Latest / The Eko Lens Podcast / Foundation for Blind Children
Transcript
- speaker-0: Welcome to the Echo Lens, the podcast where we view assistive technology through the eyes of lived experience. I'm your host, Kinesha, and each week we explore how dignity, design, and innovation intersect with empowering blind and low vision communities. We're not just reviewing tech, we're refraining it. And this is a space for truth telling, for honoring voices that often go unheard, and for challenging the industry to do better. Whether you're a developer, a user, or someone who simply believes in equity, you're in the right place. So this is the ECHO lens. Let's take a closer look. So today we have Julie and Julie is a mission-driven nonprofit leader with a history in developing successful programs. Julie has a passion for developing high performance teams, fostering an excellence oriented culture, and is deeply committed to bettering the lives of individuals with as the vice president of programs, she provides a strategic direction for diverse ranges of initiatives from education and rehabilitation to employment and advocacy. Her prior role as a director of rehabilitation services, where she managed a team of 20 vision professionals allowed her to really establish a successful relationship with others. a successful relationship with government agencies, school districts, community partners, and her experience as a senior director at PRA Health Sciences equipped her with valuable leadership skills and expertise and operational initiatives and quality assurance. Julie, as a master's of science and urban sciences from the University of Nebraska School of Public Administration, as well as a bachelor of science in human development and family science with a focus on child, youth, and family studies. She grew up in a small farming town in Nebraska, but has made Phoenix her home for several years. Well, thanks, Julie, for coming on our podcast today. We're so excited to have you. So, Julie. speaker-1: Thank you for having me. speaker-0: Tell us a little bit about your connection to the low vision and blind community and how you got connected to this group of folks. speaker-1: Sure, I am vice president of programs at Foundation for Blind Children. Foundation for Blind Children is an organization in Arizona. We've been around since 1952. We were founded by parents who wanted their children who had, who were blind or low vision to live at home and to attend their schools and grow up in their local communities at that time. In the 50s, the only opportunity for students with visual impairments or who were blind were to relocate to Tucson to the state school for the deaf and blind. And for a lot of families, they said, that's not what we want. And so those families created FBC. And since that time, you know, we have been, I think, North Star for people in Arizona to come and receive services, education and support. And we have everything from our early intervention programming to school-based services to adult programming. We serve all of Arizona. We partner with school districts, with families, community agencies. Our mission and our goal is that we want to provide education tools and resources to individuals with vision loss so that they can have independence. I have been part of FBC for eight years and I had previously not been in the blind or low vision community. It was a new entry for me and I have learned so much about the community, about the disability community. Personal connection to vision loss. My mother has macular degeneration. She has had her retinas detached multiple times. And so for me, it has always been important to ensure that she would have access to doing all of the things that she does as an active older adult. She's just going to do them differently. speaker-0: I love that. are you, have you helped your mother in when it comes across for assistive technology and things like that from the work that you do? speaker-1: Yeah, I think for what I've done with my mom is I've shared with her that a lot of the ways that she can access information is using simple things that are on her iPhone, whether it's magnification or voiceover or talk to text or different apps like Be My Eyes. She has been fortunate that she's had very successful reattachment surgeries and her low vision is managed very well. But it's been really cool as a daughter to be able to share with her some of the professional learnings that I have that help support her journey. speaker-0: Yeah, and can you tell us a little bit about ⁓ the work that you're doing with the youth? Because we had a conversation about this a while ago when we were talking about, you know, we found y'all and reached out and wanted to hear more about the program and how we could help here at Echo Vision Foundation. What is some of that really cool work that you do with the youth? speaker-1: I mean, there's so many things that we do with our youth programs. We do everything from doing transition age camps in the summer, and these are supported through Arizona Vocational Rehabilitation. But really, at the core, they create community for our students that are ages 14 to 19, who oftentimes are the only kid in their school that is blind or low vision. And we're helping them master technology. We're helping them get ready to jump into college. We're working with them on their employment readiness so they can get that first part-time job. We are giving them opportunities to conquer maybe a fear that they have or a fear that the general public has. So we've done things like hike the Grand Canyon. We've done things like sail the Spanish Virgin Islands, swim Alcatraz. So. For us, it's important to give opportunities to students so that they can gain confidence in their life. And I think you'll find that students who go through those types of experiences and conquer them, they are really determined and successful in that next level of emerging leaders. And it's also to share with the community who doesn't maybe know a lot about people who are blind or visually impaired or maybe already have a bias about what a person who has blind or visually impaired can or cannot do. I love that we can showcase that, ⁓ you don't think that a person that's blind or visually impaired can fly a plane? Well, guess what? They can. And here's the way that they do it. They just do it a little bit differently. So those are the types of things that our young adult programs do. We also have recreation programs where students are getting together and they're going rock climbing or they're going on a hike or you know participating in running things like that. For us we want to give the students all of the opportunities to access different experiences whether that is something physical or being able to explore a monarch or put on the Ray-Ban glasses or doing all the things so that they have confidence and can make decisions in their lives of what's best for them. speaker-0: Yeah, that's so great. There was a lot of things that you said that you do with them that I've never experienced, Stephen. That's an, go hike the Grand Canyon and do all of that as my vision changes. My legal blindness is newer for me. I became legally blind in September. So I've been like learning how to, you know, do all these things that I haven't been able to do. I've had a vision issue for a couple of years, but yeah, it's been a... Definitely a different name, so I wish I would have had like access to some of this stuff at the start, right? speaker-1: Yeah, I think that's super important. think awareness is everything in terms of the supports and opportunities and services that are available in individuals' communities because those can define ⁓ how a person approaches the world with a higher level of confidence. speaker-0: So this sounds like, you know, we're trying to make everything as accessible as we can for the programs that you're providing, right? So what does the importance of the accessibility mean to you? So not just in tech, like these youth and young adult lives in general, like what does the accessibility part and providing that mean to you and mean to your agency? speaker-1: Well, I think accessibility can be everything from being able to have awareness and access to a program. So one of the things that I've always believed is that your zip code shouldn't dictate if you get quality services or that your zip code or where you live or whatever that looks like because you live in a rural place doesn't mean that you should get lesser services. And so for FBC, We want to make sure that in Arizona, it doesn't matter if you live in La Paz County, which is a smaller county in a rural area or Maricopa County where Phoenix is, you should be able to get the same type of quality services, tools, resources, and then access to experiences. And that's a very important thing. So I think it starts with awareness and then making sure that you have quality vision providers out in the field. As a teacher of students with visual impairments, I am not one, but I have teams of TVIs and their whole role in a child's journey is to ensure that they can access information in their school setting. And really what that means is a TVI isn't an expert in math per se, like they're not a math teacher, but they are going to figure out for that particular student, what is the best way that they can access their multiplication table? Or do they need to use a device called a math window? Or are they going to use an abacus to learn, you know, mathematical concepts? What does that look like? Tactile information. And then once the student has access, the subject matter expert teachers and the administrators are aware of what those services are or those supports are. And we can make those available and then the students can be shoulder to shoulder with their sighted peers. And that is a very important thing to make sure that, you know, getting access to Braille or large print or a magnifying device shouldn't be hard. so that's a very important role that FBC has is making sure that students get those resources. speaker-0: Wait, what's a math window? I've never heard of that. speaker-1: So there's an organization called the American Printing House for the Blind, an APH. They're based in Louisville, Kentucky, and they create all of these amazing devices and tools that teachers who train or who are teachers of students with visual impairments use with students and then give to students so that they can access information. So it could be something like, like a math window is specific to math and I don't know the logistics of how exactly a math window works, but for example, if you're working with a student and you're trying to train them on concepts of parallel lines or maybe as it relates to traveling with a white cane, you would use a game that's called Trex. And Trex is a really cool game that helps students understand spatial concepts. And so it's sometimes using fun. to teach a concept. And so our teachers are able to leverage these different tools, like a math window, like a Trex game, like a Wheatley board, to help students process information maybe more tactically. speaker-0: Yeah, I think so many listeners are going to be interested in that because those are things they probably have never, you know, never heard of asking for those type of assistive devices to be able to continue to learn and grow. I know of the American Printing House for the Blind and some of the things that they propose, but now I'm going to go on the website and see what I can get connected to. speaker-1: I think that there's these just hidden gems that are all around us. So APH, it's probably a plug for APH, but APH ⁓ has ⁓ a network of individuals who support the entire country. ⁓ There's a concept called the federal quota. The federal quota is how schools and students can get these types of devices or ⁓ assistive technology that are very expensive, right? Because vision is a low-incident disability. And so these are readily available to individuals that are in the K through 12 setting who have visual impairments. And they usually get access because their TBI gets them connected with something called an instructional resource center. It's a pretty elaborate concept. But I think what is important to know is that I think there is so much information out there. There are really great resources and tools for people to utilize. It's just awareness. speaker-0: The awareness piece for sure. I'm definitely going to be going down a little bit of that research for myself. speaker-1: That's a great one. speaker-0: Yeah. So what are some of the other things that y'all do at your agency to support blind and low vision folks? speaker-1: There's so many amazing things that we do. We have something called family education and support. We refer to it as FEZ. And what FEZ is, is it's a space for families to come together, maybe lean on each other. Maybe they'll have a guided discussion, a conversation about what might be next steps for their child who has a visual impairment, a place for families to connect, go out in the community, do things and see that. they're going to be able to go to the Children's Museum, they're going to be able to go to the zoo, even with a child with a visual impairment. They're just going to do it a little bit differently. We create their support groups. We have infant play groups. We provide ⁓ a lot of community events. most recently we just had an event called CaneQuest and CaneQuest is, how would I describe it? Kind of like... field day. And that's, think, the best way to describe it. So like in school, you participate in something called field day, where you do different obstacle courses and activities. For students who use a white cane, CaneQuest is that, that's their field day. So they are going through different scenarios to demonstrate all that they've learned in orientation and mobility, which is how students learn how to use a white cane. So We will do an event like that, have a fall festival where we bring all of our families together and they get a celebrate together and have a pumpkin patch and bob for apples. have a preschool, which we have approximately 50 students in our preschool and we have three campuses here in Phoenix. We have an elementary school that goes to fourth grade and districts will send their students here to get specialized instruction. We have itinerant services. That's where our providers go out in the community and work with school districts so that high schooler or a middle schooler that goes to their school in their neighborhood gets vision services. We have the transition programs, which I talked about, which are summer-based focused on independence and being career-ready. We have an adult program. ⁓ for individuals who are looking to go back to work after vision loss. We have a program for older retirees called New Horizons. We are the instructional resource center for the state of Arizona. We have all of the Braille, large print, and ⁓ resources that teachers of students with visual impairments need to work with their students. there's so many services. think for me, the way that I describe FPC is that place for education tools and resources that you can come into at any point in your vision loss journey. speaker-0: that so much. is it only available just to Arizona or is there access to some of those resources like someone outside of Arizona could maybe come to the website and see? speaker-1: Yeah, that's a great question. It's so Arizona is our community primarily serve Arizona. However, we do provide Braille and large print support to I think over 30 states in the country. if they don't have somebody Braille is is a code and and Braille is the key to literacy. So Braille Braille lists are they're not everywhere. It takes it takes a lot to learn. You have to get certified and in different levels. And so we are able to fulfill a lot of those needs because we have a really strong program of Brailus that will provide those resources. So we don't provide services per se out of the state because we want to make sure that our own backyard is served and Arizona is supported. However, There are organizations that we partner with across the country or that we have relationships with that do serve different populations. So like I was saying, the American Printing House for the Blind is an organization that we'll work with. We work or part of the Delta Gamma community. So there's different Delta Gamma schools across the country that provide maybe services for infants and toddlers. So, but yeah, I think. For us, Arizona is our community. speaker-0: it. I love it. So thinking about the future a little bit, what is something maybe that y'all have that you're working on that's coming up that you could maybe talk about or something that you hope for this next generation of youth and folks who are going through this experience? Like what is your hope for the assistive technology for them and Are y'all doing some like strategic planning to launch some new things in that space? speaker-1: That's a great question. You know, I would say in the space of assistive technology, I believe it's very important for clients, our adults, our teens, whoever they are, to be using things that are readily available to the degree that they can so that whether, you know, it's an app on your phone or... ⁓ you know, they're using NVDA or JAWS to make sure that they can access information at their work computer, whatever that looks like. We don't particularly, like, we don't develop anything. You know, there's nothing in the pipeline per se of, of we're creating this thing. But for us, it's about making sure that our providers are providing the best. They are informed with what's the next generation of the thing. So we have a really great group of assistive technology instructors that really get super fired up about learning the new thing. So it's not uncommon for me to have gone to a conference or watched a podcast about something and learned about a new app or device or something. And I will quickly send that over to that team and they will dissect it and tell me good, bad, indifferent. We also do make it a point to make sure that our instructors are trained on or they are able to break down a new tool or device. whether that's learning, you know, the best way that our students could use those Ray-Ban glasses or if maybe there's a new magnification device that might be helpful, something that's portable that our older adults who have low vision could use, for me it's important to make sure we get those in our hands, making sure that we're able to recommend with confidence what somebody could use. for example, in the space of cane travel, there's been a lot of work in the space of getting haptic feedback from cane as you're traveling. Like, is that something that our orientation mobility instructors would recommend? Can we offer that to our students as something they can try out? like what works for them. So making sure that our community has access to those tools so that they can test them out because ultimately everybody's vision and experience is different and they just need to have access to being able to test out that stuff. speaker-0: Yeah, and that's pretty on par of what we're doing here at ECHO Vision Foundation, right? We want to bring in groups of folks to be able to test these different technologies so we can build a platform for blind and low vision folks to go to so we can really pull back on what that disability tax looks like, right? Because blind and low vision folks, when they don't have access to all of those resources or knowledge about them, they're buying things. that might not work for them or might not be right, right? And then like, what do you do with it then? Maybe you can't return it. Maybe like it might be an investment that was lost. So that's so very important to have those, those connections together with that. Julie, as we wrap up here, what is like one message that you would love to leave with our community? speaker-1: But there are lot. I'm thinking about employment right now. know, individuals who have disabilities have a very high unemployment rate. Individuals who are blind or visually impaired have a very high unemployment rate. And I believe that a lot of that has to do with employers not knowing all of the ways that an individual can access information. It's just that they're going to do something differently. And I think my message would be... If you ever have the opportunity to observe someone who has a visual impairment or who is blind and is using assistive technology, observe them and see how they do it. Because I do believe that there is power in being able to see how quickly somebody can access information, how quickly somebody is doing things because they're using keyboard commands and shortcuts, and that they are going to do the same great job and be able to do the same things that can who maybe has full vision. So for me, it's about taking time to get to know how somebody does a thing so that then you can be more informed in the community if maybe you ever have the opportunity to hire someone who has a visual impairment or whatever that looks speaker-0: I love that so much and I think that is a wonderful message to send out to folks of that awareness, you know, so we can make sure that we're providing what we need at the right time in the right space. Julie, you're amazing. Thank you so much for joining us on the Echo Lens today. speaker-1: It was my pleasure. I'm excited to see what you guys come up with. You are doing something that has been a need in the community for a long time, which is putting together all of those resources and tools and one place that people can go and access. And then I think the sky's the limit. speaker-0: Yeah, Christine's vision is coming to life and I'm so excited that we get to move that forward. So, well, thanks for joining us on the ECHO Lens where we view assistive technology through the eyes of lived experience. If today's conversation sparked something in you, share it, rate it, and keep the dialogue going. To learn more about the beautiful project or to support our work, you can visit echovisionfoundation.org. Until next time, stay curious, stay connected, and keep seeing with love. Thanks, friends.