Many graduates of the OTC returned after losing additional vision.
This raised some issues which were still unresolved at the time I
retired at the end of 1993. The straight forward cases were those
former students who had continued into schooling or employment and
later returned to the agency for help after they had lost either their
job or additional sight. The VRC's would refer them back to the OTC,
and we would review the case and tailor a refresher course designed to
meet the individual's needs. But we also were sent those former
students who had left the OTC, gone home and sat for several years,
went for a dog guide, worked in a training program at the Light House
for the Blind, washed out of the training and sought help from their
VRC's. With no other options, other than to let their client dangle,
the VRC's would send them back for "further training". I had several
students come through the OTC as many as 4 times. Without any
noticeable improvement.
Carl Jarvis
On 7/14/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
But when they lost that bit of vision, why didn't they return for further
training? Or was that not permitted?
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Friday, July 14, 2017 2:07 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Blind Man in a Hotel Room
A great majority of the newly blind adults who entered the OTC, during the
years I worked there, believed that they were hopelessly crippled if they
became totally blind. Their natural instinct was to use what remaining
vision they had, even when such use got them in trouble. A young woman
training in the Business Enterprises Program(BEP), filled a container with
boiling hot water from the jacket of the coffee urn.
She bent down with her nose almost in the container, trying to see when it
was close to the top. But the clear water in the silvery container was
difficult to tell how high the water had come. She suddenly realized that
it was running onto the floor, and she jerked the container away, spilling
boiling water up her arm as far as her elbow, and across her stomach. In
the BEP, we could only encourage students to wear sleep shades while in
their initial training. She had chosen to not wear them. She told me that
so long as she had any sight at all, she would use it. Knowing this, I had
walked her through a couple of ways to be safe when drawing a container of
boiling water. She ignored my good efforts, and relied on her eyesight.
In the OTC, I had the authority to insist upon sleep shades as part of the
training. However, I did make many exceptions. People who had serious
vertigo were not required to wear them during Shop Class or when on Mobility
Training. And over the years several students were so immobilized to the
point that they suffered major panic attacks, were not required to wear the
shades. In every such case the students failed to achieve the level of self
reliance they needed to succeed on the job. Over the years I have run into
many of them at our state conventions. Many of those who live alone are on
SSDI and have in-home care givers. Some have sighted spouses who guide them
everywhere, doing even the most basic of tasks for them. I should mention
that these are the students who trained without sleep shades, and later lost
all or most of their sight.
Male students often gave me the assurance that they would never need to know
home making skills. They had wives to do that. And many women came to me
asking to be allowed to skip wood shop, because they would never use such
skills.
Over and over I would explain that these classes were a central part of the
training. The end result of the OTC experience was the establishment of
self confidence, self belief, and of self worth.
Sleep shades were not used to teach students to "be blind", as so many
believed.
I remember one time a fellow came back to the OTC after several years
working at the Lighthouse. He told me that he had cheated and did not wear
his sleep shades whenever he could get away with it, even sweet talking a
couple of his instructors into not making him wear them.
"And look," he informed me, "I'm successful. I have a steady job, a wife
and two children. I made it without needing those sleep shades".
After he left my office, about half an hour later, I headed down the hall to
grab a cup of coffee. There was my former student, standing in the hall,
backed up against the wall. He was waiting for his wife to come and fetch
him and guide him to the parking lot. Now that he could see only shadows,
he had developed a serious lack of confidence in his ability to travel
independently.
After saying all that, I have arrived at a place in my life where I believe
that if people are satisfied with where they are in life, that is all that
matters. Even in those cases where I believe they could have done so much
more, the choice is theirs, and so are the consequences.
Carl Jarvis
On 7/13/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Well yes, there will always be that gulf between blind and sighted,
and some partial vision won't eliminate that. But I don't think that
that fact is relevant in terms of helping people learn to function
optimally. If we're just talking about skills and not about social
acceptance, I can't understand why using whatever tiny bit of residual
sight is left, isn't helpful, just so long as people recognize
precisely when that bit of sight is, and is not, helpful. I don't
understand why this would have changed in the past 50 years. I have
certainly had to make decisions over the years, particularly in the
past 9 years, about under which circumstances to depend on my sight
and under which circumstances, the small amount that is left isn't
useful. It is painfully clear when it is and when it isn't. When it
isn't, I either have to substitute another method for accomplishing a
task or, in some instances, reluctantly give up a pleasure like
watching an audio described episode of Nature on PBS or looking at
flowers or the pictures in my picture albums. And no, touching a
flowering bush is not as lovely as seeing it. However, if I had ever
learned to sew, (I never did), that is a skill that my partial vision
would have been useless for and it would have been appropriate to tell me
not to bother trying to see the stitches.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2017 8:16 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Blind Man in a Hotel Room
Hi Miriam and All,
Right. Initially I was heavily influenced by the NFB philosophy. As
time passed and I became convinced that the NFB's approach was too
heavily weighted toward teaching every student to behave as if they
were totally blind, I began to modify how our OTC incorporated
residual vision into the total training package. Our Commission
director, Ken Hopkins, and our OTC director, Don Brown, were both
mentored by Ken Jernigan. While I had been influenced initially by
Jacobus tenBroek's speeches in the collection, "The Man and the
Movement", I became fast friends with Hopkins, and while he was Commission
Director, I followed his lead.
Ken Hopkins was, and still is, a keen mind. Both he and I have come
some distance from that old hard nosed party line. But after saying
that, I hasten to remind you that societal conditions are some
different today for blind people than they were fifty and more years
ago. Nonetheless, my position continues to be that eyesight is such a
dominant sense that if we don't initially remove it, and its
temptations, we will have a significant reduction in assisting low
vision people to become as independent and competent as they need to
become in order to compete with the sighted population.
But in discussing this with prospective students, I would stress that
the end result must include all of our senses. I do believe that in
the long run the NFB's focus on teaching "Blindness Skills", and
ignoring how to incorporate all of our senses, was a road block to
large numbers of low vision people who could have had a far more
successful experience. Still, I feel some need to remind you that the
hard nosed approach was appropriate under the conditions in the 30's,
40's, 50's, and even through the 70's.
With more understanding teachers, students are not measured by how
much sight they have.
Techniques are much more insightful. Honesty is the best policy, and
those teachers understanding that are developing some amazing
students. As far as I am concerned, there will still be great chasms
between the Blind and the Sighted Worlds, but there continues to be an
ever growing understanding toward those of us who do not conform.
Carl Jarvis
On 7/13/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Sounds like the NFB line. But when you have a bit of vision, setting
it aside during a period of the day for training purposes is, I
think, artificial because the natural response is to use vision when
you have it and that's what you'll do for the remainder of the day.
So I would hel people use their tiny bit of vision to its great
advantage while, at the same time, providing all the other skills as
enhancements and backup. When the time comes that your vision doesn't
do the job, you turn to those other skills and sharpen them. I never
would have been motivated to learn braille until I really needed it
to make reading books and writing notes to myself, easier. I
remember being in Spearfish South Dakota at that University's VIP
Program for two weeks one summer in the early 90's. It was like a
blind version of the Elder Hostel Program. Anyway, there were people
there with partial vision equivalent to mine, and some whose vision
was better than mine. And what was shocking to me was that they had
never been encouraged to use the vision they had. They functioned as
if they had much less, or none at all. I remember a social worker,
much younger than I. We were at an American Indian Center, and a
sacred mountain was being described to us where people went to
worship. It was right outside a huge picture window where we were
standing. This social worker, a member of our group, was turned
somewhat away from the window. I knew she had some vision, enough to
see that mountain so I asked her if she wanted to see the mountain
that was being described. "Oh yes", she said. Could I see it? I just
told her to turn around and where to look and she was so delighted.
But had I not told her where to look, she wouldn't have tried. That
sort of thing kept happening throughout that two weeks. The staff,
just lovely faculty from the University, always acted as if none of us
could see anything.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carl
Jarvis
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2017 3:48 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Blind Man in a Hotel Room
Vision loss is a very personal thing. Each of us come with different
personalities, different sorts of vision loss, different points in
our lives when it occurs, different expectations, different
support...or lack of support, different health concerns, different
skills, and very different abilities to adapt to blindness or severe
vision loss.
For many folk, when they first lose vision, it is important to them
to tell everyone exactly what is going on in their eyes. When I
taught an Attitude Class in the orientation and training center, at
some point early on, I would suggest that we go around the room and
tell the class whatever we wanted to share regarding our eyes and
how we felt it impacted our lives.
When we were finally finished, I would say something like, "Okay, you
can see how we are quite different in how much we see, and how we
feel about it.
But one thing we do have in common. We have lost enough vision that
the world will look upon us as Blind. And since the world, the
sighted world, is not informed enough to understand just what we can
do, and not do, it falls upon us to be their teachers." I would
continue...as is my long winded habit, and tell the students, "You
may have the flu, or a diabetic reaction, and I might excuse you from
class or some specific task, but never, never, never use your vision
loss as an excuse. Since most blind people have some usable sight,
be thankful for what you are able to see.
But we are going to set aside your remaining sight and learn to trust
your other senses. Especially those senses that are still fully up
and running.
Today you are all depending upon eyesight that is iffy at best, and
could get you into a real jam. But by sharpening your remaining
senses, learning to rely on them, you will find that at the end of
this program you will use whatever sight you have, as an enhancement."
Without training, without positive direction, suddenly going from
decent vision to drastically altered vision can be immobilizing.
Reminding them that anything worth having is worth working for, these
new students roll up their sleeves and begin upon a journey of hard
work, lasting from 6 to 9 months.
Carl Jarvis
On 7/13/17, Bonnie L. Sherrell <blslarner@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I have been seeing better in my left eye than my right eye for
years, and often what I see with my right eye simply gets totally
overwritten by what's seen by the left one.
If Mr. Keillor has deteriorating vision in the eye that didn't get
operated upon, then I find myself wondering if they didn't operate
on the proper eye!
By the way--am going to collect my new glasses prescription today.
Was told the glasses would be ready next Monday, so the optician
must have worked his behind off to get these done to return to
Costco yesterday afternoon! I'll see how well I see out of my right
eye now, although the prescription is becoming so strong what I see
through the right lens tends to make things look VERY small anymore.
Bonnie L. Sherrell
Teacher at Large
"Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even
the very wise cannot see all ends." LOTR
"Don't go where I can't follow."
We gave the Goblin King control of our nation!
