Members of the VisionServe Alliance Board of Directors at their board meeting last fall.
Across the country, there are a number of organizations dedicated to empowering people who are blind or low vision. While each of these organizations specializes in different areas of the vision loss field and all have their own unique identity, they do have one thing in common: They all exist to lift up people with vision loss. Together, they comprise the wider landscape of the blind and low vision community, often working together to make the world a more welcoming place for everyone with vision loss.
There are two major consumer-advocacy groups at the national level: the National Federation of the Blind (NFB) and the American Council of the Blind (ACB). Both groups are member organizations made up of and led by people with vision loss. In addition to providing a variety of programs and services, they both work with lawmakers at the federal level to advocate for issues important to our community.
In addition to advocacy, NFB offers a variety of community programs and services. Their programs range from blind parent mentoring to helping people build employment skills to promoting student success. Like the Council, NFB provides white canes at no cost to those who need them. Their canes are the long rigid white ones. The cost of these canes is covered by grants and private donations.
ACB also offers a variety of services along with federal policy advocacy. They work with many other blind and low vision organizations to foster community. ACB offers a wide variety of peer support groups and resources for people with vision loss, including groups for students, artists and musicians, guide dog users, and many more.
In addition to consumer/advocacy groups, there are a number of other organizations across the country working in the blind and low vision community.
The Association for Education & Rehabilitation of the Blind & Visually Impaired (AER) is a group for vision services professionals. Their mission is to promote and support the field by advocating for evidence-based practices, high-quality standards and value-added resources, and giving voice to important issues. Certified Vision Rehabilitation Therapist and Orientation & Mobility Specialist Brent Perzentka of the Council is a member of the Wisconsin chapter of AER and sits on their board of directors as a member-at-large.
The American Federation for the Blind (AFB) provides a wealth of information for people with vision loss. They run the website VisionAware, a comprehensive resource for daily living tips and other basic information about adjusting to vision loss. In recent years, AFB has also begun conducting valuable research on people with vision loss across the country, helping fill an important information gap.
National Industries for the Blind (NIB) focuses on employment resources for people with vision loss. They work with businesses and agencies that serve people with vision loss to help them build skills to enter and succeed in the workforce. NIB supports their member organizations in providing integrated and competitive employment opportunities. NIB recognizes that vision loss does not need to be a barrier to employment, and helps people not only find jobs but grow in their career.
While all of these organizations specialize in their own area of the blind and low vision community, it’s important for them to connect and work together to make real, lasting change in the lives of people with vision loss. VisionServe Alliance (VSA), of which the Council is a member, has been a leader in helping forge those connections. VSA works to strengthen the entire vision loss field by cultivating industry leaders and by supporting its member organizations and helping them grow. One way they do this is by connecting both national and state-level organizations to help develop a shared set of goals. VSA also facilitates valuable research, such as the Big Data Project, which has produced reports on Older and Working Age Adults with Vision Loss. These reports have been an outstanding resource for the Council in our advocacy work.
Executive Director Denise Jess of the Council serves on VSA’s Board of Directors. “We all have different perspectives on the needs and experiences of people with vision loss,” Denise says. “These different perspectives help all of us become more well-rounded, and ultimately stronger, organizations. The mutual support and development we gain by working together through VSA creates common ground between us all and helps lead to concrete change.”
Finding ways to work together is the best way to advance the interests of the blindness and low vision community. The cross-organizational work being done throughout the country helps each organization be more effective at their own work. In the past, collaboration among the different networks was rare; these days, partnerships are happening across our field on a regular basis. That’s a wonderful development, since as they say, it takes a village to create change.
