My mother, the college student??
Posted: Tue Nov 25, 2008 12:10 pm
So some of you know that my mother is blind. She wasnt born blind, up until about 8 years ago she had good vision. However, she's been a diabetic for the last, oh, 25 years or so... and as you might of guessed, the diabetes monster reared its ugly face, and her health as well as her vision started to fade.
Right before she started loosing her vision, she decided to go back to college to finish up a teaching degree she started when she was a youngster. At that point she needed about another 2.5 years of college to finish things up (4 year degree.) She made it a year or so before unable to continue...
Fast forward about, eh, 8 years...
She lives alone in her apartment, listens to the tv/radio and waits for vistors.. A few months ago she started talking about how much she wanted to finish her teaching degree... So my sister and I started doing a little research, turns out that one of the local colleges accepts visually challenged students and they even have all the lastest and greatest equiptment!!!
So we got her a computer and a program called zoom text (basically makes the font bigger) and shes been relearning how to use a computer (she used to be pretty good.)
Today I took her to an appointment with the colleges "special needs counciler" and he got her all signed up and registered for college...
It's going to be pretty tuff for her, she basically blind as a bat, she can read font about THIS BIG with the use of a strong magnifying glass.
Can she do it??? Yeah, I think so.. Hope so!
Shes probably not going to be able to teach, but shes always been a really good writer (yeah, I didnt take after her in that department), so she'll probably try being an independent writer for the news paper or something.???
Right before she started loosing her vision, she decided to go back to college to finish up a teaching degree she started when she was a youngster. At that point she needed about another 2.5 years of college to finish things up (4 year degree.) She made it a year or so before unable to continue...
Fast forward about, eh, 8 years...
She lives alone in her apartment, listens to the tv/radio and waits for vistors.. A few months ago she started talking about how much she wanted to finish her teaching degree... So my sister and I started doing a little research, turns out that one of the local colleges accepts visually challenged students and they even have all the lastest and greatest equiptment!!!
So we got her a computer and a program called zoom text (basically makes the font bigger) and shes been relearning how to use a computer (she used to be pretty good.)
Today I took her to an appointment with the colleges "special needs counciler" and he got her all signed up and registered for college...
It's going to be pretty tuff for her, she basically blind as a bat, she can read font about THIS BIG with the use of a strong magnifying glass.
Can she do it??? Yeah, I think so.. Hope so!
Shes probably not going to be able to teach, but shes always been a really good writer (yeah, I didnt take after her in that department), so she'll probably try being an independent writer for the news paper or something.???
