Hi Jimmy, I definitely agree that this would be a very good topic for our check in call. I really appreciate everyone?s comments on the presentation. By the way, I was one of the folks they talked to, and videoed. I did so only because our Executive Director asked that I do so. It was fine, but I am a bit gun shy around these folks, past experience has taught me to be very wary of their underlying intent. So, Here is my thoughts on the presentation: An airliner and a Greyhound bus have several similarities of purpose, and also share some similar characteristics, such as both are for the purpose of transporting passengers over long distances. Also, each of them have components such as rows of seats, wheels and tires, ventilation systems, at least one engine, an instrument panel, a means of control, and require somebody to control the vehicle. Nonetheless, no matter what you might add on to a Greyhound bus, you can?t make an airliner out of a Greyhound bus. I felt as though they truly want to find a way to make it possible for blind and low vision individuals to become COMS instructors, but at the same time they don?t seem able to grasp the simple fact that the sun doesn?t revolve around the Earth. A paradigm shift would come at a very heavy price for the Conventional school of thought, and I don?t think they are able to grasp that their model cannot be modified to meet the demands of truly equal access for blind instructors, and that bolting on a few non-visual monitoring techniques is going to solve the problems they are running into. By the way, I mentioned to them several times that if they want to understand how all this works, they need to talk with the experts at the PDRIB. I haven?t heard where that has happened. I also suggested that they might simply want to send their blind and low vison students to Louisiana Tech, and have them get their training there. Well, all of that aside, they are very nice people, I think they are well meaning, and perhaps their efforts will have a positive impact in another generation or two. Jeff From: NOMC <nomc-bounces at lists.nbpcb.org> On Behalf Of Jimmy Morris Sent: Wednesday, September 20, 2023 5:10 PM To: jackson.dezman at gmail.com Cc: NOMC Mailing list <nomc at lists.nbpcb.org> Subject: Re: [Nomc] Wonderring about how many attended the Presentation last evening I do agree with a lot of this. I think this may be a great topic for us to discuss at our check-in meeting with everyone on October 16th . How does this sound to everyone? Jimmie Morris On Sep 20, 2023, at 3:40 PM, jackson.dezman at gmail.com <mailto:jackson.dezman at gmail.com> wrote: ? Jeff, I did attend it. Firstly, very nice comments you had. I feel like Dr. Laura Bosman had the most progressive thinking out of the 2 presenters. It was kind of hard to get a read on Dr. Griffin-Shirley. I know the presentation centered around accommodating blind and low vision O&M instructor trainees as it related to instruction, but I guess I was surprised and had forgotten about the lack of emphasis on personal travel skill development in these programs as opposed to our program at Tech. It seems that their observations of blind instructors centered mostly if not completely around NOMC, which is great, but I would love to see them expand it to a larger group and/or those trained under the COMS/ACVREP model. Would love to hear your thoughts Jeff. Thanks, Dezman From: NOMC <nomc-bounces at lists.nbpcb.org <mailto:nomc-bounces at lists.nbpcb.org> > On Behalf Of Altman, Jeff Sent: Tuesday, September 19, 2023 11:46 AM To: NOMC Mailing list <NOMC at lists.nbpcb.org <mailto:NOMC at lists.nbpcb.org> > Subject: [Nomc] Wonderring about how many attended the Presentation last evening Hello Everyone, I?m wondering how many of you attended the ?Successful Strategies Employed by O&M Candidates and Blind O&M Specialists,? presented by Dr. Nora Griffin-Shirley last evening? I?m also interested in hearing your thoughts on it. I certainly have my own thoughts on it, but I would like to hear what others think before I give my thoughts. Jeff _______________________________________________ NOMC mailing list NOMC at lists.nbpcb.org <mailto:NOMC at lists.nbpcb.org> http://lists.nbpcb.org/listinfo.cgi/nomc-nbpcb.org