Blind Children Have Dreams to Realize

By Joyce Scanlan, President

(Editor’s Note: This was the keynote speech at our parents’ seminar on May 6, 2006.)

When we opened for business with four or five students at Blindness: Learning in New Dimensions (BLIND), Inc. in January of 1988, we were amazed to discover that when students were asked to discuss their plans for the future in seminar sessions, they absolutely could not articulate anything about their hopes or dreams for their lives down the road. The staff of adult blind people spoke of their plans for writing books, traveling, owning homes, retiring one day, and all the usual things Americans look forward to doing. But the students—who were mostly quite young, some of them having been blind since birth and others losing their eyesight very recently—were totally silent with only the “I don’t know what I’ll be doing” as a response. As we all became better acquainted, students began to open up and tell us of how they had never been asked such a question before and they were struggling to express what they had always thought was impossible. Those who had become blind more recently said that they had given up on their career plans and any thought of fulfilling previous dreams for their future. Everyone eventually did gain confidence and begin looking forward to a bright tomorrow and a meaningful life ahead. This may seem to be a sad story, but I think it tells us something of the life many blind people, even today, lead. It tells us something of low expectations, dashed hopes, wasted lives, dreams unrealized, and much more.

Today, we’re all going to focus on the future of the blind children, who are known to us, and consider what each of us can do to make sure that their futures are as rewarding and as fulfilled as their innate abilities and their imaginations can realize. Let’s go along with Thomas Jefferson who said, “I like the dreams of future better than the history of the past.” Let’s remember that “Empty pockets never held anyone back. Only empty heads and empty hearts can do that.” The winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1921 gave the following advice: “To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan but also believe.” What can we do? What can we dream for the blind children we know? What beliefs must we have in order to plan well so that the dreams of today’s blind children will come true?

I came into the world as the third of five children, all born within a period of seven and one-half years, I was the first child in our larger family of cousins, etc. to have an imperfection; I was blind with congenital cataracts. Both my parents were devastated when they learned I was blind. My mother couldn’t talk about it at all; she wept for three weeks. When she finally decided to take me to the doctor and learned that I really was blind, she gathered up her inner strength and decided that I would have as normal a life as she expected for all her children. When surgery was performed on the cataracts when I was nine months old and my mother realized that I could see, she wept again—this time for joy. As I remember, my life was as normal as everyone else’s, although I was always legally blind. When I was three years old, I fell down a long flight of stairs carrying a glass—and it was glass—of ice water. The scar on my head just above the hairline is still there. We lived in that upstairs apartment for another two years and I was never stopped from carrying my glass of ice water down that long set of steep stairs. My brothers and sisters taught me to roller-skate and ride a bike, and I was always included when we built a tree house together or decided to run away from home to camp in the woods at the end of our block. We played school, and my older brother and sister taught me to read. Now, my grandmother and my mother had disagreements about whether or not I should be allowed to do all these “dangerous and challenging” activities, but I was never held back, as my grandmother wished. Incidentally, when I was four years old, I spent the summer with my grandmother; one day, I locked her in the basement for quite a long time; so I think she may have learned not to lower her expectations for me just because I was blind.

Education was always important in my family. In the long-ago dark ages of the 1940’s when I was ready for school, there was only the option of the state residential school for the blind. Special education for blind kids didn’t come to my hometown until 1960—too late for me. My parents’ determination that I be educated outweighed their sadness and anxiety about sending me 200 miles away from home to receive that education. My mother wept again—and I did, too—when she left me at school the first time. As a shy kid—many won’t believe that—I found it hard to adjust to my new environment, meeting all new friends and adapting to the rigors of the school routine. Five girls were in my class that first year. We played together on the playground, roller- and ice-skated, climbed trees, went exploring in the surrounding countryside, played in the deep, deep snow during the long, cold winters, and got all wet and muddy when the snow finally melted in late May. Several decades later four of the five women are still in touch, although our lives have definitely gone in different directions.

In those days, every child, even those who were barely legally blind as I was, were taught to read Braille. Now, I had already learned to read print in the home school with my older siblings as teachers, so I was not at all interested in those little bumps that you read with your fingers with no pretty pictures to look at. So, I looked at the Braille dots, and my teacher, Miss Ada Mark, covered my hands so I couldn’t read the Braille with my eyes. I actually flunked the first six weeks of Braille reading with a score of 54; remember 75 was passing, so I really failed. Nevertheless, Miss Mark won out; she taught me to read Braille. According to Oprah Winfrey, “The key to realizing a dream is to focus not on success but on significance—and then even the smallest steps and little victories along your path will take on greater meaning.” Learning Braille was one victory for me, one that I didn’t totally appreciate until long into adulthood. And by the way, I abandoned Braille and denied having knowledge or skill until after I had lost most of my legally-blind eyesight at about age 28.

Two important points about the residential school were significant: the academic education was excellent and prepared me well for college and a successful career; residential schools may be quite different today. And the social life in my day was good. I had close friends during my life there, and I am in touch yet with several of those childhood friends. It’s a myth that the residential school experience denies one social contacts. Many blind children are lonely and isolated in the mainstreamed system.

There was one very negative aspect of the residential school: we all learned some very bad attitudes toward blindness. Now such attitudes may also be prevalent in the public school system, but I can tell you they were big-time bad in our residential school. Because of certain practices at the school, we all learned that our value in life is in direct proportion to the amount of eyesight we had. The pecking order was that those with the most sight were at the top of the totem pole, and those with zero eyesight were at the very bottom. Tasks were divided into two categories: those requiring eyesight and those which did not. The students with some sight did everything that required moving around, the lifting, the moving of furniture, verifying information, being sighted guide to the blind kids, etc. The totally blind folks did the sedentary things such as washing dishes and just eating. That sort of instruction around blindness set most of us off on a track which made us do just about anything to avoid thinking of ourselves as blind. While in school those of us with some sight were the kings and queens of the world; however, when we left the cloistered life of the residential school, we were suddenly thrust onto the lower rung of the visual-acuity ladder, because most of the others around us were sighted. The bad attitudes were the negatives at the residential school, but remember, in those days the residential school was our only option. Today, we have more choices for learning opportunities.

I loved school very much—so much that I continued through the bachelor’s and master’s degrees with five years of teaching experience during the school year. When I developed glaucoma and lost a good bit of eyesight, I soon left teaching, mostly because of fear that I could no longer be successful. I also was alone without any role models to give me support and encouragement. This should have demonstrated to me that trying to hide out from blindness just doesn’t solve anything.

Those were dark days in my life. The state rehab people said that they would help me find employment only if I went to their adjustment-to-blindness training center. When I finally caved in and said I’d go, the adjustment center people threw me out after only one month of training. I told the BLIND, Inc. students that I thought that was one of the best things that had ever happened to me. They seemed to enjoy hearing that I had been kicked out, and I really enjoyed telling them about my negative experience there. So you might say that being tossed out of a training program became a useful experience for me.

British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli said, “Nurture your mind with great thoughts, for you will never go any higher than you think.” Also remember, happiness doesn’t depend upon who you are or what you have, it depends solely upon what you think. I can honestly tell you that my thinking was all bad, influenced by negative forces before I encountered the National Federation of the Blind in 1970 when the organization came to Minneapolis to hold its national convention. That was probably my low point after losing my “precious partial vision.” I was unemployed, impoverished, depressed, and without hope for my life. That convention turned my life around. I met very competent, independent, employed people in all fields, confident, concerned blind people who reached out to me and encouraged me to join their ranks to help others. They weren’t ashamed of their blindness and showed genuine pride in who they were and what they were doing.

Many programs have been added to the organization since 1970, such as the National Organization of Parents of Blind Children with its Minnesota division. I am absolutely certain that if such an organization had been around when I was a small child, my parents would have leaped at the opportunity to participate, to learn and share what they believed. Many people choose to run away from blindness as I did for so many years. They are convinced that distancing themselves from other blind people frees them to be “their own person.” Without the National Federation of the Blind and its division for parents, your young children who are blind will have no way to measure their skills to deal with blindness or understand their rights in the world in competitive employment areas. We must teach young blind children to think high, to dream big, and to know that success will be there. Henry David Thoreau said, “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.” A dream is your children’s creative vision for their life in the future. They must break out of their current comfort zone and become comfortable with the unfamiliar and the unknown. All of their dreams can come true—if they have the courage to pursue them. They must dream big and dare to fail.

Our children of today are our leaders and decision-makers of tomorrow. They will carry forward the torch of the National Federation of the Blind to new heights and accomplishments. Let’s prepare them with the best tools to meet the challenges that will certainly be there for them. They will have the opportunity to give back to their communities as much as they have received and more. Pope John XXIII gave advice which is relevant to children who are blind: “Consult not your fears but your hopes and your dreams. Think not about your frustrations, but about your unfulfilled potential. Concern yourself not with what you tried and failed in, but with what it is still possible for you to do.”

This seminar is funded by a grant from the Imagination Fund of the National Federation of the Blind. I hope your day will be a time to learn from each other and to share your ideas and experiences. Everyone has much to give.

Enjoy your day together!