The world of the visually impaired seems reclusive especially for normal people in society. But with the new Learning Centre which was opened last month and is located at the Bangkok School for the Blind on Ratchawithi Road, it’s perhaps a new beginning where people can get to understand more about them.
“We wanted a central place where people could come and learn more about the school as well as the education of blind people,” said Ruksuk Chairanjuansakul, headmaster of the Bangkok School for the Blind, of the new learning centre which is also supported by HSBC Bank. As an educational organisation that has been around a relatively long time, the Bangkok School for the Blind regularly receives visitors who come to the school to observe methods for educating the blind. To that end, according to Ruksuk, the Learning Centre was established to showcase the school’s history, resources and contributors.
The place features several exhibits on the legacy of the school, beginning with a biography of one of the school’s founders, Genevieve Caulfield, a blind American woman who created the Foundation for the Blind in Thailand in 1939 out of a passion to provide an education for the visually disabled. The exhibit even features a voice recording of Caulfield herself, recorded in 1955. Other exhibits are presented on the topic of education such as voice recording machines, Braille-typers and even textured globes and maps, so students can touch and “feel” the shapes of countries.
There is a part which portrays a “Wall of Fame” of sorts, dedicated to highlighting the contributors and dignitaries involved in the foundation, displaying famous alumni and details of the donations made by the royal family. All descriptions are available in Thai, English and Braille.
While currently still a single room, the headmaster said that there are already plans to expand the centre to include a wider variety of learning tools such as Braille printers. The problem, however, lies in the cost of these machines, a lot of which have price tags of at least hundreds of thousands of baht.
Braille maps for studying geography.
“Learning equipment for visually-impaired people is tremendously costly as most companies see developing technology for disabled people as a fruitless investment,” Ruksuk commented.
The lack of manufactured media items that can be used by blind people has also led to a lower accessibility of information for the visually-impaired. “When a new book is released in Thailand, the sighted can just buy it from the store and read it. For a blind person, their choices are limited to either having the books read to them, or waiting months for a Braille version of the book, which costs much more than the regular version,” said Ruksuk.
“In many other countries, the government alleviates this problem by offering to cover the difference in manufacturing the Braille version for the publishers, provided both versions are released at the same time and sold at the same price. This way, publishers are encouraged to publish more books that are accessible to the visually impaired, and the gap of accessibility to information is greatly reduced.”
While the Thai government does offer an annual support budget for the school, the amount offered by the government is negligible at best, said the chairwoman of the Foundation for the Blind, Khunying Uraiwan Sirinupong.
“The funds provided to us by the government don’t even come close to being enough,” said Khunying Uraiwan. “We also have to rely on financial aid from organisations in the private sector and their generous donations.”
HSBC Bank is one of the foundation’s corporate supporters who provided the funds for the construction of the Learning Centre. In a happy coincidence, it turns out that HSBC Bank has a history with visually impaired individuals. In fact, one of the men who helped invent the Chinese version of Braille was the very first manager of the bank in Shanghai more than a century ago, according to Varanandha Sutthapreeda, head of communications of HSBC Thailand.
“We support the construction of the Learning Centre for the Blind for its purposes in education; not only for the people who are interested in learning about the legacy or the tools used in the school, but also the visually-impaired as well, so that they may better understand how the methods of caring for blind people have evolved over the years,” said Varanandha.
Ruksuk also stressed the importance of education for the visually-impaired, saying that by giving them the knowledge and skills they need, blind people will not only become less dependent on the help of others, they may even turn out to be positive contributors to society.
“Education benefits everyone, from blind people themselves to their friends and family,” said Ruksuk. “By giving them the necessary tools to take care of themselves, not only will their family members be able to contribute more to society as they won’t have to worry about them all the time, but blind people themselves can also gain more confidence to strike out and contribute.”
While education is a start, however, Ruksuk also brought up the importance of understanding and consideration from other members of society, especially businesses, which rarely ever consider people with any kind of physical disabilities, let alone blindness.
“Don’t just write donation cheques or buy blind children lunch solely out of pity,” he said.
“Those things can only keep our students fed and full for a time, but they are only temporary. Instead, we should work together to create sustainability for all kinds of disabled people through education so that they may have the opportunity to depend on themselves as individuals.
“As it currently is, the government has a required quota for businesses employing over 100 people to employ at least one physically-impaired person.
“The reality, however, is that many businesses would still rather pay the penalty tax than hire physically-impaired employees. They’re not even giving these people a chance.”
Some of the tools used throughout the school’s history.
Khunying Uraiwan and a girl from the school lead the students in singing before lunch.
