Braille Without Borders Charitable Trust is a nonprofit that provides education and training to blind and visually impaired people globally. It operates an International Institute for Social Entrepreneurs in Kerala, India that offers a one-year residential program teaching participants skills like project management, fundraising, computer literacy and more to become self-sufficient social entrepreneurs. The program has trained over 40 people from 16 countries in its first session. Braille Without Borders focuses on help-for-self-help and empowering marginalized groups through its educational activities and training programs.
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Braille Without Borders Charitable Trust is a nonprofit that provides education and training to blind and visually impaired people globally. It operates an International Institute for Social Entrepreneurs in Kerala, India that offers a one-year residential program teaching participants skills like project management, fundraising, computer literacy and more to become self-sufficient social entrepreneurs. The program has trained over 40 people from 16 countries in its first session. Braille Without Borders focuses on help-for-self-help and empowering marginalized groups through its educational activities and training programs.
Braille Without Borders Charitable Trust is a nonprofit that provides education and training to blind and visually impaired people globally. It operates an International Institute for Social Entrepreneurs in Kerala, India that offers a one-year residential program teaching participants skills like project management, fundraising, computer literacy and more to become self-sufficient social entrepreneurs. The program has trained over 40 people from 16 countries in its first session. Braille Without Borders focuses on help-for-self-help and empowering marginalized groups through its educational activities and training programs.
Copyright:
Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
Available Formats
Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
Braille Without Borders Charitable Trust is a nonprofit that provides education and training to blind and visually impaired people globally. It operates an International Institute for Social Entrepreneurs in Kerala, India that offers a one-year residential program teaching participants skills like project management, fundraising, computer literacy and more to become self-sufficient social entrepreneurs. The program has trained over 40 people from 16 countries in its first session. Braille Without Borders focuses on help-for-self-help and empowering marginalized groups through its educational activities and training programs.
Copyright:
Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
Available Formats
Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
BRAILLE WITHOUT BORDERS, BRIEF OVERVIEW OF ACTIVITIES
Who/What is Braille Without Borders Charitable Trust?
Braille is used as the basic tool to impart literacy to blind people.“ Without Borders” on one hand means BWB can work anywhere in the world, but more important BWB doesn’t want to set any borders/boundaries/limits for blind people. In the beginning of 2009 Braille Without Borders opened a new centre in Kerala: the International Institute for Social Entrepreneurs.
International Institute for Social Entrepreneurs
Braille Without Borders focuses on help-for-self-help, therefore an International Institute for Social Entrepreneurs has been set up. This unique centre will conduct a one-year intensive residential course for mainly blind and visually impaired participants from all over the world. BWB’s initiative is to transform mainly blind participants to self-sufficient and highly capable individuals who will be able to make a positive impact on society in whichever part of the world they live in. Braille Without Borders selected those people with the right initiative, motivation and skills required to fight poverty and create opportunities for the disadvantaged. After the course the students should be able to: - Initiate or run a social and or environmental project. - Understand what teamwork is about. - Lead a team and delegate within the team. - Create awareness / work with media / find ways to finance the projects
Target Groups Motivated, committed and talented people without regard to race, creed, national origin, gender, age, handicap, social status, financial status or religious affiliation. Due to the ability to solve problems, to focus and to their experiences being marginalized (often), BWB believes that blind and partially sighted people can contribute to society in many ways. Therefore BWB mainly concentrates on blind and partially sighted participants.
Activities and Goals
Over the past ten years Braille Without Borders has gained valuable experience in the education of blind children and adults in Tibet. It created the new and unique method of “self integration” in which blind children after gaining enough self confidence and knowledge integrate themselves into regular schools or society. BWB set up several training programs such as medical massage / physiotherapy, agriculture, cheese making, compost production, market gardening, carpet weaving, knitting etc.
In the new institute in Kerala, participants from all over world will be trained so they are able to set up social and environmental projects in their own regions/countries. Participants from the following countries have been selected to participate in the first badge of training: Sierra Leone, China, Columbia, Germany, Ghana, India, Japan, Kenya, Liberia, Madagascar, Nepal, Norway, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia and South Africa. A team of international motivated Catalysts will execute the unique curriculum which includes: -Management, Project planning, fundraising skills / -English, speech and debate training / -Computer hard & software. Use of special equipment for the blind / -Administration and bookkeeping skills / -Communication and PR / -Practical training in existing developmental projects.
Concept of training: journey in five acts
Act one: Welcome to the tropics
- Orientation (on campus, in the Velayani area, in Kerala) - Introduction - to the upcoming programme, the facilities and the local culture and language - Breaking the ice - getting to know each other’s dreams, cultural differences etc
Act two: Finding my voice
- Communication - debate, interaction, conflict management etc.
Braille Ohne Grenzen – Braille Sans Frontiers – Braille Zonder Grenzen – Braille Sin Fronteras – www.braillewithoutborders.org - Speech - voice training, Public speech, stage training, etc. - Media - campus radio, campus magazine, Talkshows, photo, video, radioplays - Work on case studies and radio plays with the topic "cultural taboos"
Campus IISE, completely built in environmentally friendly style
Act three: Getting real
- Movements - disability, aids, women, peace, environment etc. - Work on real BWB-projects. - Going public - organizing events, pr and fundraising, etc
Act four: The wild world
- Internships (two months in social or environmental projects) - Evaluation -
Act five: The sky is the limit
- Creating and finalizing one’s own vision. - Project planning - project concepts, proposals, presentations etc. - Financing - budgeting, financial proposals and reports, raising funds etc |
Location
The project is located in Vellayani, a village around 12 kms from Trivandrum city in the state of Kerala in the South of India. Situated next to a beautiful fresh water lake, the campus is built in an environment friendly local style based upon ideas of the late British architect Laurie Baker. The campus has the following eco-friendly “ingredients”: - Rain water harvesting - Bio gas plants - Grey water treatment - Eco-san toilets - Solar energy - Wind energy - Most of the buildings are built with mud that originates from the property itself. The college block comprises of classrooms, Braille library, recording room, computer room and a Braille printing press. Further the campus has an auditorium, The centre will have a very well equipped computer lab and library which will also function as a research centre for the blind.
There will be a provision for an intake of maximum 40 students per annum which then can lead to a potential 40 new projects the following year worldwide.
The work of Braille Without Borders has received several AWARDS & RECOGNITIONS
• In December 2008 Sabriye Tenberken was chosen as one of 15 most influential
overseas experts over the past 30 years in China. • In December 2008 Sabriye Tenberken received the "Life Award" in Innsbruck, Austria.
Braille Ohne Grenzen – Braille Sans Frontiers – Braille Zonder Grenzen – Braille Sin Fronteras – www.braillewithoutborders.org • In November 2008 Sabriye was awarded with the “Goldene Bild der Frau” Award in Germany. The award was given by Germanies largest women’s magazine “Bild der Frau”. • In November 2008 the National Braille Press in Boston handed Sabriye the “Hands On Award” for her book “My path leads to Tibet”. • In October 2006 Sabriye Tenberken received the "Mother Theresa Award". • In October 2006 Braille Without Borders received the "Mother Theresa Award". • In October 2006 Sabriye Tenberken received the "National Friendship Award" from the Chinese government in Beijing. • In September 2006 Sabriye Tenberken received the "Chomolongma Friendship Award" from the government of the Tibet Autonomous Region. • In December 2005 Sabriye Tenberken und Paul Kronenberg received the „National Fundraising Award 2005" • On the 4th of October 2005, the German president, Dr. Horst Koehler, handed the "Bundesverdienst kreuz" to Sabriye Tenberken. www.bundespraesident.de
• In June 2005 Sabriye Tenberken, together with 999 other women worldwide was nominated for the Peace Nobel Price. www.1000peacewomen.org • In February 2005 Sabriye Tenberken received the Leila Luce Hadley award for courage from the World Wings Quest Trust. www.wingsworldquest.org • In January 2005 Sabriye Tenberken was chosen a "Young Global Leader" by the World Economic Forum. • On 10-11-2004 Sabriye Tenberken received the Time magazine Asia's HERO award. • On 26-10-2004 Sabriye Tenberken received the Time magazine European HERO award. • On the 26th of February 2004 Sabriye Tenberken received a Christopher award for her book "My path leads to Tibet". • On the 8th of February 2004 Paul Kronenberg received the "Bronzen Peelhaas" in his home village Venray. • On the 7th of October 2003 the Dutch Ambassador, Mr F.de Heer, honered Sabriye Tenberken and Paul Kronenberg on behalf of the Dutch Queen with the "Ridder in de orde van Oranje Nassau" decoration ("Knighthood in the order of Oranje Nassau"). • In September 2002 the project was awarded with the "Nuernberger Teddy fuer Menschenliebe". • In September 2002 the Wolfgang von Goethe Association awarded Sabriye Tenberken and Paul Kronenberg with the Albert Schweizer Award. • In 2001 Sabriye Tenberken was chosen as a "Global Leader of Tomorrow" by the World Economic Forum. • In the spring of 2001 Sabriye Tenberken and Paul Kronenberg were awarded with the "Zilveren Jandaia" handed out by the "Stichting kerk en Wereld" in Holland. • In December 2000 Sabriye Tenberken was awarded with the "Charity Bambi" handed out by Burda in Germany. • In 2000 Sabrie was chosen as "Women of the year" by the Frankfurt International Women's club.
More information about BWB can be found on www.braillewithoutborders.org
Braille Ohne Grenzen – Braille Sans Frontiers – Braille Zonder Grenzen – Braille Sin Fronteras – www.braillewithoutborders.org
