NACC refuses education for blind student

All names have been left out of this posting for now since it is an on going issue.

It’s frustrating enough being blind and trying to get a job when job seekers don’t look any further than your disability. What do you do when you’re blind and an organization absolutely refuses to let you get training in a field that you know you can do due to your disability?

A person over at National Association Career College states that

“With a disability myself, I would certainly not want to discriminate against anyone. Nor would I want any organization that I work with to discriminate.”

But it is exactly what they are doing.

A blind student is trying to apply to Everest College in the Early Child Care Assistance program. This field requires that you’re able to observe children at different age groups, (infants to school age) and NACC feels that a blind person is absolutely unable to do this in any way, shape or form!

Yes, it is difficult to do everything that a sighted person can do in this job, but is it impossible? No! Just ask any blind parent or any organization that actually works with disable children that are willing to work with a person that is blind who wishes to work at their facility.

This blind student did attend Algonquin College in a different program that in the end didn’t work out. The program although attempted was too hard to arrange so that the blind student could be successful. The program at Algonquin College is no where near the same as the one at Everest College, but since Algonquin told NACC in the end that it couldn’t be done with this student NACC feels that it works for Everest as well.

Wrong! The program at Algonquin College was more sighted than anything. The student would have had to be able to give shots, administer meds, give oxygen and so on. Maybe in time it could be figured out, but after some time off and really thinking about it the blind student figured it would be best not to continue. It wasn’t the exact type of job they were wanting.

The program at Everest is more hands on in working with children, getting down on the floor and playing with them if they are toddler/pre-school age or changing diapers if they are infants or helping with school work if they are in school. The program at Everest is a lot easier to adapt for a blind student course wise for one main fact of the courses are only one at a time and the longest is maybe 2 weeks in length. When the blind student tried pointing out that Everst would be easy to adapt, this is what they received.

A NACC representative says that “I would be interested to understand how you believe that program would be extremely easy to adapt. If that is the case, and we can do it, I’ll be more than happy to facilitate the process.”

But when they were given some examples on how this could be done and how frustrating this is becoming, this is the response that was returned.

“And just so you understand, I’m also annoyed we’re hitting a brick wall. I was hoping that what you had said about Algonquin would have helped us but that’s not the case.”

Well duh! Of course it’s not the case the programs aren’t the same. NACC would know this if they’d actually take time to listen to what the student is trying to tell them.

There are all sorts of accomidations that can be arranged in the program itself and placement setting for the blind person, but NACC is refusing to even consider working with the person to see how it will work.

Is a person that’s blind suppose to just let this go and say, “ah well, no big deal. I’ll just take some meaningless job that I’m not interested in?” Is that what NACC really wishes would happen? Is that what the NACC representative that says they are blind as well did?

Hmm, maybe they did and that’s why they don’t see it as a big deal and are closed minded.

As a blind parent of 2 adorable monsters and a person that has helped take care of friends little ones and volunteered with children in many cases I’m out raged by this. By NACC’s way of looking at things because I’m “blind” I can’t “observe” my children. There’s just no way.

Cat