Imagination Fund

Creating a Future Full of Opportunity

What is the Imagination Fund?

Your gift to the Imagination Fund will:

• Make it possible for blind youth to achieve careers in math and science
• Provide hope for seniors losing their vision
• Advance technology helpful to the blind
• Train and inspire professionals working with the blind
• Provide parents with critical information helpful to their blind children
• Help blind people across the country and around the world to benefit from the research, technology, education, and inspiration of the National Federation of the Blind and the NFB Jernigan Institute

Our Accomplishments

The Imagination Fund helped support the NFB 2007 Youth Slam.  Held this past summer, Youth Slam was a fast-paced, experiential, four-day academy exposing over 200 blind youth to exciting opportunities in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM).  This educational experience (in partnership with NASA, the National Science Foundation, and the Johns Hopkins University Whiting School of Engineering) included an ambitious mentoring program with ongoing, supportive, learning experiences for blind youth and their teachers. 

Conducted the Third Annual Circle of Life and Rocket On! Science Academies—These summer sessions, held in partnership with NASA, focus on exposing blind youth to science with a hands-on approach that is sometimes limited in conventional science classrooms.

Maintained the International Braille and Technology Center for the Blind (IBTC)—This evaluation, demonstration, and access technology training center contains over $2 million worth of speech and Braille technology for the blind.

Hosted the annual Possibilities Fair—This resource fair provides an opportunity for seniors who are losing vision to learn how to improve and continue to enjoy their lives. 

Expanded the NFB-NEWSLINE® Program—Delivered over 250 daily newspapers and magazines (four in Spanish) and the Associated Press wire service to over fifty-seven thousand blind individuals by telephone.

Developed the Kurzweil—National Federation of the Blind Reader—The “camera that talks” combines state-of-the-art digital photography and a powerful PDA with specially developed scanning and speech output software—all in a single, handheld device. 

Established the Jacobus tenBroek Library—This unique research and resource library on the non-medical aspects of blindness provides materials about blindness from the perspective of the blind. As you can see, we are not simply advocating for skills and resources, we are actively changing what it means to be blind!

Be a part of this exciting challenge! 

Join us in saying, “The blind are on the move and fully engaged in our society.”

For more information or to make a gift to the Imagination Fund please contact us at:

National Federation of the Blind
1800 Johnson Street
Baltimore, MD 21230
(410) 659-9314, ext. 2406
ImaginationFund@nfb.org
http://www.imaginationfund.org/