VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITIESWe very much appreciate anyone who can offer to do volunteer work for the American Action Fund for Blind Children and Adults. Donations are greatly appreciated, but the willingness to take the time to volunteer also shows commitment. The American Action Fund is able to offer services and programs to blind and deaf-blind individuals who would otherwise not be served. Our services are available especially to blind children, the elderly blind, and the deaf-blind. Many blind people do not know what services exist to help them. You can make this information available by distributing our materials to schools, church groups, libraries, nursing homes, senior citizens centers, retirement villages, doctors' offices, low vision clinics, and so on. Questions Kids Ask About Blindness, and Handbook for Senior Citizens: Rights, Resources, and Responsibilities are two books which are published by the American Action Fund. Our book for children uses a simple question/answer format to give information geared toward children about blindness. This can be distributed to elementary and middle schools, pediatricians' offices, boy scout and girl scout troops, church groups, etc. Our publication for senior citizens gives much needed information to help people deal with vision loss in their later years. Since over half of all individuals who are blind are over age fifty-five, there is a real need to get information out to this segment of the population. You can be of great help in this area by distributing our pamphlets and telling people about our services in some of the community outlets mentioned above. The American Action Fund for Blind Children and Adults maintains a library and produces Braille and Twin Vision® books. Twin Vision® books consist of Braille and print text on adjacent pages. We also produce historical documents in Braille, such as the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. Please inform pre-schools, schools, and parents groups about these services. Our Braille production for our lending library is currently done mainly at our California location. We utilize many volunteers who are able to come into the library. It used to be that all Braille was hand-produced, but with the advent of computer technology and Braille printers, it is now possible to produce Braille much more readily. There are still volunteer groups in most states that teach and produce Braille. If you would like information about how to contact the groups in your state, please write or call. The National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress offers a correspondence course in Braille transcription. This transcribing course takes from eight months to a year to complete. Once it is completed, certification as a Braillist is issued by the National Library Service. For further information please contact the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, 1291 Taylor Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20542, (800) 424-8567. Federal law permits materials used by transcribers to be mailed without charge. Therefore, there will be no expense to you for materials or for postage. The deaf-blind are a segment of the population which has specialized needs, but which receives very little attention from service providers. The American Action Fund publishes a special Braille news summary every week called Hot-Line to Deaf-Blind. If you find deaf-blind people who would like to receive Hot-Line to Deaf-Blind on a regular basis, please send their names and addresses to American Action Fund for Blind Children and Adults, 1800 Johnson Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21230. If you encounter deaf-blind people who need assistance, please encourage them to contact us. Several valuable scholarships are offered each year by the American Action Fund to blind individuals pursuing higher education. All of the high schools, colleges, and universities in your area should have copies of these scholarship applications. We also have free Braille calendars for distribution to any blind or deaf-blind person who needs them. You may also want to contact local service groups (such as Lions Clubs or the Optimists) to see if they would be willing to help spread the word about the service programs of the American Action Fund for Blind Children and Adults. If you would like to provide direct volunteer assistance to blind individuals in your state, please contact us for information about state and local organizations of blind people in your area. People who can provide transportation, help with shopping, or do reading are especially needed. These are just a few ideas for very much needed volunteer assistance. However, you may have skills or talents that you want to use in a particular way. If another project is better suited to your talents and the time you have available, please let us know. Our materials can be provided to you in the quantities that you need for distribution. Just write or call to let us know if you need materials. It is very important to the lives of blind and deaf-blind people that they get this information. Thank you for your assistance in helping make this a reality. |