No Job While Student Teaching

“Get a good education and you’ll go far.” Those words are the compass for my life. Most people would say this to be true for themselves as well, but as a blind person this has also been a prayer, praying that I will be able to share the gift with others. Education has been the flame that lent its light to the possibilities of the future, and we are so close. We’ve done everything right. Paid our taxes, gone to school, given back to the community when we could. At the moment, we need some help. I have been in Graduate School working on my Master’s in Special Education since Spring 2016. My ultimate goal is to become a Teacher of the Visually Impaired. This means that I am going to be able to, not only teach braille but also share my life experiences with blind children, so that they can better themselves toward a brighter future. I am near the end of my Masters Degree program, and my next step is Student Teaching. This is where the difficulty lies. In the state of South Carolina, if you are working for an educational institution and are Student Teaching you must leave your job. I’m not a certified teacher, but I work for an educational institution so must leave my job teaching blind students the technology for their equal participation in the classroom. You heard that right, no paycheck while I student teach. This could be anywhere from 12 to 14 weeks. On top of this, my husband, who is also blind, lost his job a year ago when his company was sold. He is trained as a Systems Administrator in IT, but even after a year’s worth of job hunting and interviews, he’s getting nowhere. Sadly, situations like his are all too common for blind people. Seventy percent of the blind population are currently unemployed. That’s right, seventy percent! My husband’s social security check isn’t going to keep us afloat without my paycheck. As of now, his social security check covers our rent – that’s it. We live on what I make, and without my paycheck, I have no idea what we’re going to do… You see, it’s not just the two of us we have to worry about. We have guide dogs as well. Our two guide dogs, Samwise & Verner are an essential part of how we get around day to day and incredible companions. We’ve also kept our two retired guide dogs Doc & Hansen. You may wonder why. They have given us many years of faithful service, love and companionship, and we simply couldn’t part with them. These amazing dogs saved our lives in the South Carolina floods in 2015. They awakened us to let us know the water was coming into the apartment. Who knows what would have happened without them! So this is us, the Irwins, the two humans and our four furry guides asking for a little bit of help. Many thanks, Nancy & Billy