Pune's school for the blind

Nestled in the heart of Koregaon Park is a residential school with a difference; the classrooms are the same as in regular schools, the syllabus is the same too, except the students use textbooks written in Braille; this is because the students are blind.

Established in 1934 by Dr. Shankar Rao Machva, the Poona School and Home for Blind Boys is run by a charitable trust. The school draws its students from all over Maharashtra. The Trust pays for everything – the boarding, lodging, school and even medicines. The school is mostly residential with 150 boys, but they do have 20 day scholars.

The gentle, soft-spoken principal of this school Chadrakant Vaman Bhosale is himself visually impaired. He is also an alumnus of this school. He says that the mission of their school is to provide their students with the skill sets to enable them to live their lives in the sighted world.

From Class 1 to 4, the children are taught Braille on campus. From Class 5 until Class 10, the students go to regular schools. Regular schools have resource teachers to help these kids; for the ones that don't, the Trust tries to help out by providing writers for the children.

The school accepts students between the ages 4 and 10, and the students may stay until they are 18, or they finish their 10^th, which ever is sooner. The children are taught to be comfortable with their disability. In addition to their lessons, the school also teaches the children music, both vocal and instrumental, caning of chairs and even computers.

Near the computer room Ramesh and Gyaneshwar, a couple of 10^th std. students explain they are currently learning to save files with JAWS. (JAWS is a blind user-friendly screen reading software which converts a normal PC into a talking computer so that the blind can learn to operate the computer).

Sports plays a big part in the school; the students are taught running, long jump, high jump and sack race to name a few. The school is involved in state level sports for the visually impaired too. In fact, at the district level, the school came first the previous year.

For pleasure, the students might play chess, kabbadi or cricket. They play regular cricket, except the ball is specially designed to emit sounds in order to help the players.

So how does the school prepare the children for life outside of its premises? Bhosale says that some students go on to become telephone operators, others may run STD booths, or even become teachers. A few in fact formed an orchestra. The orchestra plays in the Bund Garden Park on Sunday evenings between 6:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m.

Being blind is no longer a life sentence; the school prepares the blind to live their lives with dignity.