It’s our job at the Colorado Center for the Blind to believe in our students, often well-before they begin to believe in themselves.

“We see you struggle when you first come for training, ” Assistive Technology Instructor Brett Boyer often says, “but we also have the privilege of watching you grow … and it’s always amazing.”

It is a privilege, and a joy. But it’s not a passive observation, because all of our instructors teach, challenge, push a little, pull a little, and encourage all along the way to give our students the opportunity to learn the things that make them increasingly independent and to develop the resilience and ingenuity to continue to learn and grow after the student moves on. Students go on to work or more training or college or, as happens sometimes, back to the work they did before they became blind.

This article appeared in USA Today yesterday, November 17. It features our graduate Erin Daley, of whom we are naturally quite proud. In the article, Erin mentions that she loves to travel and will be visiting the Baltic countries. Well, she’s on her way right now!

If you’re a sighted person, you likely have misconceptions about blind people. Time to educate yourselves.

Check out this story on usatoday.com

Nothing tempers the desire of our students to find the tools and the belief in themselves that will sustain them in their quest to live lives of independence and success!

And so, still cautious, still wearing masks indoors all day, the Colorado Center for the Blind carries on with the training and the programs that will give our blind students those tools – in the kitchen, at the (computer) keyboard, reading electronic Braille displays and traveling the Denver Metro area on RTD. Indeed, these are the tools upon which to build for a lifetime!

Late this spring we determined to bring challenge recreation back for our students. We set it aside for over a year for reasons of social distancing, etc. First, We arranged to go whitewater rafting in Idaho Springs, where we’d gone for almost ten years, and it was great to be back on Clear Creek with some old friends!

Meanwhile, martin Becerrra-Miranda was tasked with finding a new company to guide our Independence Training Program students on rock climbing excursions.

“I think these guys might be the ones,” Martin said after talking with Dan Krug of Denver Climbing Co. “They just get it.”

His reasoning was sound. Dan K told Martin he started rock climbing to address his own anxiety.

“I felt trapped (by anxiety) until I discovered rock climbing” says Dan. “It provided me with an avenue to push my limits in a controlled environment with supportive people. These factors acted as mental scaffolding to provide support as my brain relearned my actual potential and ability. I remember this with every client I take rock climbing and recreate the circumstances that helped me.”

The certificate has arrived! Of course, the winners of the 2021 Littleton Western Welcome Week Grand Parade were announced back in August, but now that we have that piece of paper we can’t help but crow a little!

And so we won first prize in the Group/School category! Hooray!

Was it the noisemakers? Was it the matching T-shirts? Was it the goofy object Gene wore on his head? Those probably all helped, but it was more likely the excitement and the sense of release as we shook our tamborines and maracas and chanted, “Who are we? CCB!” as we marched the parade route.

When:

October 30th, 2:30 to 4:30 PM

Where:

Denver Marriott South at Park Meadows and everywhere

10345 Park Meadows Drive, Lone Tree, CO 80124

Dear Families and TVIs,

Please join us for a discussion about the journeys you are taking with your children. This event will take place during the National Federation of the Blind of Colorado State Convention. We are excited to host a panel of professionals discussing the items to be considered on the journey, beginning with birth and continuing through adulthood.

Panelists:

Tanni Anthony, Ph.D.

Director, Access, Learning and Literacy, Exceptional Student Services, Colorado Department of Education Consultant on Blindness/Visual Impairment

Carlton Anne Cook Walker

It’s Etiquette Day in Home Management, and one of our newest students decided to dress up for the occasion. Sure, his attire is not strictly “black-tie” but definitely a cut or two above our normal business casual.

For Etiquette Day our Home Management teachers, Delfina and Stefanie walk students through everything from proper place settings to the techniques of maintaining polite manners when you can’t see your food.

Dan H took this as an opportunity to set himself apart. Every item from the brown felt hat, to the suit coat from Korea, to the tiny tie and the rings and beads, have some significance related to important people in his life – his mother and father, his sisters and his fiancée.

They love Chaz Davis in his hometown of Grafton, Mass. But we are just as proud of him here in Littleton, Colo. at the Colorado Center for the Blind!

Chaz, a 2016 Paralympian in Rio and a 2017 graduate of CCB, won the Boston Marathon’s visually impaired division on October 11. It was the 125th Boston Marathon, but the first year that this division was available for blind runners to register in. Previous blind marathoners in Boston just … well, ran.

Blind runners run with a guide to whom they are tethered, meaning that the guide and blind runner must be carefully matched as far as speed and endurance, and marathon runners may change guides during a race.

Join us in-person for a combined Learning Box and FAST rocket-building activity!

When:

October 16th, 2021
1:00 to 3:00 p.m.

Where:

Colorado Center for the Blind
2233 W. Shepperd Ave.
Littleton, CO 80120

Register by:

October 12, 2021