Recreational gift for visually-impaired

Visually impaired children on the island will soon have access to a new exciting collection of equipment geared to providing them access to fun games and sports.

The Progressive Optimist Club of Barbados (POCB) in partnership with St. Vincent’s School for the Visually Impaired in Liverpool England, on Monday made a Sight-box presentation to the Barbados Council for the Disabled.

The collection of games, called a Sightbox, was created by visually impaired children from St Vincent’s School who were extremely concerned about the lack of access to equipment and technology for visually impaired children and individuals living in third-world countries.

The Sight-box container comes with equipment designed with blind and visually impaired children in mind, with the added benefit of allowing them to play these games with other children who have their full sight.

During the morning’s presentation, President of the Barbados Council for the Disabled, Kerryann Ifill, thanked the club for its generous donation, and said that persons with disabilities should be given equal opportunities to participate in sporting activities.

“A lot of people misguidedly think that persons who become disabled, have no interest or aptitude to participate in organized sports, and that leisure time activities are confined to sitting at home listening to radios.

As we move to more healthy existence, it is important that all persons be provided with opportunities to exercise, enjoy, and envelope the team spirit and camaraderie that we all need to get through with life challenges and its difficulties,” she said.

POCB president, Eleanor Rice, told the media that the presentation was an important one to the club, as it keeps in line with the Optimist International’s theme of focusing on “Children with Learning Disabilities”.

“This presentation means a lot to us at Progressive Optimist, and this Sight-box was initiated by Andre Davidson, who is our PR person.
After nearly a year we are so happy and very pleased to be able to make the presentation here this morning,” she said. (SB)