Fatima Muhammad Saudi Gazette JEDDAH — The Society for Rehabilitation and Service of Visual Impairment, Ibsar, will start a training course for visually impaired persons to help them in their employment. The course will start next week and will last for five days. Mohamed Tawfiq Ballo, secretary-general of the society, said the training is to enhance employment of visually impaired persons. “The training targets 30 individuals and the new workers at the society who have not received this training previously,” he said. Ballo also stressed the need in the Kingdom for training specialists who can in turn train visually impaired persons to be able to know their environment and move independently in public areas and work places. There should also be job opportunities for visually impaired persons to be able to compete in the job market fairly and independently. A supervising specialist for visually impaired persons who works at the education department in Al-Ahsa, Radi Al-Shaba'an, will be in charge of providing this training course. Al-Shaba'an stressed the importance of using different senses that can help visually impaired people to interact with their environment and make them capable of moving without much difficulty. The “know your environment skills” is a training program that Ibsar provides to visually impaired individuals. It helps them move using a stick and walking in public places, cross roads, on elevators and stairways. It also helps them retrieve things they may have dropped while walking. “Acquiring the skill of moving and walking individually with the help of a stick is an essential skill that visually impaired people will need to master to be able to pursue their jobs, and therefore it becomes an essential part of the job training program,” explained Al-Shaba'an.
