School for the blind, visually impaired to open in downtown Tucson

The Tucson School for the Blind, at 149 N. Stone Ave., will provide specialized, individualized instruction in a small community setting, said school director Kate Scally.

Scally, a former music teacher at the Arizona State Schools for the Deaf and the Blind (ASDB) for 15 years, said she began exploring the idea of opening a nonprofit school early this year after ASDB announced plans to relocate its deaf and hard-of-hearing programs to a new campus in Oro Valley. Under the transition, blind and visually impaired students would be integrated into local public school districts, including Tucson Unified School District.

"I just fell in love with my students, and when everything started to come out in January and February, I started having some thoughts and doing some research into what we could maybe do to help our students out," Scally said. "I told one of my good friends who was kind of helping me out that I was just going to keep going until somebody stopped me, and nobody stopped me."

The 4,200-square-foot school is scheduled to begin classes Aug. 3 and is currently seeking state certification as a private school while applying for federal 501(c)(3) nonprofit status.

Funded through Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) voucher program, the school has enrolled 14 students so far, all of whom previously attended ASDB.

For parents such as Sierra Vinson, the new school offers a much-needed alternative.

Vinson said her 11-year-old daughter struggled in Tucson Unified schools before transferring to ASDB, where she made significant academic and personal progress.

"She’s just made so much progress," Vinson said. "As soon as we found out the blind kids were transferring (out of ASDB), that’s when we had a problem."

Vinson initially considered using ESA funding to hire a private teacher but decided to enroll her daughter at the Tucson School for the Blind after learning about the new school.

"I just think it's great that everyone's coming together to give these kids the opportunity that they deserve," she said.

Another parent, Andrea Lopez, said she and her husband considered homeschooling their two children, 17 and 12, or even moving out of state rather than return them to public school.

"We've done the public school route before," Lopez said. "We've been made a lot of promises and not a whole lot of answers have been given to us, so I'm not comfortable putting my kids in that situation."

Lopez said the opening of the new school has eased many of her family’s concerns, particularly because her children have additional medical needs that can make transitions difficult.

"We think that whether it's five kids or 500 kids, there should be a school specifically for blind children," she said. "I'm really happy that a lot of that stress has been taken off of us now that they're opening up this school."

The Tucson School for the Blind currently has three teachers on staff, with plans to hire additional educators if enrollment grows. Ideally, Scally said, the student-to-teacher ratio would be between 6:1 and 8:1.

"Part of our mission statement is to have highly qualified, certified teachers of the visually impaired (TVIs)," Scally said. "This is very important to a parent of a visually impaired child, because a TVI is someone who has taken courses in braille, taken courses in low vision methods, is trained in cane usage (and) is trained in accessibility and making technology accessible."

The new school is accepting donations to help buy furniture and technology, Scally said. Visit tucsonschoolfortheblind.org for more information.