News Release
For Immediate Release
Contact: Linn Morgan
714-573-8888 ext. 102
[email protected]

Verizon Foundation Grants Blind Children's Learning Center $75,000 to Combat Illiteracy

Santa Ana, CA - Verizon Foundation has awarded Blind Children's Learning Center a $75,000 grant, one of 26 nonprofit agencies, including three in Orange County, to share a total of $1 million given throughout the greater Los Angeles metropolitan area.

The funds will be used to fund the Center's Literacy/Technology Lab for blind and visually impaired children and youth of all ages. The Lab will be housed on the Center's grounds at 18542-B Vanderlip Avenue in Santa Ana (North Tustin area). The Lab will give blind and visually impaired students a place where they can improve their reading and computer skills.

Blind and visually impaired students do not have the same reading opportunities as typical children. Sighted students are exposed to letters, words and numbers wherever they look. Blind students need to learn the same skills without that natural benefit. The Lab will provide a rich environment addressing the special reading and writing needs leading to increased skills including technology.

"Studies show that the number of visually impaired public school students who can read Braille or large print has dropped from 95 per cent in 1968 to only 30 percent in1993," reports Stacey Proctor, BCLC's president/executive director. "This means these children are illiterate." she continued. The Lab will provide the assistance to ensure blind and visually impaired children and youth in Orange County will have the opportunity to assess equipment necessary to learn.

Blind Children's Learning Center provides direct services to blind, visually impaired, and deaf/blind children and youth, birth to 22 years of age. For more information about the Center please call 714-573-8888 or visit their web site at www.blindkid.org.

Verizon Foundation is committed to helping people and communities make progress every day. The Foundation supports a variety of programs that focus on improving basic and computer literacy, bridging the digital divide, enriching communities through technology and creating a skilled work force.