THE EDUCATOR

Implementation Status : DRS. RICHARD CHARLES AND ESTHER YEWPICK
LEE CHARITABLE FOUNDATION GRANT

Lee Projects - Making a Difference:

   On almost every day in 2003, the Dr. Richard Charles and Esther Yewpick Lee Charitable Foundation was making a contribution to the improvement of the education of persons with visual impairment in some part of the developing world. Through the year the ICEVI/ Lee initiative supported 79 projects which benefited 3,855 teachers, parents, and other support personnel and impacted on 55,634 people with visual impairment. The scheme has generated heightened awareness of the educational needs of children with visual impairment throughout the world and built confidence in those that teach these children.

In the words of Lungile, a teacher from Swaziland, Africa, the program on Mathematics organized with the help of the Lee Foundation enabled her to "get over the fear of mathematics" and she adds that she is "a confident teacher now".

Ashwini Agarwal, the ex-Director of the National Association for the Blind (India), who is himself blind, says that the E-text materials his organization has developed as a result of the ICEVI/Lee initiative will now help thousands of blind children every year.

John, a visually impaired counselor from Baguio in the Philippines says his knowledge and understanding of the principles of the inclusion of children with visual impairment in community schools is now greater than ever before as a result of the orientation programme organized by ICEVI's East Asia region with the support of the Lee Foundation.

Lucia Piccione, the regional chair of Latin America is grateful and proud and of her association with the Lee Foundation. For many countries in the vast Latin America region, the Lee projects were the only capacity building programmes in the education of children with visual impairments available to teachers and parents.

These are just a few examples of the impact and the ripple effect that the collaboration between Lee Foundation and ICEVI has generated in 2003.

Major themes addressed in 2003:

During 2003, projects were implemented around the following themes.

     - Awareness on information and technology for persons with visual impairment
     - Inclusive education for children with visual impairment
     - Developing teaching and learning materials
     - Community-based rehabilitation
     - Parental Education
     - Braille codes
     - Computer literacy
     - Evaluation strategies
     - Education of low vision children
     - Teaching Mathematics
     - Education of deafblind children
     - Education of children with multiple disabilities
     - Orientation and Mobility
     - Early Childhood Intervention
     - Visual Stimulation
     - Regional and national networking
     - Non-formal education
     - Effective teacher preparation programs
     - "Plus" curriculum activities for children with visual impairment

The 79 projects were implemented in the following 25 countries in 2003:

ICEVI looks forward to further collaboration with the Lee Foundation in the years to come; this is a collaboration that is having a very positive impact on children with visual impairment in developing countries. ICEVI and the Lee Foundation share the goal of equal access to education for all children and judging by response to our achievements in 2003 we are truly making a difference in "reaching blind children who have been denied their basic right to education".