shifted at different periods in our history, in the documents which have embodied and expressed different movements, forces, and times, and among the prominent political writers and speakers. Equality was the dominant note in the Declaration of Independence. Property assumed relatively a stronger position in the Constitution. During the nineteenth century when fortune and geography gave the nation military safety, and free land and the open frontier gave individuals a sense of economic safety, security was assumed and liberty was elevated into a primary position. Today, as Ralph Henry Gabriel writes, "When the traditional foundations of culture crumble, ... when government by law gives way to government by irresponsible force, the preoccupation with liberty as an end in itself is replaced by a new search for security, mental, social, economic, and even physical."1 Sometimes, indeed, going far beyond mere shifts in emphasis, the elements are presented as irreconcilably contradictory. Read for example this passage from William Graham Sumner: "Let it be understood that we cannot go outside this alternative: liberty, inequality, survival of the fittest; non-liberty, equality, survival of the unfittest. The former carries society upwards and favors all of its best members; the latter carries society downwards and favors all its worst members."2 Finally, the task of stating American social and political principles is made difficult by the fact that they are not fixed and immutable as the laws of the Medes and the Persians were reputed to be. To the extent that they are a living reality in a developing democracy, they are constantly growing, maturing, and changing. Every generation, every decade is a formative period in the constitutional life of the nation. In our generation, the creative interpretation and application of American social and political principles in the sphere of international organization and in the social and economic sphere are in process. Yet, despite these difficulties in stating them, the major elements in the set of widely accepted and persistently enduring political principles and social ethics are identifiable and subject to description and characterization. The "easily remembered" formulations can be found in the landmark documents of our history. These documents not only express and embody movements and periods of the past but are as well basic forces of government in the present and for the future. They include the Declaration of Independence, the Northwest Ordinance, the Preamble to the United States Constitution, the state constitutions, the Civil War amendments to the United States Constitution, and the more famous pronouncements of the United States Supreme Court. 1. Liberty. In American political thought, liberty has many aspects and sources. It is both positive and negative. It is political, economic, personal, and, in a broad sense, social. It is founded by some in positivism; by others, in natural law; by still others in moral law. It sets in equilibrium constitutionalism and democracy. In part, liberty consists in protection against the will of the majority, no matter how regularly manifested and how lacking in oppressiveness or arbitrariness. In this aspect, it is embodied in an array of restraints on governmental action and the organized power of society. The existence of a constitutionally arranged governmental structure and distribution of powers, in fact, the existence of a constitution at all implies a system of limited government. The Constitution, too, contains many explicit prohibitions on government. Though some exist elsewhere in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the other amendments are, of course, a catalogue of these. Among them are the protection given life, liberty, and property, the requirement of established and regular procedures by government, and the guarantee of immunity from unreasonable intrusions into the privacy of one's person, house, papers, and effects. The many safeguards against improper conviction for crime refer not only to the technical aspects of criminal justice, but bespeak the basic right of personal freedom, i.e., freedom to move about as one pleases and to be not subject to surveillance and custodialization by the agents of the state. Likewise, freedom from slavery and peonage is decreed, implying not only self-ownership but free labor and the right to the rewards of labor. A dominant part of American social and political thought has always been a notion that these rights, thus fixed in the Constitution, are the indivestible possessions of individuals even when not so guaranteed. Whether derived from natural law, moral law, higher law, or various other concepts about the fundamental nature of man and society, this notion has found constant expression throughout our history. Its standard formulation is in the Declaration of Independence: "[T]hat [men] are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." These rights governments were instituted to secure and protect, not to create and confer.3 The conception that rights which are regarded as very important are somehow natural rights or derive from a higher law results from a philosophic view which has lost much of its persuasion and support in recent decades. The Founding Fathers, however, and most American statesmen down through the Civil War period, made it their starting point. Natural rights thus became inextricably woven into the fabric of American social and political thought and popular belief. They lurk just below the surface of many of our State papers, judicial pronouncements, and political orations of today. Of those Americans who do not accept this particular philosophical conception most still insist upon the great importance and basic character of the rights proclaimed. So far, I have spoken of the constitutional side of constitutional democracy. The democracy side is a positive aspect of liberty. It has to do with the individual's right to participate in government, in the determination of social direction and policy. Its foundation is the doctrine of popular sovereignty and the consent of the governed. Its implementations are the right of suffrage, the right to seek and hold office, and the right of the majority to rule. Its indispensable conditions are freedom of speech, press, and assembly.4 Liberty is positive in another phase besides that of the co-sovereignty of citizens of a republic. Government is responsible for the protection of the rights of the individual. This cannot be wholly achieved by the government itself refraining from invading them. It must prevent others from invading them. It must eliminate and control the conditions which nullify them or make their exercise impossible. It must foster, promote, establish, and maintain the conditions which make their exercise possible and significant. This is especially true if the right is active rather than passive; if it involves doing and not just being; acquiring and not just having; speaking and not just listening. Congress, as Webster declared in his famous debate with Hayne, is under an obligation to exercise the powers delegated to it in the Constitution for the purpose of achieving the objectives set forth in the Preamble of the Constitution--to "establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity....."5 Men have a right to live, to personal freedom and personal security. They have the right to marry, have and rear children, and to maintain a home.6 They have a right, so far as government can assure it, to that fair opportunity to earn a livelihood which will make these other rights possible and significant.7 Men may not be bound to the place of their poverty and misfortune; they may move freely about the country in search of new opportunity.8 They have a right freely to choose their field of endeavor, unhindered by arbitrary, artificial and man-made impediments.9 They have a right to enter the common trades, callings, and occupations of the community. They have the right, if they are free, to manage their own affairs as they see fit, unless and until there is interference with the equal rights of others to manage their affairs or there is injury to the welfare of the community. "It is not enough," wrote the President's Committee on Civil Rights in 1947, "that full and equal membership in society entitles the individual to an equal voice in the control of his government; it must also give him the right to enjoy the benefits of society and to contribute to its progress.... Without this equality of opportunity, the individual is deprived of the chance to develop his potentialities and to share the fruits of society. The group also suffers through the loss of the contributions which might have been made by persons excluded from the main channels of social and economic activity." 2. The Dignity of Man. Deeply imbedded in this conception of liberty is a democratic view of the individual, of his role in society, relation to the state, essential dignity and worth. It is the individual who possesses rights which are fundamental and inalienable. He is at the beginning and the end of the State. He organizes it and gives it authority. Its powers are conferred to protect his rights and to assure the conditions necessary for their maximum expression. The State exists for his benefit, not he for its. "In democratic society," wrote Charles Merriam, "regard for the dignity of man stands behind the throne of public order, a constant reminder of the need for liberty and justice as well as order, a constant plea that the human personality shall not be forgotten in the multiplications of laws, in the ramifications of administration or in the antiquarianism of formal justice."10 Democracy breathes respect for all men and seeks to preserve their individuality and autonomy. This spirit is violated wherever men are alienated or sheltered from the mainstream: not only in the overt gestures of rejection but in the sentimental embrace of patronage and protection. Humanity is degraded and individuality disparaged by treatment of the person as a unit in a category determined by irrelevant traits, defined and measured not in unique terms of personal character and achievement but in the stereotype terms of physical, or national, or racial difference. 3. The Rights to Property and to Contract. The rights to property and contract have likewise been regarded as fundamental in the American system. The right to property along with life and liberty is listed as one of the three great rights of all free men in Chapter 39 of the Magna Charta. It appears thus also in the American State Constitutions, early and late, in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, in the United States Constitution, Amendments V and XIV and elsewhere.11 The rights to liberty, property, and contract are interlocking if not interchangeable concepts, The right to contract is sometimes stated as an incident to the right to property; sometimes as an independent aspect of liberty. Property is described by some as sufficiently broad to incorporate all other rights of individuals, including liberty; and liberty is often regarded by others as broad enough to encompass the right to acquire, use, and enjoy property. The three rights of liberty, property, and contract are thus intimately associated in American thinking.12 Property and contract rights are not unlimited; but on the contrary, are subject to public control in the public interests. They may be abridged, and, in some cases, destroyed altogether, if that is necessary to protect the community against injury or danger in any form, against fraud, or vice, or economic oppression, or serious public inconvenience, or depression, or other disasters. The power to control is coextensive with the social and economic activities of men. It finds its limit in the nature of the acts forbidden or required and its justification in the direct relation of these acts to the public welfare or to the equal property rights of others. The power of the State over property and contract rights, however, is not merely negative or incidental to the power to legislate for the health, safety, morals, and general welfare of the community. The basic character of the right and the purpose of government regarding it cannot be minimized or ignored. That purpose, as in the case of liberty, is to protect and preserve, maintain, and nurture the right. The power to regulate the use of property and contract, consequently, may not, save in very rare and special circumstances, be converted into the power directly to take property and contract rights. And in discharging its primary and affirmative duty with respect to these rights, the State must keep constantly in view the essential values of private property in our system. It is a central factor in the organization of society. It is an impelling source of motivation. It is a principal incentive for productive activity. It is a reward for labor and contribution. It is at once the object of individual enterprise and success and the means of achieving success. And contract is the form of expression and governing instrument, not only of most business activity, but as well of most of the transactions of daily life. 4. Equality. Only second to liberty itself in our history has been the ideal of equality. In fact, equality has always conditioned liberty and determined its character just as liberty has always conditioned equality and determined its character. In the Declaration of Independence, the first of the "self-evident truths" is that all men are created equal; and all men are equally "endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Alexis de Tocqueville, in 1835, described equality in America as "the fundamental fact from which all others seem to be derived and the central point at which all my observations constantly terminated." In his view, it gave "a peculiar direction to public opinion and a peculiar tenor to the laws; it imparts new maxims to the governing authorities and peculiar habits to the governed." It "extends far beyond the political character and the laws of the country, and... has no less effect on civil society than on the government; it creates opinions, gives birth to new sentiments, founds novel customs, and modifies whatever it does not produce."13 Equality, even more than liberty, stood in the forefront of the historic struggle in the nation to abolish property in man and the institution of slavery; and, along with liberty, emerged in the Civil War amendments to the Constitution. The Thirteenth Amendment, freeing men from slavery and nationalizing the right of freedom, nationally guaranteed what slavery denied: the equal right of all to enjoy protection in those natural rights which constitute freedom. The Fourteenth Amendment, in the three redundant clauses of Section I, re-embodied these same objectives and added an explicit guarantee of the equal protection of the laws, thereby adding another confirmatory reference to the self-evident truth that all men are created equal and are equally entitled to the protection of government in the enjoyment of their natural and inalienable rights.14 Like liberty, equality has many phases. One of them relates to the doctrine of proper classification. The laws must be aimed at the achievement of a public and constitutional purpose. They may not be motivated by hatred, vengeance, favoritism, or private gain. Legislation framed with a discriminatory purpose, manifesting "an evil eye and an unequal hand" contains an elementary antagonism to the idea of the equality of men. Once legislation is endowed with a public and constitutional purpose, it still must meet other tests. Because there are real differences among men, regulation would be altogether ineffective if it had to apply to all or none. The law must therefore be selective. But to be equal, it must treat all those similarly situated alike. The differences between men that underlie selection must be real differences and must bear an intimate relationship to the purpose of the law and valid social goals. All other differences are irrelevant and must be ignored. "Class Legislation," said Justice Field in summing up this doctrine, "discriminating against some and favoring others, is prohibited, but legislation which, in carrying out a public purpose, is limited in its application, if within the sphere of its operation it affects alike all persons similarly situated, is not within the amendment."15 Another phase of the idea of equality is the rule of law. If all men are created equal and equally possess certain rights, and if governments are instituted to secure and maintain those rights, and men therefore are equally entitled to such protection, the protection can only be afforded by uniform rule, that is, by law. One way of putting this is the expression "Equality before the Law." Another way is in the celebrated words of the Massachusetts Bill of Rights: "That the government of the Commonwealth may be a government of laws and not of men" Thus, in this aspect, the doctrine of equality is in effect a command that the government act by established and regular procedures and by uniform rules. It is a command that the purely personal, the arbitrary, capricious and whimsical, be reduced and eliminated from the exercise of power. It is a command that the rules be fixed and announced in advance in a way which will make them freely and publicly available. It is a requirement of a degree of certainty and predictability in government action and of a system of rights growing out of uniform rules. It is finally an order that administrators as well as legislators act within these confines. In still another phase, equality is not negative and procedural but positive and substantial. Anatole France referred to "the majestic equality of the laws which forbid rich and poor alike to sleep under the bridges, to beg in tile streets, and to steal their bread." But the demands of equality are not met by the equal treatment which results from the absence of the laws or from the indiscriminate application of the laws to those who are dissimilarly situated. Moreover, the demands of equality are not exhausted by the doctrine of classification and the rule of law. The equal protection of the laws refers to the quality of the laws as well as to the mechanics of their operation. The reign of equal laws involves as well the reign of just laws, and the maintenance of equality in the enjoyment of rights is at the heart of the system of justice. Equality thus must be the very purpose of governmental action and policy as well as a test and measure of its means. It must "give direction to public opinion," determine "the tenor of the laws, impart "maxims to the governing authorities," and modify "whatever it does not produce." Particularly is the government under a duty to guarantee equality of opportunity. Without that, freedom itself cannot last and becomes an illusion. The only aristocracy that a system founded upon equality can tolerate is an aristocracy of personal merit and achievement. Uniformity and regimentation, on the one hand, and status, influence, and power based on birth, social position, or inheritance on the other hand, are equally incompatible with equality. Equality of all men presupposes respect for the rights of others. In a society of equals, therefore, men are free to be different. All limitations on opportunity, all restrictions on the individual based on irrelevant differences of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, and the like, are in conflict with equality and must be removed and forbidden. Access to the mainstreams of community life, the aspirations and achievements of each member of society, are to be limited only by the skills, energy, talents, and ability he brings to the opportunities equally open to all Americans. From what I have said so far, a number of propositions emerge: (1) Preferential treatment of the blind based on favoritism, privilege, whim, prejudice, patronage, pity, charity, self-interest of others, or feelings of like or dislike, cannot be justified and indeed does a great deal of harm. On the other hand, preferential treatment which takes account of the special qualities or needs of the blind or aspects of their situation not shared by others, which is aimed at a desirable social objective and which employs proper means properly adapted to this purpose is not only justifiable preferential treatment but is treatment which should be at the foundation of all public and private policy toward the blind. (2) Blindness has a dual aspect: the physical and the social. The first is the disability; the second is the handicap. Treatment of the disability is a medical task. Overcoming the handicap is the function of rehabilitation. (3) The handicap consists mainly of the misconceptions of the sighted about the physical disability which result in social exclusion. In all but the physical sense, and even to some extent in that, it consists of a loss of full membership in society; a denial to the blind of the rights and goals which others share--liberty, equality, property, dignity. (4) Overcoming the handicap of blindness, therefore, means removing the bars, exclusion, and denials of which the handicap consists: conferring on the blind the title deeds of social freedom and membership; the rights of liberty, equality, property, and dignity; in short, their reintegration into society. (5) Programs which address themselves to this purpose or which move in this direction, while they necessarily involve preferential treatment, meet all the tests and standards set up for good policy. Such special arrangements might better go by the name of equal treatment. Indeed, to lift from the backs of the blind the special, heavy, and unnecessary burdens which society has caused them to bear and to call this preferential treatment can hardly be regarded as anything but the bitterest irony. Programs which move in the opposite direction, which accept and build upon the public misconceptions about the nature of the physical disability, which presuppose the incapacity and abnormality of the blind and which institutionalize that presupposition in segregation and custodialization--all programs, in other words, which continue or intensify social exclusion or which are motivated by patronage, charity, whim, prejudice, or self-interest involve preferential or special treatment which increases the handicap. They perpetuate the very attitudes and conditions which they should be designed to prevent. (6) Preferential treatment is also justified which: (a) tends to ameliorate the immediate physical consequences of the physical disability of blindness; or (b) pending the day when integration has been achieved, mitigates the financial and other consequences of social exclusion or offsets the disadvantage resulting therefrom by means which do not further entrench the public misconception or which do so as little as possible. (7) To be consistent with the standards dictated by the basic principles of our social, political, and constitutional system, programs for the blind must: (a) Allow the blind to manage their own personal affairs and proceed on the assumption that they are capable of doing so. (b) Not only permit the blind, but stimulate and encourage them to develop their potentialities, share in the fruits of society, and contribute to its work and progress. (c) And to do this, not only permit, but stimulate and encourage the blind to work, to engage in individual enterprise, to exercise free judgment and free movement in the search for opportunity, freely to choose their fields of endeavor and to enter the common callings, trades, occupations, and professions of the community. (d) To stimulate and encourage the blind to do these things by relying on the normal incentives, principal among which are financial remuneration and the improvement of one's economic lot and social status. (e) Permit, stimulate, and encourage the blind to acquire, enjoy, and use property, real and personal, not just for immediate consumption purposes but as a motivational source of endeavor and a means of economic improvement. (f) Protect the essential dignity of the individual: by recognizing the worth of the human personality and treating it as a community asset rather than a community liability; by supplying aids and services without humiliation, without undue intrusion into the privacy of the recipient, without imposing upon him the badges and indicia of a needy and special status, without subjecting him to the personal judgments of social workers influenced by humanity, charity, approval, or other emotions; by making possible a standard and circumstance of living not conspicuously different from that enjoyed by the rest of the community; by leaving recipients free to make their own decisions as to spending, living arrangements, and personal matters. (g) If the demands of equality are to be met, public financial aid must be granted as a matter of right, the element of personal discretion exercised by administrators and welfare workers must be eliminated, the amount and conditions of the aid must be specified in uniform rules made accessible to recipients and prospective recipients and sufficiently exact so that recipients may determine to what they are entitled and what their responsibilities are. Legislative and administrative standards must be established which are uniformly applied, which treat all welfare recipients alike who are similarly situated with respect to a valid purpose of the welfare law, and which vary the amount and the condition of the grant when there are real differences among recipients in terms of their relationship to the welfare program. Finally, equality requires--as does liberty, the dignity of the individual and the essential notion of property--that the purpose of the welfare law be opportunity as well as security. Relief rolls should provide relief; but they must also provide the means of escape from them. Reintegration into society through open and equal access to the mainstream of community productive activity must be an object of welfare law and a measure of its adaptation if the fundamental political and constitutional principles of our system are to be honored in the fact as well as held out in the promise. Measured by these standards, evaluated in the light of these considerations, how do our programs and provisions for the blind prove out? The answer must be mixed. Some programs are well-adapted to these principles; others poorly; and still others are in flat contradiction of them. Unfortunately, some of the most important programs fall into the latter two categories. The rapidly growing and recently created system of orientation and adjustment centers--focusing on mobility training, personal care, prevocational manual skills, and the development of attitudes which make these other activities possible and fruitful-are properly oriented and adjusted to reduce the immediate physical consequences of the disability of blindness, to uproot the conviction of incompetence, and to impart self-confidence, hope, and a zest for living. The home teacher system, though hampered by the need to deal with the blind person in his home and then only in occasional short visits, substantially moves in the same direction as the orientation center. It is most effective when used as a case-finder for the center and otherwise works in close collaboration with it. It is least effective when it emphasizes handicraft as mere busy work or when it teaches Braille to clients who will never have any use for it. White Cane laws, now enacted in almost all the states, by giving the blind a legal position in traffic and moderating the discriminatory harshness of the contributory negligence rule, make meaningful for the blind the human and constitutional right of free movement, just as the cane itself makes more meaningful the physical capacity of free movement. What about good vision requirements established in many laws and regulations dealing with jobs, licenses, and the like? Some of these are, of course, perfectly in order. Where sight is indispensable to the performance of the task--as in hunting with a gun, driving a truck, or working as a photographer of wildlife for the National Park Service--the blind are legitimately excluded. Where sight is not indispensable, as is the case in thousands of jobs public and private from which the blind are now barred--the continued exclusion of the blind can have no special justification. In many of these cases, the bars remain up because those who tend them have only their misconceptions to guide them. Laws and regulations giving preference to blind persons with respect to jobs are not mere favoritism if they are based on the special qualifications of the blind to perform the tasks assigned. This is clearly so when the blind are called upon to work in or administer programs affecting the blind. In that circumstance, blindness is an enabling asset endowing the worker with special knowledge, experience, and the confidence of his clients which probably cannot be secured in any other way than by being blind. Of course this enabling asset should be given determinative weight only when other things are equal. For the blind to be given preference in other situations in which blindness does not contribute to the ability to do the work would be as unjustifiable as to discriminate against the blind in jobs in which blindness does not detract from the ability to do the work. What about vending stands for which the blind are given rent-free locations on public property, in connection with the establishment of which they are given a preference and protection against vending machine competition, and with respect to the operation of which blindness is not an enabling asset? These special arrangements will not withstand merited criticism once the blind have achieved a footing of complete economic equality. Until that time arrives, however, the vending stand program is preferential treatment which is justified as a small offset to almost universal economic discrimination against the blind; and one in which bona fide jobs are provided for qualified blind workers at comparatively negligible cost to the public; and one in which the blind are presented to the public in an aspect of competence and normality. If the management of the vending stand programs is to be consistent with the standards above discussed, it must keep supervision and control at an absolute minimum; allow the operator to purchase his stand and equipment with only an option to repurchase by the public; give the operator complete independence in the management of his business affairs retaining only the power to revoke the license if the operator proves incompetent or becomes publicly obnoxious; protect the operator's profits against confiscation for the support of supervisory personnel or sub-marginal stands which the administrators have mistakenly established in unprofitable locations. The control system, on the contrary, reflects the custodial attitude toward the role and abilities of the blind, a conviction that the blind are incapable of running their own businesses and incompetent to lead their own lives Let us turn next to public assistance. Liberty in the direction of one's affairs, the whole basic principle of self-management, is violated by the means test. Under it, the individual recipient soon loses control of his daily activities and the whole course and direction of his life. The capacity for self-direction presently atrophies and drops away. With each new item budgeted or eliminated, with each new resource tracked down and evaluated, the social worker's influence increases. This is an inevitable concomitant of the means test. It results from the nature and extent of the system. It is bred and nourished by the provisions of the statutes and the rules issued under them. It is in the flexible joints of the cumbersome machinery. It is in the detail and intimacy of the investigation. It is in the inescapable confinements of the budget. It is in the idleness defeatism, and waning spirit of the recipient. Whatever the social worker's wishes and intentions, her hand becomes the agency of direction in his affairs. The "concern of assistance with the whole range of income," wrote Karl DeSchweinitz, "always contains a threat to the freedom of the individual. Even when there is no conscious intent to dictate behavior to the beneficiary, the pervasive power of money dispensed under the means test may cause the slightest suggestion to have the effects of compulsion `Whose bread I eat, his song I sing.'"16 Not only is liberty violated by the means test but so also are dignity and equality--and for many of the same reasons. Dignity is jeopardized by the initial financial investigation, by the searching inquiry into every intimate detail of need, living habits, family relations, by the setting up of a detailed budget of expenditures subject to repeated examination and review, by the continuously implied and often explicit threat that if behavior is uncooperative or unapproved, aid will be reduced or stopped, by the wholesale substitution of agency and social worker controls for the personal direction of personal affairs, by the unwarrantable intrusions into privacy involved in each of the foregoing and the galling humiliation of the whole process, and, finally, by the constant tendency of the whole system to push living standards down below a minimum of decency and health. The excessive individualization of the whole design and process of means test aid is fundamentally antithetical to the idea of equality. A system which makes so much depend upon a minute examination of every aspect of the individual's situation necessarily involves personalized judgments by officials and invites arbitrary and whimsical exercises of power, prevents the enforcement of a uniform rule even when the legislative provisions and administrative regulations are detailed and exact, renders it impossible for the recipient himself to determine to what he is entitled, constitutes the very thing intended to be prevented by the idea of "a government of laws and not of men," and flies in the face of basic requirements of proper classification. Since with respect to the purposes of public assistance law most individuals are parts of groups standing in the same relationship, those who are similarly situated are not treated alike and real differences are frequently disregarded. Means test aid also violates the notion of individual opportunity, access to the mainstream of community productive activity and normal incentives. Since means test aid requires that all income and resources of the recipient be applied to meet his current needs, and since the public assistance grant is reduced by the amount of any such available income or resources, the usual financial motive for effort and endeavor is removed from the recipient unless the recipient can gain enough and with sufficient certainty to be independent of the relief rolls. Granting aid as a matter of right contradicts practically all of the tendencies inherent in the means test and produces a system more consonant with the political and constitutional assumptions and goals of American democracy. Aid as a matter of right requires the establishment of fixed and uniform rules specifying the terms and conditions of the grant. Thus the principal features of the system must be laid down by the legislature. This contrasts with the means test variable grant, based on individual need individually determined by the administrative agency under discretionary authority conferred by the legislature. Those who are similarly situated are therefore necessarily treated alike and under standards comparable with those governing assistance to other groups in the community. Granting aid as a matter of right protects the liberty of the individual to manage his own affairs and conduct his daily life free of authoritarian controls and caseworker supervision. It protects the dignity of the individual. He is treated as a member of a class entitled to be dealt with in a manner determined by law, not by individualized administrative discretion. The occasion is eliminated for invasion of the individual's privacy, supervision of his personal behavior, and humiliating probing into the intimacies of his life; and a seminal principle is established which stands as a barrier to all such actions. Finally, rehabilitation. The primary task of vocational rehabilitation, as I have said, is the overcoming of the social handicap--not the physical condition. It consists in the creation of an environment within society, within public programs, and within the blind themselves, which will be in the fullest sense conducive to normal livelihood and normal life. It involves opening up the channels of social participation, that is, enabling the blind to enjoy the benefits of socially determined standards of liberty, equality, property, and dignity. Its time-tested tools are vocational orientation, vocational training, counseling, and guidance which stimulates and opens up horizons--and finally, of course, placement in remunerative employment in the common callings, trades, pursuits, and professions of the community. In the proper conceptions of its function as well as in the use of these time-tested tools, the vocational rehabilitation program of the United States must in large measure be pronounced a failure. The hope and opportunity are to be measured in miles; the actual accomplishment must be measured in inches. Rehabilitation so far as the individual rehabilitant is concerned is a complex process in which mental and emotional elements are predominant. It involves myriad adaptations not merely physical in nature but social and psychological. In effect, the entire personality must undergo reconstruction; the blind person's conviction of his own incompetence accepted from the public misconception must be uprooted; a rebirth, a new act of creation must be wrought. In this process, ambition, hope, and self-reliance are essential ingredients. Consequently, rehabilitation by the command of the counselor, or submission to his attitudes and preferences, or by the coercion which results from conditioning public assistance upon it is a contradiction. It is therefore futile. It is as futile as ordering a person to restore his emotional balance while adding to the very factors which cause the unbalance. Since the objective of rehabilitation is restoration to a normal useful role in society, the standards of success are in large measure culturally determined. The rehabilitated person, thus, is one for whom the assumptions and goals of the community have become as significant as for others, who has in fact achieved equal opportunity to enter the calling of his choice, to acquire, use, and dispose of property, to exercise the right of personal independence, and to operate on the other assumptions and principles before listed. Just as the habits of freedom are not learned by experiencing slavery, so ambition is not learned by destitution, self-management by authoritarian controls, incentive by denying the hope of gain, or self-respect by second-class citizenship. Rehabilitation by command or coercion cultivates the very traits which frustrate and prevent rehabilitation. A rehabilitation program which continually impresses upon the client a sense of his helplessness and dependency, which enshrouds him in an atmosphere of disbelief, doubt, and defeatism, and which exhibits attitudes of guardianship and custodialism, must inevitably sap the fibre of self-reliance, undermine hope, deter self-improvement, and destroy the very initiative which is indispensable to rehabilitation. Rehabilitation by stimulation, by opening up new horizons, by assisting the client in the achievement of goals of his own choice, by incentives carefully planned to encourage productive activity by the expectation of normal rewards--retention of earnings, improvement of standards of living, accumulation of real and personal property--places rehabilitative effort in conformity with the political assumptions, economic impulses and behavioral standards imposed by democratic thought and current social knowledge. Optimistic and skillful counseling, built on personal experience with the handicap and its problems, is required to accomplish this delicate work. Under the present program such counseling has not been supplied. On the contrary, too often rehabilitation officers have themselves subscribed to the conviction of the incompetence of the blind. Little has been done under the present program to halt the tendency of shunting the disabled into a limited series of stereotyped occupations, to provide a staff which will have and exhibit full confidence in the blind, and which will aid the blind to enter fields of their own choosing. Little has been done under the present program to strengthen placement as an inescapable function of the rehabilitation agency. For the blind this is the arduous culmination of a long and arduous process. It cannot be accomplished by automatic referral to employers. It can only be accomplished by the application of highly specialized and individualized techniques of affirmative contact with employers, aggressive seeking of employment opportunities, personal demonstration, and follow-up. Little is done under the present program to remove the obstructions to employment of the physically handicapped which exist in the public mind, in the statutes, ordinances, administrative rulings, judicial decisions, and institutional practices. Above all, the true nature of handicap and the elements which compose it, particularly the social and the psychological as distinguished from the physical and medical elements; the proper functions and goals of rehabilitation; the relationship of disability of dependency, especially economic dependency; the part presently played and properly to be played by public financial aid under social insurance and public assistance in the process of rehabilitation; the determinative character of the reintegrative objective and the bearing upon it of liberty, equality, property, and dignity--these basic and urgently pressing questions have never been sufficiently analyzed by the responsible officials in Vocational Rehabilitation. Until this whole pattern is changed, until a great deal is done to reorient the training and functions of rehabilitation workers, to strengthen guidance and counseling services, to improve techniques and focus rehabilitation attention on the placement of rehabilitants in competitive employment, and to remove legal, administrative, and other obstacles to the employment of the blind in the public service, the trades, professions, and common callings of the community--until that happy day rehabilitation of the blind is likely to continue to be measured in inches and not in miles. Americans are familiar with the unhappy divergence between creed and conduct in many phases of our national life. Myrdal's observation of the disparity between social equality as a cherished political norm and our unequal treatment of the Negro is but one instance of a pattern that is all too pervasive. The field of blind welfare provides another, one which has been less noticed but is not less conspicuous or significant. FOOTNOTES 1. Gabriel, THE COURSE OF AMERICAN DEMOCRATIC THOUGHT 22 (1940). 2. Sumner, THE CHALLENGE OF FACTS AND OTHER ESSAYS 25 (Keller ed. 1914). 3. For illustrative statements of this doctrine see, Johnson and Graham's Lessee v. McIntosh, 8 Wheat 543, 572 (U.S. 1823); Story, MISC. WRITINGS 74 (1835); Justice Matthews in Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 U.S. 356 (1886); Justice Cardozo in Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U.S. 319, 325, 328 (1937); see also Justice Murphy dissenting in Yamashita v. Styer 327 U.S. 1, 26 (1946). 4. Winston Churchill speaking at Fulton, Missouri, March 1946. 5. Under the general power of the states, often called the "police power," wrote Justice Barbour in City of New York v. Miln, 11 Pet. 102, 139 (U.S. 1837), "[I]t is not only the right, but the bounden and solemn duty of a State to advance the safety, happiness and prosperity of its people, and to provide for its general welfare..." Said Justice Field in Barbier v. Connolly 113 U.S. 27, 31 (1884), "[N]either the [14th] amendment--broad and comprehensive as it is--nor any other amendment, was designed to interfere with the power of the state ... to prescribe regulations to promote the health, peace, morals, education, and good order of the people, and to legislate so as to increase the industries of the state, develop its resources, and add to its wealth and prosperity." 6. See Meyer v. Nebraska, 263 U.S. 390, 399 (1923). 7. Truax v. Raich, 239 U.S. 33, 41 (1915). Justice Hughes there said, "It requires no argument to show that the right to work for a living in the common occupations of the community is of the very essence of the personal freedom and opportunity that it was the purpose of the amendment [14th] to secure." 8. Edwards v. California, 314 U.S. 160 (1941). 9. Truax v. Raich supra note 7; Allgeyer v. Louisiana, 165 U.S. 578 (1897). 10. Merriam, THE NEW DEMOCRACY AND THE NEW DESPOTISM 84-85(1939). 11. Justice Chase in Calder v. Bull 3 Dall. 386 (1798); Chancellor Kent, 2 KENT. COMM. 1 (1827). 12. Braceville Coal Co. v. People 147 Ill. 66 (1893). 13. DeTocqueville, DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA 3 (1945 ed.). 14. tenBroek, ANTISLAVERY ORIGINS OF THE FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT (1951). 15. Barbier v. Connolly 113 U.S. 27 (1885). 16. DeSchweinitz, PEOPLE AND PROCESS IN SOCIAL SECURITY 56-57 (1948). KENNETH JERNIGAN LIBRARY FOR BLIND CHILDREN A Division of American Action Fund for Blind Children and Adults 18440 Oxnard Street Tarzana, California 91356 ******APPLICATION FOR LIBRARY SERVICES****** Applicant's Name_(PRINT)_________________________________________ Mailing Address_(PRINT)__________________________________________ City, State, Zip_(PRINT)_________________________________________ If applicant is a minor, please name parent or guardian _________________________________________________________________ The books offered by the KENNETH JERNIGAN LIBRARY are available in the following Grade levels: CHECK The Grade Level Of The Books You Desire. Pre-School Kindergarten Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6 Grade 7 Grade 8 (young adult) Is subscriber... BLIND ADULT?__________ BLIND CHILD?__________ Birthdate of Child________ PLEASE READ THE BACK OF THIS APPLICATION Agreement Covering Library Services. 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