The 13th National Cricket tournament for the blind will be played in Bangalore from March 1 to 5, 2006. Teams from Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Delhi, Haryana, Orissa and Jharkhand will be participating. These are the winners and runners up teams from the four zonal tournaments held earlier in the season.
Universities are likely to allow visually impaired students the option of writing answer papers for examinations on computers. This would do away with the age-old system of students using a ‘scribe’ during examination.
In a letter to all universities, including deemed universities, the University Grants Commission (U.G.C.) has taken note of a request in this regard from the office of the Chief Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities (C.C.P.D.), and requested universities to take ‘necessary action in the matter’ and bring it to the notice of colleges affiliated to it.
Chicago based Chase Bank has installed a fully accessible, state-of-the-art A.T.M. at the Chicago Lighthouse, 1850 W. Roosevelt Rd.—the first A.T.M. at the site. Chase Bank and Chicago Lighthouse are partnering to train visually impaired people on using A.T.M's.
The bank has donated up to 300 sets of earphones, which the Chicago Lighthouse has been distributing. The earphones can be used at any accessible A.T.M.
Back in October 2005, eyeNews reported on Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) EDUSAT project in Gujarat that gave visually impaired people a chance to access the latest information. The good news is that this system has got into wider usage. The modern technology involving satellite and digital equipment enabled over 2,000 students at 10 blind schools across Gujarat to revise subjects such as mathematics, science, hindi and social studies before the board examinations.
Like many colour-blind people who have adapted all their lives to a particular way of seeing things, Harry Rogers feels his inability to discern red and green hasn't caused him much trouble over the years. Even so, there is one particular difficulty, making sense of charts, graphs, weather maps and other colourful material on his computer screen.
Now, eyePilot, software will enable colour blind people such as Rogers to navigate the Internet.
Disability Rights Commission (D.R.C.), U.K., has called upon disabled internet users to rise up against inaccessible website owners and help it take complaints with the force of law. The step from D.R.C. followed the launch of new guidelines to amend the limitations in Website Accessibility Initiative, set up by the World Wide Website Consortium. New guidelines on how to make websites user-friendly for disabled people have been developed by the British Standards Institution. The initiative was sponsored by the D.R.C. after an investigation in April 2004.
Mayra Ramirez is blind. She knows she's never going to drive. She can think of a lot of things she'd rather be studying than rules of the road, but she didn't have a choice. Blind students in Chicago, U.S.A. wonder why city schools make them take driving course.
Chicago public schools requires all sophomores (pre-college) to take the class and pass a written road-rules exam--a graduation requirement that affects about 30 blind and visually impaired students in specialised programmes.
A team led by New York’s Columbia University, is hopeful that their work could help aid the development of the new treatment for Age-related Macular Degeneration (A.M.D.).
According to a research, nearly three-quarters of cases of one of the world’s most common causes of blindness are linked to just two genes. Previous work had shown that several variants of a gene called Factor H significantly increase the risk of A.M.D.
Gujarat won the 13th ‘National Cricket Tournament for the Blind’ defeating Haryana in the finals at the Chinaswamy Stadium in Bangalore on March 5, 2006.
The tournament also became a platform to select best players for the national squad that will play the forthcoming cricket World Cup for the Blind to be held in South Africa in December, 2006.
The five-day tournament saw players in high spirit. In a game where seeing the ball well is considered so important, the cricketers demonstrated the importance of mind over matter.
"Reading means the world to me and I can’t imagine what it would be like, to be denied this pleasure,” said children’s laureate Jacqueline Wilson. She is urging fellow writers to make their work more accessible to visually impaired persons.
At the National Judo Championship held between February 25 –26, 2006 in Mumbai, 30 students of ‘Happy Home and School for the Blind’, Mumbai demonstrated that judo wasn’t something, which they took up just for kicks.
A state-of-the-art eye care centre that would house facilities; equipment and expertise related to eye care under one roof has been inaugurated at Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh.
The centre has 100 beds and eight operation theatres. In extension to the already existing department of ophthalmology, which started working in 1962, the advanced eye care centre would work as a tertiary centre with special focus on prevention and control of blindness.
The 2006 IFDS (International Foundation of Disabled Sailors) Blind Sailing World Championship will be held from September 20 to 27, 2006 in Newport, Rhode Island,hosted by the New York Yacht Club (NYYC) with the assistance of Sail Newport. More than a dozen nations are expected to send teams for the championship.
El Alma en Las Manos or ‘The Soul in the Hands’, a tactile exhibition by contemporary Mexican sculptors opened on March 9, 2006 at Zerum museum at San Francisco, U.S.A.
The exhibition seek to bring blind children closer to the world of visual art had 22 pieces of tactile sculpture from Mexico.
The exhibition was organised in collaboration with Consulate General of Mexico, the Mexican National Council for Culture and Arts, ‘Zerum’- a multimedia arts and technology museum, and non-profit organisation ‘LightHouse for the blind and visually impaired people’, U.S.A.
Almost every subject has diagrams, charts and graphics, or artwork and these graphics and diagrams are largely inaccessible to a visually impaired learner and totally inaccessible to a blind student.
That may not be the case any more. Herefordshire's Royal National College for the Blind, U.K. (RNC) has created a new talk and touch system to help students use maps, charts and diagrams.
International Computer Driving License (I.C.D.L.) curricula will be available in an accessible format to visually impaired persons in United Arab Emirates by the end of year 2006.
The world's first Arabic Braille I.C.D.L. courseware has been developed by I.T. Education Project (I.T.E.P.) and ‘Tamkeen’- the training centre for visually impaired people.
"When I was small and studied in a blind school I came across a number of girls who couldn't pursue their dreams due to poverty. I decided that very time that I will do something for such blind girls.”
The result is ‘Pragna Chakshu Mahila Sevakunj’. An organisation run by Muktaben Dagli and her husband Pankajbhai, both being visually impaired.
‘Pragna Chakshu Mahila Sevakunj’ started ten years ago in a tiny room as a project to help visually impaired girls become self-sufficient. Today, it takes care of 125 girls in nine tenements in Surendranagar, Saurashtra.
Its compact, portable and ergonomic design makes it extremely user-friendly. The newly designed wireless Braille keyboard incorporates bluetooth technology along with infra-red wireless technology. It enables visually impaired people to use the communication interface with a number of current appliances and devices, such as personal computers, P.D.A.s, pocket P.C. or mobile cell phones.
The wireless Braille keyboard has been designed by ‘Robotiker-Tecnalia’ (Spain) for O.N.C.E. (the Spanish National Association for the Blind).
The device will be on sale shortly.
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