To our shock and amazement, we received a call from our state’s Department of Blind Services, that our 19 year old blind son David would NOT be able to move into his dorm in six days for his freshman year at college because the cost for room and board would suddenly NOT be covered by the state. This is after two years of planning and counsel with the agency and our case workers regarding his college plans.
This in addition to them now refusing to provide him a braille notetaker to access the college materials, thinking that audio accommodation is now sufficient due to “budget cuts”, even though David is a “braille user” and can read braille at over 300 words a minute. The backstory for this situation is detailed in Episode 1 and 2 pf “David – Blind and College Bound”.
I provide an update on both situations later in the video, but suffice it to say that the chances of David getting a braille notetaker before school starts are approaching zero, so David has started a GoFundMe campaign to buy a modern braille notetaker on his own.
David put together a business case (read the GoFundMe campaign) for a BrailleSense Polaris, an Android-based notetaker.
David’s GoFundMe campaign, “David Needs Braille for College” is here: https://www.gofundme.com/david-needs-braille-for-college