On 25th November 2022, VE conducted an Anubhav- Experiential STEM Learning session with the students from Higher School for the Blind, Palayamkottai, Tirunelveli in Tamil Nadu. 45 students with visual impairments from grades 1-8 actively participated in the day-long Anubhav workshop which was divided into two parts- Maths & Science....
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Vision Empower conducted its first-ever Teacher Training in Jharkhand 21st and 22nd of November 2022. The training was conducted in the capital city at Brajkishore Netraheen Balika Vidyalaya. A total of 7 teachers from 3 special schools attended the training which focused on equipping them in teaching STEM concepts to...
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“I pledge to enhance digital skills of women and girls with visual impairment”, shared Vidhya Y in the discussion conducted by World Summit on Information and Society (WSIS) Forum 2022 on 22nd November 2022. The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) Forum 2022 represents the world’s largest annual gathering...
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VE joins hands with the Odisha government to implement its interventions that aim to make STEM education accessible for students with visual impairment. Read the news here.
“Volunteerism is the voice of the people put into action. These actions shape and mould the present into a future of which we can all be proud.” – Helen Dyer As part of celebrating the month of giving, our partner- Microsoft India decided to give Vision Empower one of the...
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VE’s co-founder Vidhya Y was invited as a speaker at the Intuit India Accessibility Summit conducted on 9th November 2022. Vidhya shared about her challenges with getting accessible education as a child with visual impairment and how that motivated her to start Vusion Empower, a not-for-profit organisation working to make...
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VE conducted its first in-person Pragya Teacher Training at the Devnar School in Hyderabad, Telangana. A total of 10 Science & Math subject teachers attended the one-day training. The training was facilitated by VE Coordinators Meghna Chowdury, Nibin Mathew, Rajeswari Pandurangan and Shiladitya Datta.
Vision Empower was invited by Giftabled India to demonstrate the usage of the Hexis Antara solution at an assistive technology expo organized by Goldman Sachs in Hyderabad.
Vision Empower participated in the fifth EMPOWER Conference conducted by IIIT-Bangalore at IIT Madras Research Park, Chennai. The conference witnessed various stakeholders in the assistive technology sector, including researchers, organizations, industries and policymakers coming together to create and share 'Assistive Technology Solutions.
On 1 st October (Saturday), 11 teachers from the special school attended the teacher training workshop conducted by Vision Empower. Out of them, 4 teachers are visually impaired. It was an online training facilitated by VE Educational Coordinators Ms Devidatta, Ms Jyoti and Ms Prerana.
On Wednesday, September 28, 2022 Vision Empower's co-founder Vidhya Y was acknowledged and honoured at the 13th NCPEDP-Mphasis Universal Design Awards, along with 14 other innovators for her work in making STEM education accessible for children with visual impairment.
(Teacher Training at Pune, Maharashtra).
As Vision Empower (VE) continues to meet its goal of reaching 100 schools for the academic session 2022-23, we are training teachers from special schools every month. This month, we conducted a Pragya Teacher Training on the 12th and 13th of September at the Poona School and Home for Blind, Pune, Maharashtra. 22 teachers from 6 schools of Maharasthra, 5 from Pune and 1 from Mumbai, participated in the training aimed to equip teachers with accessible STEM teaching methodologies & resources.
The IEPVD Boys and Girls School at Agartala, Tripura celebrated Teachers' Day on 5th September. As Vision Empower closely works with the teachers and students from IEPVD, Sudipta- VE's School Coordinator was invited to the celebration by the students she regularly conducts VICT sessions with.
Vision Empower conducted a two-day Pragya Teacher Training in hybrid mode, in IEPVD Boys’ and Girls’ School, Narsingarh, Agartala. The training was focused on foundational concepts of Algebra, Geometry and Science module. A session on Braille literacy with students was also conducted.
Vision Empower conducted a Pragya Teacher Training workshop in collaboration with the Department of Special Education, Avinashilingam Institute for Home Science & Higher Education for Women in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu under the able guidance of Dr Victoria Naomi, Dean of Special Education, School of Education at the Institute.
On 12th August 2022, Vision Empower (VE) in partnership with IIIT-Bangalore and Microsoft Research hosted, Shri Ashok Chandra Panda, Minister of Science and Technology, Public Enterprises and SSEPD (Social Security and Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities) along with Mr Bhaskar Jyoti Sarma – Secretary, SSEPD (Social Security and Empowerment of...
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After a much-awaited wait due to the pandemic, students enjoyed learning STEM concepts through fun and accessible practicals in the Anubhav sessions. A series of 3 Anubhav sessions were conducted by Vision Empower at 3 schools in Bangalore, namely Mathru Educational Trust for the blind, Jyothi Seva School and The...
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A comprehension reading activity was conducted by Vision Empower with students from The Karnataka Welfare Association For Blind (KWAB) on the occasion of Helen Keller Day. The students were divided into two groups for the reading activity. The first set of students were taken to a classroom where the VE coordinators handed the Hexis device to each one of them.
It’s been 142 years since Helen Keller, an American author, lecturer and political activist was born in Alabama, U.S.A. She is celebrated for being the first deafblind person to earn a B.A. degree and begin a revolution in the level of awareness in society about the capabilities of people with blindness and deafness.
Vidhya Y, one of the founding members of Vision Empower was invited as a Resource Person at the Consultation on Capacity building for People With Disabilities (PwDs) in Internet Governance organized by the Asia-Pacific School on Internet Governance (APSIG) in partnership with the Internet Society's Accessibility Standing Group
A three-day Pragya Teacher Training was conducted by VE in collaboration with Mathruchhaya Trust, Bangalore. A total of 27 teachers participated in person out of which 7 are sighted, 2 have low-vision and the rest 18 teachers are persons with visual impairment. 6 teachers participated online via zoom.
"We never thought numeracy concepts can be taught to children using Braille card games”,said teachers of the National Association for the Blind (NAB), Haldwani after attending the teacher training.
As the first child to be born blind in Thirumagondanahalli village located on the outskirts of Bengaluru, Vidhya Y faced many challenges. Read this article written by Tenzin Norzom to learn how Vidhya came up with solutions to the obstacles she faced.
“15% of the world’s population lives with some or the other form of disability” shares Vidhya Y in the panel discussion conducted by World Summit on Information and Society (WSIS) Forum 2022 on 28th April to celebrate Girls in ICT Day. The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) Forum...
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In this article written by Anjali Krishnan, co-founder of Vision Empower Vidhya Y shares her experience and inspiration behind starting a non-profit organization called Vision Empower.
Vision Empower revived its offline teacher training after a long time of conducting numerous online teacher training. The three-day Pragya Teacher Training was conducted in Tripura from 30th March to 1st April 2022 by VE facilitators Devidatta Ghosh, Meghna Chowdhury, Sudipta Ray Chaudhury and Rajagopal N.
"A vision to guide the challenged"- VIDHYA Y'S STORY FEATURED IN THE INDIAN EXPRESS Mocked for choosing mathematics in her childhood and discouraged by several institutions and teachers against pursuing science, Vidhya Y defied all odds to not just bag gold medals in her Masters, but is today leading other visually-challenged people to taste success, through effective learning in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) courses.
Vidhya Y attended the annual event of Entrepreneurship Cell & MSME Cell of NITIE (National Institute of Industrial Engineering ) Mumbai as a speaker. Vidhya Y shared her story of success.
A fireside chat by Vision Empower
The National Science Day is celebrated every year on 28th February in India to mark the contributions of scientists towards the development of the country. On this day, in 1928, Indian Physicist Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman made an important discovery in the field of spectroscopy, which was later named after him – the Raman Effect.
VE conducted an online science quiz for students from grades 3 to 10 from all the schools VE engages with. There were over 140 students who answered the Science and Nemeth related questions in the quiz and over 16 students got all the answers correct.
Speech by the students on Sir C V Raman on the occasion of National Science Day
We bring to you a fireside chat by industry experts on the occasion of National Science Day 2022. The speakers for the talk 'STEM Education- The need for it be to be Experiential and Inclusive!' would be Mr Kartik Sawhney and Dr Procheta Mallik.
“The current generation has over 1.1 million children with visual impairment in India yet in all the generations till now, less than 50 of them have chosen to study STEM subjects beyond high school”, shares Vidhya Y in the panel discussion conducted by World Summit on Information and Society (WSIS) Forum 2022 on the International Day for Women and Girls in Science.
On 4th January 2022 on the occasion of World Braille Day, Vidhya Y, the co-founder of Vision Empower moderated a panel discussion organised by the Cognizant Foundation. The topic of the panel was “An inclusive society for persons with visual impairments” where experts working in this field came together as...
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On the occasion of International Braille Day 2022, Vision Empower launches its Braille Reading Initiative at schools.
On International Braille Day 2022, Vision Empower expresses its gratitude to the co-creators of Hexis, Rajagopal N and Paul D’ Souza. Hexis is an electronic Braille reader which automatically converts text to Braille on a refreshable Braille display.
We have all heard or read about the inventor of the Braille script, Louis Braille. Louis was born on January 4 in 1809 in France and became blind after a childhood accident at the age of 3. But, he quickly mastered his new way of living. When Louis was only 15 years old, he created the Braille reading and writing system based on Charles Barbier’s night writing system (a note-taking system he invented of embossed dots to represent sounds).
(International Day for Persons with Disabilities, 3rd Dec 2021) A rainbow, out of the many storms that the Covid-19 pandemic brought, has been the increased usage of platforms like zoom. While we’ve all talked about the zoom fatigue and the boredom people faced all day working from home, there is a brighter side too. Assistive technology platforms like this have played an important role in empowering people with various disabilities to become contributors in conferences and events where earlier they would be mere participants.
(A talk by Vidhya Y in WSIS Forum 2022 Brainstorming Session) “Technology is a great enabler, it’s a necessity for women with visual impairment rather than a luxury”, says our co-founder Vidhya Y in a brainstorming discussion conducted by World Summit on the Information Society(WSIS).
(A Pragya Teacher Training Session with the graduates of NIEPVD) Over 20 Bachelors in Education (B. Ed) students from the National Institute For The Empowerment Of Persons With Visual Disabilities (NIEPVD), Tamil Nadu, attended the training which focussed on introducing the fresh graduates to Computational Thinking concepts through games.
