1st EBU International Conference on Education, 19-23 July 2000, Montegrotto Terme (Padua) - Italy
When I started my school career back in 1959 it was - at least in Germany and many other countries - common knowledge that blind people had to attend special, residential schools where they would get an excellent education. Looking back I must admit that this was true - with one exception: during the first decade of my school years we did not get enough training in mobility and independent living skills. But our academic training was very good.
My first six school years were spent in a small institution which at that time had no more than 35 students. Except for weekends and vacation time we all had to live in the dormitory. We had teachers who were very much dedicated to their jobs. They were all able to read and write Braille - including Grade II Braille - and even in their leisure time they often worked on models which would have helped us get a better understanding of the world around us. These models were made out of wood, plaster and other materials and showed buildings and streets around our school, landscapes, islands and more.
My teachers were sighted, with one exception: there was a blind man who was not a teacher by profession, but he came and taught piano and accordion. We all knew that he was the President of our State Federation of the Blind, an organisation we would all join once we were old enough (at that time, you had to be 16 before you could become a member).
Yes, those were the good old days! During the last four decades, many things have changed in the education of the blind and partially sighted, and - as with other facts of life - it is not always easy to say whether things changed for the better or for the worse. I mentioned above that during the first decade of my school career there was not much training in mobility and independent living skills. This has changed, and that definitely is a change for the better.
Educators have discovered the partially sighted as a separate group and have developed special curricula for them. That is a change for the better; however, we hear complaints: blindness skills, which on some occasions might be of help to this group as well, are totally neglected. So this coin shows two sides.
Whereas in my school days segregated education was the rule, we nowadays see more and more visually impaired students integrated into the regular school system. The emphasis at the schools for the blind has shifted to multi-handicapped children. If educators speak of multi-handicapped, they usually mean visually impaired plus mentally retarded and maybe with other additional handicaps. So in this sense, the blind student of average or above intelligence using a wheel-chair would not be regarded as multi-handicapped. You may argue that this is not a good terminology, but to my knowledge no one has come up with a better one so far.
Now the shift to integrated school training of the visually impaired would be a wonderful thing if the students got the quality education we received in our school years. In order to achieve that we would need many more teachers who are specialists in the education of the visually impaired and more so-called "media centres", where school books and other materials could be produced in Braille and large print. At these centres they would also have to be able to produce up-to-date maps and other models as required by the individual students. After all, they should have the same material available to them as their sighted class mates.
That's the theory. Many people, including myself, have complained that the reality is totally different. Many governments see an integrated school system or - to use the up-to-date term - mainstreaming as a good way to save money. It is very easy to justify the reduction and even destruction of special services for the visually impaired with the "Full Inclusion" ideology. And it is unfortunate that some blind people - without considering the final consequences - fall into the same trap. This is already one area where EBU can and must help. We must make those visually impaired people feel at home in the organisations of the blind. We must make them aware that as sensory impaired people we have special needs which are different from those of other handicapped people and we must show them that the blind are the best advocates for the blind!
There is another problem associated with mainstreaming. Very often blind students who attend regular schools do not know any other blind persons who could serve as role models for them. This is also true for their families and - with the exception of the special education teacher who may see them once a week - also for their teachers. This can prevent them from developing a healthy attitude about their blindness, thus causing low self-esteem. After all, as they see every day, they have more limitations than their sighted peers and they may not know that other blind people have overcome many of those. When I was living in the USA I got to know a man who went through the regular school system seemingly without problems. Only when he started university, where he wanted to study psychology, did they find out that he had a learning disability. So while he was at school his limitations were attributed to his blindness. He certainly did not get a school education tailored to his individual needs.
The skill which is most important for blind people is the ability to read and write Braille efficiently. Studies conducted in the USA have shown that about 90 percent of blind people who are in employment read Braille. We all know that this is the most neglected skill in the education of the blind today. And we know the reason. Unlike the teachers in the little school I attended 40 years ago, many teachers of the visually impaired today are not at all efficient in the use of Braille. In their university training they are often not even required any more to learn Grade II Braille - even in countries like Germany where Grade II is the common form of Braille. So is it any wonder that those teachers start questioning the value of Braille? Whenever a new technology becomes available, be it the reel tape recorder, the cassette recorder or the computer, people tell us that this is the end of Braille, that Braille will become obsolete now. Experience has always proved them wrong, and we who are able to use Braille efficiently know that nothing else can give us the same degree of independence. By the way, all these technologies are also available for the sighted. Why doesn't any one get the idea that finally print will become obsolete?
Let me add two remarks here: 1. Sighted teachers are not the only ones who have a tendency to try to make life easy on themselves. I have been a member of the commission who worked on a reform of the German Grade II Braille - something we had to do because the official rules for proper spelling were changed in the German speaking countries. There were some blind teachers who, at times successfully, tried to change the rules in a way which would make them easier to teach. Of course, the official argument was that the proposed new rules are easier for the student to understand. But many of us wonder why things we were able to learn suddenly are impossible to grasp for today's youngsters. 2. What I said about the importance of Braille is not only true for totally blind individuals, but also for many persons with low vision. The argument is that they should use print because there is much more reading material available for them. But what good does that reading material do them if they can only read for a few minutes at a time and then have to suffer from eye strain? Wouldn't it be better to teach Braille to them and let them decide when they want to use Braille and when print is preferable for them?
So where do young blind children of normal intelligence get a quality education? Mainstreaming often does not provide it and at special schools they have specialised on the multihandicapped.
We cannot answer this question if we just think of a dual model: integrated education on the one hand and segregated schools on the other. We need a system in which both sides cooperate. There are skills which can be taught better at special schools; there are times when a student may no longer be able to handle the frustration of being one blind student among hundreds of sighted youngsters; there are times when the student in a segregated school really feels closed in and should go out into the unprotected world. We need a school system which meets all these needs. There must not be integrated schools on one side and segregated institutions on the other. Both must cooperate and be available whenever a student needs them and it must be possible to switch from one to the other without difficulty.
I have used the term "quality education" several times already. For me it means an education which is tailored to the individual's needs and best capabilities, enabling him or her to lead a full and productive life as an integrated member in his or her society. It will be up to this conference and to bodies like the EBU Commission on Education to fill this term with life.
So far, I have described the current state of the education of the visually impaired. Of course, in this short speech I cannot touch all areas in this field. We should not forget the issue of vocational training, social skills and computer training. It is almost common that sighted youngsters have their own computer and become computer experts at an early age; but what about the blind? Their parents have to dig deeper into their pockets because they also have to pay for the expensive screen readers which enable their youngsters to perform at least a part - but still only a part - of the things their sighted peers do on a PC.
One of the many strong points of EBU is that it represents organisations OF the blind as well as those FOR the blind. Take as evidence the national delegations at our General Assemblies. If I may use my country as an example: one of the members in our delegation is a representative of the German Association of the Educators of the Blind; and of course the European President of the International Council of the Visually Impaired, Herman Gresnigt, is a well liked guest at the assembly as well. This already shows you that all in all we have good cooperation between the "Professionals" and the "Consumers" within EBU. And in this context I should not neglect to mention the parents of visually impaired children, who are also represented in some national delegations as well as in some of our commissions, for example the Commission for Activities of Multi-handicapped People. At the same time, it is clear that our Union is led by people who are visually impaired themselves. Thus it can be ensured that EBU really represents the interests of the blind and partially sighted.
Organisations of the blind in large part consist of people who have gone through the educational system and may or may not have found employment afterwards. Thus, we can judge what was useful in our education, which errors have been made and which qualifications were most effective for us. Because of that we can give our advice to professionals in the field of education of the visually impaired as well as to those who make important decisions in that area (e.g. politicians). This is a major reason why we established the EBU Commission on Education.
Organisations like ICEVI are not only made up of sighted people. We have many blind people who work in the field of education. They should not only join professional organisations, but participate actively in their work. Our experience and advice is needed within organisations for the blind and we should not withhold it or preserve it for bodies which are run by us. After all, decision makers outside the blindness field do not understand and are not interested in the difference between organisations OF and FOR the blind. Therefore, it is good if we can speak with one voice, like we do as European Blind Union.
If our advice is not sought or accepted, we must make our voice heard louder. We can do this by strengthening our organisations of the blind at the grass roots level and by being present when and where decisions of importance to us are made. On the European Union level we have established the Brussels Office, so we are right where the heart of the European Union is beating. On the European level in general we have established contacts and started fruitful and increasing cooperation with the Council of Europe.
Lobbying is not the only channel available to us. This conference is a good example of what we can do. We must make sure that the conference will have fruitful results and we must publish those as widely as possible - not only within EBU.
We have the EBU Newsletter whose circulation is increasing steadily. So this is a perfect place to inform people about this conference and its results.
EBU has established an internet site at
It is a nice coincidence that there is another EBU in Europe - the European Broadcasting Union. At our sixth General Assembly in Prague we had a speaker from that organisation. We should take advantage of this situation and try to get them committed to closer cooperation between our "sister EBUs".
What about a mailing list on educational matters within the EBU Internet structure? The EBU Social Rights Commission has set up its Hermes Network. The Technical Commission already had its mailing list many years ago. We should follow their examples. A lot of work can be done through the internet.
So, as you can see, there is a lot of work ahead of us, during and even more after this conference. Therefore let me close by wishing you a successful and fruitful conference. The National Federation of the Blind in Baltimore, USA, the World Blind Union and many other organisations claim that they "change what it means to be blind". This is a very worthy cause. Let us do our part by beginning to "change what it means to be educated as a blind student".
Back to the: Home Page