Giving The Blind A New Vision
Amity's Work WIth The Blind And Visually Impaired
Katrin Fiedler
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An eye-opening experience - Cataract operation in Suining, Jiangsu Province |
Watching Yu Quanqing selling his goods, first quoting the exact price and then carefully counting his change, he does what thousands of other street vendors in China do. Observing him later on his way home, one hand pulling his cart, he still looks entirely ordinary... or does he? His second hand is holding a cane that helps him negotiate his way. Yu Quanqing is blind.
He may be blind, but he obviously is not helpless. Yu Quanqing is one of the beneficiaries of Amity's Community-Based Rehabilitation Project (CBR) in Yixing. CBR projects aim at equipping blind people and the communities they live in with the skills necessary to make the blind full members of society. In 2002 alone, Amity's CBR projects in Yixing (Jiangsu) and Luzhou (Sichuan) provided 300 disabled persons with various rehabilitation services. 89 blind people were trained in massage skills and were assisted in finding jobs. In Yu Quanqing's case, he and his family were recipients of a small loan that helped them to open their own business.
Yu's story is not only a personal success for the 59-year-old, but it is also a source of inspiration for China's blind people. In March of 2003, Yu Quanqing had the opportunity to attend a WCC meeting in Thailand titled "Ecumenical Agenda of Churches in Solidarity with Differently Abled Persons". Yu was accompanied by He Congpei from Amity's Medical and Health Division, who acted as his interpreter and guide.
"As we two Chinese representatives entered the conference room for the first time, there was applause from the audience welcoming us," Yu writes about this experience. "My translator, Mr. He, translated all conference proceedings faithfully for me. I also spoke in the plenum, I spoke mainly on three aspects: My childhood experience and the process of how I lost my eyesight, my work as a helper in a restaurant (moving the bellows to keep the fire going) that I did for 17 years, and my experiences with the market economy. I sold little flatbreads, ice cream, I walked the streets carrying a wooden trunk on my back, calling for customers the whole day. Finally, I opened my own little shop..."
"My talk at the meeting received a lot of applause. In the break afterwards, the conference chairman came over, and all the representatives came to shake my hand, hug me or take a picture with me. They were all impressed, saying: This blind Chinese person gave his talk without a manuscript, he spoke with empty hands. They were all very happy with my speech."
Similar stories of empowerment could be told in other areas of China, empowerment that includes not only the visually impaired, but also those around them. In 2002, over 300 special education teachers were trained in new concepts and methods of teaching visually- and hearing impaired children. And, in a particular twist for sustainability, Amity-trained CBR specialists started training a new generation of CBR-workers in Yixing - workers that can assist blind people like Yu Quanqing in their rehabilitation.
Medical support is another key area of Amity's work for the blind, and again, training is a crucial element of all projects. Every year, dozens of county eye doctors are trained in cataract surgery, and thousands of cataract patients have their vision restored. This is Amity's response to "Vision 2020", a campaign launched by the World Health Organization in 1999. Aimed at eradicating avoidable blindness in the world by 2020, the campaign tackles the four major curable or preventable causes of blindness, among them cataracts. Through training grassroots doctors in cataract operations, Amity makes these operations accessible and affordable to patients in remote rural areas. The emphasis is on sustainability - strengthening eye departments of grassroots hospitals and establishing medical teams.
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Seeing special needs - Teaching the visually impaired requires special skills and equipment |
Amity does not only take on the role of an initiator of projects, it also occasionally acts as a consultant for other organizations running development programmes. One case in point is the Golden Key Research Center of Education for the Visually Impaired. Based in Beijing, the Golden Key Center is particularly active in the field of education for visually impaired children. Its founder Xu Bailun, virtually blind himself, started implementing projects for blind children in 1985. "One year after the Golden Key Research Center was established, somebody introduced me to the Amity Foundation. The Amity Foundation then helped me to locate a number or European agencies that support work for the blind. In that sense, Amity was instrumental for us in securing sources of funding," Xu remembers.
Until today, Amity plays an important role in the implementation of Golden Key's Inner Mongolia project, a programme that is largely funded with money from Christophel Blindenmission (CBM), Evangelischer Entwicklungsdienst (EED), Hildesheimer Blindenmission (HBM) and the Dark and Light Foundation. "Amity acts as a go-between transferring the funding from the original sources (CBM and HBM) to Golden Key. We help with the monitoring of the funds and also offer advice, if Golden Key wishes," Gu Renfa from the Amity Foundation explains. "As a growing organization, we need support and advice, not only money," says Steve Hallot, a British low-vision activist who has recently joined the Golden Key Center.
The abovementioned Inner Mongolia project aims at integrating low-vision and blind children into ordinary classroom teaching. The reason behind this setup is twofold: First of all, the low population density in Inner Mongolia makes it difficult to have schools for the blind in every location with a blind child. And, more importantly, there is a new global trend for integrated education that emanated from within the blind community itself. "Many blind people who attended special schools for the blind feel that this did not equip them for life in real society, hence the call for inclusive education," explains William Brohier, an international expert on education for the visually impaired who acts as a consultant for CBM.
To enable ordinary teachers to provide education for the blind or visually impaired, every classroom teacher of a child with such special needs receives a short but intensive training. Subjects covered, for example, are teaching skills and psychological rehabilitation. Often left at home without anything to do, the blind children in particular lag behind in their social development and need psychological rehabilitation by the time they finally enter school.
Xia Tianyu stands for many children whose lives were changed through the Golden Key project. Now a confident fourth-grader, the boy showed behaviour typical of isolated blind children when he was discovered by the Golden Key project. Nothing of his former clumsiness is noticeable as he guides his visitors across the campus and shows off his new reading and writing skills.
While the concept of inclusive education has received much praise (including an award from UNESCO) and is hailed as a feasible model for education for the impaired in developing countries, problems remain. Judging from the experiences made so far, the basic concept of training classroom teachers to teach the visually impaired does work. However, once students have progressed beyond the first few grades, they are taught by a large number of teachers, all of whom should ideally receive training.
Equally unsolved is the question of sustainability. Constant screening and training of new teachers is necessary in order to ensure access to education for all visually impaired children. The very nature of inclusive education, which implies total coverage of all schools and school-age children at the grassroots, makes strong commitment from the relevant authorities necessary.
In Inner Mongolia, the complex ethnic situation brings about additional problems. Many students speak Mongolian at home, yet the official Chinese Braille language is standard Chinese. For blind students, this means that their only access to education is through a second language.
Still, the project undoubtedly greatly benefits the children involved - and not only them. Often, the presence of a visually impaired child acts as a catalyst for the classmates, who develop new initiatives and awareness for the problems of the impaired. "I can think of three different ways in which our school community has profited from accepting blind student Xia Tianyu," says education official Yang, who acts as a supervisor for the project in a local school. "First of all, we were granted 50,000 RMB [US$6,250 approx.] to improve the grounds and prepare them for the arrival of the blind student. Secondly, by taking in Xia Tianyu we have created an atmosphere that is favourable to helping the impaired. For example, the school community collected money to support Xia Tianyu's family. And finally, Xia Tianyu is a gain for the school because he is an excellent student."
And who knows, maybe one day Xia Tianyu will serve his school in other ways as well. "I want to become a teacher," he announces, while his parents, still disbelieving but obviously proud, smile in the background.
