Vision Empower
Providing accessible solutions in STEM education for children with visual impairment
Vision Empower (VE) is a Not-for-Profit enterprise which empowers children with visual impairment through inclusive education. VE is incubated at IIIT Bangalore.
WHY we do what we do
The Reality
One fourth of the world’s blind population lives in India. In fact, 30% of India’s blind lose their eyesight before the age of 20 and many become blind before the age of five. Given their special needs, children with visual impairment need special resources to have the same opportunities in education as their sighted counterparts. Of the 68% of blind students who go to school, 11.5% eventually drop out (Source : "Population Enumeration Data (Final Population) in Census of India. Derived from here).
While like every other child, a child with visual impairment has the right to education, the current Indian education system and a stark lack of resources leads to majority of blind students being denied the opportunity to learn Science and Math after class 7. Therefore they cannot pursue STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) careers. In the state of Karnataka, of the 45 schools for the blind only one offers these subjects in high school.
A child with visual impairment is debilitated by a ‘wall’ on her road to STEM education.
WHAT we do
Vision Empower seeks to shift the present statistic, making STEM accessible to students with visual impairment.
Learning Resources
VE, in collaboration with its partners, is creating STEM content for students in the form of Braille books, audio books, tactile diagrams and other accessible content for each topic at all grade levels.
Anubhav : Experiential STEM Learning Programme
Anubhav is VE's flagship experiential STEM learning programme with the aim to develop the scientific temperament among children.
Pragya : Teacher Training Programme
VE teacher training workshops equip school teachers, both with visual impairements and sighted, with the methodologies that aim to make STEM lessons interesting and effective.
Ananda : Hand-holding Programme for Students
VE volunteers work with students to reinforce STEM learning through after-school engagements.
Assistive Technologies
VE has initiated several research projects to design and develop assistive technology to enable students with visual impairment to learn STEM concepts on par with their sighted peers.
WHO We Are
The Empowering Ecosystem
Team VE, along with our partners, collaborate to create accessible content, instruction kits and technologies to assist the teaching and learning of STEM for children with visual impairment.
Team
People at the heart of VE
Know More
VIDHYA: Visually impaired since birth, Vidhya overcame immense challenges to become the first blind student to study math at the higher secondary level in Karnataka and the first blind student to pursue a computer science major in her university. She is the motivation behind Vision Empower and aims to break down barriers in STEM education for the blind.
SUPRIYA: an IT professional with over two decades of experience is the powerhouse behind Vision Empower. Her experience in volunteering as a teacher to children with visual impairments since 2015 provided an impetus to conceive Vision Empower.
AMIT PRAKASH: is an Associate Professor at IIIT Bangalore. He actively engages with the notion of inclusion in designing digital technologies and democratizing social systems for his research and consulting endeavours.
Our valuable core team of ADITYA, RAJ, SHILPA, mentors and student interns who help build / steer the vision with more ambitious projects, connects.
Know MoreOur Partners
Big dreams, great ambitions need superstars to complete the ecosystem. These are our star partners and collaborators.
Vividha Trust
Matru Chaya Trust
Mitra Jyothi Trust
XRCVC
Tactile Center, Assistech Labs, IIT Delhi
IIITB
Touchétech Labs
VE Supporters
IIITB
WIPRO
Samsung
Let's Tag On
Omega Healthcare
Elektrobit
Volunteers
Make a difference to your life. We have such heartwarming stories to share!
A journey with VE is enriching and rewarding...
Take Maruthu, who enjoys learning/playing along with our 5th grade Prajwal, every saturday at SRMAB, or Nalina who helped with Maria or Biswesh who was a participant in the hackathon.
If you are looking for a meaningful way to contribute to society and wish to join us in this endeavour, we would be more than happy to hear from you! There are myriads of ways you could help us. Please write to supriya@visionempowertrust.org
The BUZZ
News & Events
Making STEM accessible with the aid of Geometry Boxes
Vision Empower is sincerely grateful to Mr. Balaji Varadarajan for contributing to this endeavour of making STEM accessible, by donating geometry boxes to all the schools using funds he has earned for his contribution as a Programming language trainer for visually impaired persons.
Science to be easily accessible to visually impaired school children
In what could be a boost in Science education for the visually impaired, the Indian Institute of Information Technology-Bangalore (IIIT-B) has developed a technology to help generate tactile images of diagrams in Science textbooks faster.
MoU with Enability Foundation
VE and Enability Foundation incubated at IIT Madras signed an MoU on 6th of August 2019 to collaborate on creation of tactile diagrams using Tactograph, a product designed by Enability. The two teams will work on making more tactile diagrams available to VI teachers and students for Science and Math. The team at Enability Foundation…
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An Empowering Odyssey
Vidhya’s Journey with VE: Inspired by the Cause
With her teaching experience for sighted children, Vidhya took up the challenge of designing accessible curriculum for Grades 1 and 2 for children with visual impairment. She talks of how she forged past her discomforts and inexperience, and successfully takes up the challenge.
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Volunteering with Commitment : Devidatta Ghosh
Devidutta’s discussion with Supriya kindled a curiosity about the possibility of using a customized version of the activities and teaching aids she was using for sighted children. With her long-standing commitment, she is helping in developing Teacher Instruction Content and looking to contribute in other ways too.
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PRAGYA 2019: REFLECTIONS AND EXPERIENCES
The teachers training program, Pragya 2019, conducted on the 26th, 27th and 28th of June, served as a platform for many science and math teachers in the state to come together for 3 days of learning and fun. The event offered an opportunity for teachers to brush up their skills, learn through the experiences of other teachers in the group, and also get to know one another closely, creating a community that enables its members to learn from one another.
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Publications
ICT Trends : United Nations Asian and Pacific Training Centre for Information and Communication Technology for Development (APCICT) created for inter-governmental organizations
CodeTalk: Improving Programming Environment Accessibility for Visually Impaired Developers
“We can go anywhere”: Understanding independence through a case study of ride-hailing use by people with visual impairments in metropolitan India
YOU & VE
Volunteer with Us
Students with visual impairment do better in smaller groups and with individual attention. Volunteers like you can play a crucial role in filling the gap and making STEM accessible to students. If you would like to know more about our volunteering opportunities drop us a line at admin@visionempowertrust.org. We’ll be happy to talk to you.
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