Home| Keynote Speeches| Workshop Papers| Other Documents
First of all, I would
like to convey my special thanks to the organizer of this conference for
offering me this opportunity to respond to Mr. Zurita's speech in this
plenary session. To me it is such an honor, and, indeed, a challenge. I
have decided to accept this challenge given the fact that I myself have
always subscribed to the belief that "unity" and "diversity" are just equally
important. In fact, I truly believe my critical response to Mr. Zurita's
speech is as crucial and vital as my acceptance of it. The fact that ICEVI
has invited both Mr. Zurita to speak and me to respond, knowing that we
are both from the World Blind Union, indicates that we, blind people, are
no longer view as the same in virtually all aspects.
When I was asked to respond
to the keynote speech of this plenary session, I understood that the speaker
is suppose to address the question "What is Preventing the Full Participation
of Persons with Visual Impairments in Shaping the Education Process? From
my observation, the speaker seemed to build the point of his speech based
on the main theme of this conference,
"Stepping Forward Together:
families and Professionals as Partners in Achieving Education for All."
Or if I am allowed to rename the keynote speech, its title could be "What
are key factors that play significant role of shaping educational process
for the blind and severely visually handicapped people?" Saying this, I
hope that it will be OK for me to respond to the speech according to its
content and how it is related to this session.
Mr. Zurita began his speech
by expressing his gratitude to ICEVI for not taking the education as just
"strictly a technical affair." He went further by pointing out that parents,
organizations of the blind and blind people themselves have significant
role to play in the educational process in addition to that of the teachers
However, he did not go far enough to say that blind people and their organizations
could and should be allowed for full participation in shaping the educational
process. To me, full participation is more than just being taken as role-model.
We must go to reach the level that blind people are treated as partners
as stated in the theme of the conference
If we are to relate what
was said in the introductory section of this speech to the topic of this
session, the last portion of the section, which says "Most of the time,
however, the problem, more than in any other factor, lies in the belief
in a mistaken philosophy about such people," may be interpreted as a suggestion
of what really is preventing blind people from full participation in shaping
the educational process.
In the second section, what
the speaker tried to call our attention is what he pointed out as the failure
of either organizations of the blind or the educational system Although
he did not really say that such failure could be treated as one example
of what is preventing persons with visual impairment from full participation
in shaping the educational process, he did go far enough to admit that
we should focus on improving it now. However, later in this same section,
he pointed out an idea, which I think, we should take a careful look at.
This is what he said: "The World Blind Union maintains that it is more
progressive for blind and severely visually handicapped pupils to enroll
in ordinary schools, along with their sighted classmates." In this case,
if we were to say such quote again in the other way around, it would be
said as "The World Blind Union maintains that it is less progressive for
blind and severely visually handicapped pupils to enroll in residential
schools, along with their blind classmates I really wonder if the World
Blind Union as the organization
maintains such belief. And I even wonder if most of you in this room really
maintain such believe. If so, I would be end up being in the minority side.
For me, it is not the matter of more or less progressive for a blind person
to be enrolled in regular or residential schools, with sighted or blind
classmates. It is the matter of right, the matter of choice and the matter
of an individual's need. And as Mr. Zurita said later the quality of education
could not be compromised. This later statement is what I agree with, but
it did not seem to support what he had stated above.
At the end of this second section, the speaker said: "Progressive organizations of the blind certainly do not feel that learning Braille is inappropriate." Yes, indeed, it is such a mild position of "progressive organizations of the blind" concerning Braille literacy If we all want to conduct more vigorous campaign for Braille literacy, "progressive organizations of the blind" should do more than just say that they do not feel that learning Braille is inappropriate.
The third section was for
the most part well said. However, it is quite obvious that the speaker
repeatedly chose to use the term "handicapped", "visually handicapped",
severely visually handicapped" or "multi handicapped." Perhaps we need
not analyze much in detail how undesirable this word has become. Even this
organization, ICEVI, has decided to drop the word "handicapped" from its
title. It is true that blindness can lead to a handicapping condition,
but just blindness itself need not and should not be allowed to do so This
is what, I believe, organizations of the blind is all about. And this is
what, I hope, this organization (ICEVI) is all about.
As an active supporter of
access technologies for blind people, I feel very delighted to hear that
such issue has received more attention from many of us. However, we should
be aware of the term "universal design" the same way as our cautious look
at "mainstreaming." What we really need and aim for is "access" either
through common/universal design or alternative design. However, an increasing
trend toward "universal design" without any consideration of specific need,
specific design even if there are available alternatives, could be impractical
if not impossible.
The 5th section seemed to elaborate on how organizations of and for the blind could work together. The speaker highlighted this section by emphasizing on the UN Standard Rules on Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities. Although at first, he claimed that the WBU and other organizations would have preferred the other mechanism like the convention, which many countries may have some reservation to adopt due to the high cost and other complicated obstacles, the WBU did go along with this proposed guideline and has managed to fully participate in its development. Gathering from this first half of the section, I have a feeling that the speaker meant to express that the UN Standard Rules is an acceptable , not the ideal one that the WBU would have fought for.
However, near the end he seemed to embrace this guideline whole-heartedly with his statement: "We sincerely hope that all organizations of blind and severely visually handicapped people will adopt the progressive view advocated by the World Blind Union The question is whether this guideline, as adopted by the UN General Assembly, has turned out to be truly progressive more than what the WBU had originally wanted or the WBU has changed its position by lowering its expectation or whether it just means that the adopted guideline is simply more advanced than any previous international guideline concerning blind people and other people with disabilities. Next to the above statement, the speaker made the UN Standard Rules look like a convention which puts the demand on member countries to follow. It is indeed a good guideline, but I would be more cautious to say that it will carry much weight as it is just a guideline or as the speaker called "progressive philosophy." Therefore, to go against or to not tolerate any thinking, which is different from this "progressive philosophy", will be quite difficult if not impractical.
Conclusion: Although I have gone through this entire keynote speech by pointing several issues which, I think, need more attention or may lack some clarification or even some issues that I may not totally agree with the speaker, I would say that the speaker did present most of what I and probably the majority of blind people would do ourselves. Therefore, after going through the speech as critically as I could do, I would like to convey my sincere congratulations to Mr. Pedro Zurita for his invaluable and thought provoking speech. As a small person with in the WBU, I must say that Pedro has been performing excellent jobs as the Secretary General with his strength, capability and strong commitment to the work which we most have in common. That is to improve the quality of lives for all blind people. That is to tell the whole world what it means to be blind and what it takes to work with blind people, especially in the same case as ICEVI, how we from all sides could mobilize our best resource to improve the education for blind and partially sighted people around the world. As he stated in his conclusion, organizations of the blind and other parties, involved in the educational system, need to be all included to achieve the goal as stated in the UN Standard Rules by working together closely and cooperatively so that it will be a true universal guideline, not just words in paper. That is indeed a call for true action, cooperation and full participation. It is now my pleasure to ask all of us from the floor to give our speaker our big applause.