Blindness is Not a Barrier to Success, Perceptions Are!

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Description

Kristin Smedley will open your eyes to SEE blindness in a new light. Warning: her stories of raising two blind sons and a sighted daughter cause a lot of laughter!

Participants will:
1. Understand that our perceptions of blindness are driving expectations and causing outcomes
2. Understand that ACCESS to tools and resources is the key to succeeding without sight
3. Be ignited to Set Extraordinary Expectations for the blind/visually impaired people they serve
4. Be armed with concrete examples of thriving with blindness.

This session is presented by Kristen Smedley.

Contributors

Kristin Smedley

Kristin Smedley’s mantra is “Life is funny... sort of.” Her fun‐loving spirit and energetic personality guided her life in the direction of a career in teaching. However, when her two sons were born blind, Kristin walked away from the classroom to teach her sons how to navigate a world they could not see. Knowing that Michael and Mitchell needed their mother to fight for them, Kristin began advocating for the tools her blind children needed.

In 2011, Kristin launched a nonprofit to fund research and resources for children living with the rare eye disease her sons have, CRB1 LCA/RP. In just nine years, the Curing Retinal Blindness Foundation has raised over 1.4 million dollars and achieved a National Rare Eye Disease Awareness Day. In 2019, Kristin published her first book called Thriving Blind: Stories of Real People Succeeding Without Sight. It achieved #1 New Release on Amazon for paperback and kindle. Kristin partnered with TMobile and the National Braille Press to make the book available in Braille. She used that book to catapult an engaged and supportive online community called Thriving Blind Academy which connects families living with blindness to each other and to mentors and resources for succeeding without sight.

Kristin lives in suburban Philadelphia with her three children and two rescue dogs.