deccanherald-synergy-13oct2008

Synergy: A network for 'visual' empowerment

By L Subramani, DH News Service, Bangalore:

A group of visually challenged students from various city colleges have on Sunday created a network called 'Synergy' to spread awareness about issues concerning visually challenged and reaching out to the blind youth in rural areas as primary objectives.

According to the students, the network will also work as a bridge between experts and fellow (blind) students to get them much needed help in skill-building and personality development to face challenges that await them in the job market.

Challenges

“As students who have been facing those challenges ourselves, we are in a position to identify them and look for the source from where we can get help,” says Vishal, a commerce student from the Jain College.

The first plan of action is to extend the network beyond the usual confines of organisation or institution and become the best source of support for students in the City.

“This is important, as a lot of us from the rural areas don't know exactly who to approach for help,” explains Amit, also a commerce student.

“One of the major issues all of us face is inaccessibility of textbooks, particularly materials for competitive exams,” points out Swathi T P, a student from BMS college.

“Copyright laws and lack of awareness (amongst publishers) about our needs would mean that we face an uphill task in preparing for the competitive exams. We would like to address this by explaining our position to the publishers and urge them to make the soft-copies of the materials available to us.”

The students will also reach out to corporate houses and colleges in the city to explore ways of achieving greater integration of the visually challenged with the mainstream society. They would also work more closely with NGOs to turn their focus towards the students. Rajani Gopal, a visually challenged volunteer/guide to the group, who works with reputed corporate in the city, mentioned that despite the NGOs doing a commendable job in rehabilitation and basic skills for the visually challenged, more focus needs to be given to issues of students.

Mainstream life

“Most NGOs have good (training) infrastructure, which can be utilised to provide help for students in career orientation and equipping (college students) to cope with mainstream life,” adds Syed Imran, another student member.

While appealing for greater support from student bodies in colleges and employee networks in companies, the students also released a long list of activities such as conducting lectures on communication, quizzes and debates. They hope such activities would help visually challenged students come together.

The network can be reached at: strengthofsynergy@gmail.com

Source: http://www.deccanherald.com/Content/Oct132008/state2008101394857.asp

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