Interviews to Empower Presents: Kristen Witucki!

Welcome! We are so glad you are here! Today’s entry is another edition of Interviews to Empower, and our interviewee will surely inspire you to never give up. Allow me to introduce Kristen Witucki!

Q: Hi, Kristen. Thank you so much for being with us today. First, how long have you been blind, and what caused it?

A: I’ve been blind since birth from an eye condition called microphthalmia, as well as hypoplasia of the optic nerve. I was born premature, which caused the blindness; no one else in my family is blind.

Q: Did you attend a public school or school for the blind, and did you participate in any extracarricular activities?

A: I attended a pre-school for children with disabilities, though I was the only blind child in the school at that time. After that, I attended public school throughout my education. Outside of school, I participated in as many bands as I could, (I played piano, clarinet,

bass guitar and percussion), and I also worked in community service and debate activities. I tried our literary magazine, but I didn’t like it. One really great aspect of schools for the blind that I learned about when I taught in one was their equal access to sports. I wasn't the best at sports anyway, but that was one area in which my

public school was also mostly unequipped to adapt.

Q: When did you start receiving orientation and mobility training? Do you use a cane today or a guide dog?

A: I began learning the cane when I was three, I think! For most of my life I've been a cane traveler, though I did travel with a guide dog for seven years and might do it again someday. Right now I don’t travel enough to use one, but that might change. 

Q: Where did you attend college and what was your major? What challenges

did you have. How did you overcome them?

A: I attended Vassar College where I majored in English, minored in German and also earned certification to teach English to students in grades 7-12. My teaching internships were challenging at times, but I learned a lot from them and from my students and cooperating teachers.

Q: What jobs have you had and where are you working now?

A: I’ve worked in various positions in membership development and customer support at Learning Ally. For two years, I taught English, creative writing and some braille to secondary students at the West Virginia School for the Blind. Now I'm the curriculum and content editor for Learning Ally's College Success Program, I mentor college students through a program called New Jersey EDGE, and I teach braille to a high school student.

Q: What do you like to do for fun?

A: I can usually be found chasing my children around, but when they’re asleep, I love to read, write, or listen to music. I also enjoy a conversation with a good friend.

Q: What are the challenges of both you and your husband being blind? How

do you two manage?

A: If the kids are quiet, they usually need one of us to investigate what they're doing, unless they've told us first. :) I don't feel that our family has any extraordinary challenges, though ask me when my kids are older! My sons are seven and two years old. I'm thrilled to have the opportunity to raise them. Most of the time, I think of myself as their mom, and I'm also very lucky to live in an area in which our parenting is respected. The only time it seemed harder was when my

first son was born. Some doctors and other hospital personnel were skeptical. It's a relief not to interact with them anymore!

Q: You mentioned writing. Tell us about your book.

A: My book, Outside Myself, took ten years to write, on and off! It cycles between the points of view of two characters: Tallie, a young girl who first obsesses about being sighted and later grapples with what being blind in a sighted world really means; and Benjamin, an older customer service representative who looks back on his life, the incredible misunderstanding he endured as he tried to fit in and his complex feelings about becoming blind.

Q: If you could give any advice to someone facing sight loss, what would it be?

A: I read or heard somewhere that blindness is the most feared "affliction" after cancer and AIDS. I'm not sure if that's still true. But there will be a time "after the adjustment," and that time really has the potential to be good, if not great! Hang onto a good opinion

of yourself, and seek out individuals who can help you to maintain that!

Q: When life gets you down, and you feel like you just can’t go on, what keeps you motivated?

A: My family and friends, birds and crickets singing, the wind in the trees, the ocean, probably most of nature. And curiosity about what is going to happen next!

Kristen, thank you again for allowing us to feature you here on the blog. And, thank you, faithful readers for being with us today. Check out Kristen’s book, “Outside Myself” here.

We hope you have enjoyed today’s post, and we would love it if you would leave us a comment below. Be sure and come back every second and fourth Thursdays for more encouragement along this journey. Until next time, be blessed.

On Apps and Babysitting

Hi, there. Welcome to the blog. Anita here with you today, and we’re going to talk about using apps to help in everyday life.

This week's blog might be short. My 22-month-old cousin, Alex, just climbed up on my lap to help me write it, and he even touched the braille as if he was reading. :) I will be babysitting him and his four-year-old brother, Drake, tomorrow while their parents work.

This makes me think of school and how all of my students have a toolbox of technology and adaptive devices. I, too, have a toolbox of apps on my iPhone. For example, I use Seeing AI and Cam Find both for identifying various items. I like Blind Square and Ariadne for my GPS apps. BARD Mobile, IBooks, and Kindle are all great for reading. And, when I asked Drake what to write about just now, he said, "It's raining today, and so we can't play outside in the sun.”

While it may be raining now (which Drake thinks of as today), it was sunny most all day. And, this reminds me I also have Weather Office and Deep Weather in my app tool box.

For recording, I use the camera app, and another great app called HT Recorder. Neither app is blind-specific. What I really like about HT recorder, though, is that it produces good sound quality, and I can record in different environments. I am always taking pictures of my cat, cousins, and such and sharing on Facebook with my friends, many of whom are family. But, I, too, want a way to remember happy times from the past, and pictures don't do that for me.

So let's take a brief tour of HT recorder since you, too, could use it to record family occasions and the like. Remember, it is polite to always ask before you record other people, and to respect the answer you receive. I like to get lifetime permission because sometimes I record people when they know it, but some of the best recordings are made when people forget they are on stage, so to speak. I also ask before sharing with social media. Many times, I just use the recordings for myself. One more thing to remember, before we begin, I am specifically talking about using this app with Voiceover on an iPhone.

HT recorder has a library where recordings are stored and where they can be shared. To reach it after launching the app, touch the bottom right edge of your iPhone screen and swipe to the left until you reach it. Then, double tap. Now, if you touch the top, right corner of the screen, you will hear the filename. This initially is a date and time of some sort. Swipe right to get to the share button. The compress, move, and folder buttons follow the share button. If you continue flicking right, you will reach the list of your recordings, and several other choices. Or, instead of flicking right, slide your finger straight down, and you should land on the "Show all Recordings..." button or words to that effect. Now, just flick right to reach your recordings.

If you decide to share a file, you can choose email, the one I use most often, or iTunes or Dropbox and maybe a couple more choices.

When you are in the library, the play button is now at the very bottom right of the screen. If you touch this and flick left, you will eventually reach a rename button, which is cool because it makes it easier to remember a special occasion if you name it something that summarizes the occasion.

If you keep flicking left past the rename button and beyond, you will reach the current audio mode. Doubletapping this choice will change your modes from conference room to auditorium, to music, to very close. These choices work differently in different environments, but I prefer conference room for recordings I make in my living room and auditorium for recordings I make during school performances or for church services. Note that sometimes during doubletapping to change modes, you might land off this button. So just touch the bottom right of the screen and flick left until you get to it again. Also if you continue flicking left past it, you will eventually reach a new button. I am not sure why there are two of them, but if you doubletap the button, you will begin making a new recording.

Note that thenow HT recorder acts like a phone, and so to hear VoiceOver, you have to hold it close to your ear, one of the few negatives of HT Recorder. After you press stop recording, VoiceOver will once again sound through the external speaker. There is also a play button so you can listen to your recording. Remember that if you press record, you are adding to the recording you have already created. To make a new recording, you must press new. If you do not select library, you see many of the same choices, but not your filenames. 

This app has more advanced features, such as editing your recording, but I won't get into those tonight, partially because I have to walk through the steps in the app as I teach you about them and partially because Drake is supposed to be going to sleep here in our living room campsite, but so far he has not. :)

I hope you give HT recorder a try, should you decide to play around with audio recording on your iPhone. Note that this app may also work on other iDevices, but as I only have an iPhone, I am referencing it. You can always check in the app store as it should tell you what devices and software versions and how much space a given app takes.

Thank you for joining us today. We hope you are having a fantastic summer. If you enjoyed this post or have a question, post a comment below. We would love to hear from you.

In two weeks, we will be back with another edition of Interviews to Empower, so mark your calendars for Thursday, July 26. You won’t want to miss it.

Until next time, stay cool and don’t be afraid to try something new.

Blessings.