Overbrook Blog

The Penn-Del AER Spring Vision Conference is being held from April 21 - 23, 2010 in Grantville, PA. This conference has a long history as a nationally-respected venue for professionals in the vision field to share their knowledge and experience with colleagues and to learn from international leaders in our profession.

This year, Overbrook is exceptionally proud to announce that two High School students, Jeffrey Boudwin and Donal Buie will be presenting “Mobilize Your Life”, an overview of the Braille Plus Mobile Manager. The students are not only end users who have a full range of knowledge on the subject, they are also two students managing Senior Year, College Classes and extra curricular activities as well.

We are very proud of Jeff and Donal for all of the effort that they have put into preparing for their presentation, and for being brave enough to share that knowledge with professionals in the vision field.

Way to go guys! We hope everyone enjoys their session on Thursday, April 22nd! For more information, please visit the Penn-Del AER website.

The Tenement Museum tells the stories of 97 Orchard Street. Built on Manhattan’s Lower East Side in 1863, this tenement apartment building was home to nearly 7000 working class immigrants. They faced challenges we understand today: making a new life, working for a better future, starting a family with limited means. In recognizing the importance of this seemingly ordinary building, the Tenement Museum has re-imagined the role that museums can play in our lives. Hands on tours are available for those who are blind or visually impaired. Click here for more information or visit http://www.tenement.org. Accessible Tours are listed here as well.

American Foundation for the Blind’s CareerConnect is a free resource for people who want to learn about the range and diversity of jobs performed by adults who are blind or visually impaired throughout the United States and Canada. Whether you are a student exploring careers, a job seeker investigating work options, an employer planning to diversify your workforce, a professional working with visually impaired people; or, a friend or family member assisting someone who is blind or has low vision, this web site can help you!

* Success Stories: Medical Transcriptionist—learn more about this growing field
* “Attitude Adjusters”—the latest installment in Aaron’s Adventures in Employment, presented as an old-time radio drama
* Watch or listen to two free online seminars for professionals working with children and adults with visual impairments.

Log in to My CareerConnect where you can develop a Personal Data Sheet and build a resume, keep up with your appointments using an electronic calendar, and more.

If you are not a registered user, consider becoming one—it’s free and easy! Register for free as a My CareerConnect User.

Search for a Mentor — their careers range from fitness trainer to voice-over actress.

For further assistance, contact the CareerConnect staff at 888-824-2184 or e-mail us at: careerconnect@afb.net.

If you don’t know about Family Connect, it is worth a visit to their amazing and comprehensive website:

FamilyConnect™. For parents of children with visual impairments
Brought to you by: American Foundation for the Blind and National Association for Parents of Children with Visual Impairments

On FamilyConnect you’ll find videos, personal stories, events, announcements, and an online community to help you guide your child to the life he or she wants.

They have both an Ask the Experts Blog as well as a Parent’s Voice Blog. Family Connect has a tremendous amount of resources for families with children who have visual impairments — and they have support systems in place to help you assist your child to meet his or her personal goals.

Please take a few moments to learn more about this wonderful community and organization.

FamilyConnect™ has a number of resources for parents of children and teenagers who are blind or visually impaired. If you are looking for fun, accessible games and activities for the holiday season, we hope you will find the following links helpful.

Holiday Gift Giving Guide

Toy Guide—AFB has been collaborating with the Toy Industry Foundation for over a decade creating this guide, Let’s Play: A Guide to Toys for Children with Special Needs. All of the toys are tested by dozens of children with vision loss, and we choose the ones that seem to be most popular. The guide indicates whether the toy is considered especially good for children who are blind (B) and children who have low vision (LV).

Jennifer Lowe, Assistive Technology Specialist with PaTTAN and expertise in Augmentative Communication collaborated with the PA Deafblind Initiative to develop this document that is a summary of web-based resources, both in PA as well as the nation. We think its a wonderful resource for parents, educators and advocates. Please feel free to share this document with others.

The Delaware County Times newspaper highlighted the athletic abilities of one of OSB’s top swimmers — Lucy Miller.

UPPER DARBY — Senior year has been a championship swimming season for a township teen at Overbrook School for the Blind in Philadelphia.

Lucy, 19, found success in the pool and has been awarded five ribbons as keepsakes of her successful competitions.

“I’ve practically been swimming my whole life,” Lucy said. “I’ve been on the Overbrook Huskies team for three years and received the Spirit Award at the regional championships,” against teams from New York, West Virginia and Maryland last month.

Read more here…

Reading for the Blind and Dyslexic Individual Memberships are now free to those with proper certification.

Thanks to major funding from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs, Grant #H327D090001 and support of private donors, RFB&D Individual Membership is now free to individuals with proper certification*.

We are pleased to make this offer available to all students so that they may complement their in-school class work at home. Registering for this free membership provides access to the entire library of more than 55,000 audio textbooks and literature titles for research and leisure reading.

We would like to thank J.D. Dougherty, a wonderful parent of an Overbrook Student and active member of PERC. He has a blog where he updates information about P.E.R.C. — Overbrook’s Parent Organization. Check it out and say hello!

CBS 3 spotlighted our good friends at The Barn at Spring Brook Farm and the students of Overbrook. (excerpted from CBS Website)

Watch the video clip here

Brotherly Love: Farm For Special-Needs Kids

Children and animals — when you put the two together you get a great story and a unique way to help kids with disabilities! Mary Beth Drobish has always loved children and animals. One day, she decided to bring the two passions under one barn.

Sit back and enjoy the hay ride with children from the Overbrook School for the Blind.

Welcome to Spring Brook Farm. Mary Beth Drobish, a widow, built this farm three years ago so kids with special needs could enjoy what country life has to offer.

“To me, this is a very special experience — to go to a farm, be in a barn and work with the animals,” said Drobish.

Not only do kids work with the 23 farm animals, they get to sit on them, feed them, and, of course, milk the cow.

Read more on CBS’s website