Visual Aid Volunteers of Florida, Inc.

It doesn't end with the braille. Braille is merely the medium, a doorway to both literacy and critical thinking, a portal to higher studies, an invitation to a larger world. Braille is access, inclusion, and empowered potential. The transcriber's core mission is to provide materials that are as accessible to the braille reader as the print material is to the sighted students and open those doorways to possibility. Alongside the instructor, the transcriber provides the tools necessary to follow a course of study and thus serves as a bulwark against exclusion and isolation. Quality braille, quite simply, is opportunity, unrestricted and enabled.

Understanding the Power of Transcription

As such, transcription holds great power. With a few poor choices, the transcriber could very conceivably ruin a child’s future. I primarily edit STEM textbooks, K-12, and I sometimes edit textbooks at a level higher than any math class I took (while in high school), meaning these students have achieved a level I never did at that age. They have a great potential. We hold the power to either encourage that potential by supplying a textbook that provides the necessary ingredients to encourage learning—or destroy that potential by doling out textbooks full of inconsistently or incorrectly formatted material and typographical errors.

Imagine a child learning math but encountering a problem with a typo. Their answer is wrong—although their calculations were correct. Nothing too dramatic in and of itself. But now compound those errors and typos, and it could very well reach a level where the student could draw the undeserved conclusion that they are just not good at math. That would be—to put it simply—a tragedy. We have in essence destroyed one avenue to success for that child. That is our power as transcribers: to encourage greatness or to negate it. I know which side of that equation I want to be on.

The Unobstructed Path

This moment, this tipping point between success and resignation, is where we as transcribers must strive to construct an unobstructed path to success. We must prove ourselves dedicated to the mission: Independence through Accessibility. We must prove ourselves knowledgeable in all applicable codes—in all their obscurities and digressions (looking at you, Nemeth)—and in all applicable formats, ensuring consistent and appropriate choices for translating a print document into braille. Consistency is key, not just through the textbook at hand, but extending through those other textbooks from other transcribers that that child will invariably receive and through all tests and handouts acquired from any myriad of sources. Transcription consistency should seek to transcend place or circumstance and be maintained regardless of school district, state boundaries, or the national borders of all UEB- compliant countries.

The Burden of Virtue

This power is a responsibility; at times, it may feel like a burden—and it should feel like a burden. Because the ambition, the purpose and hope of this occupation, must remain: to fulfill the promise to every braille reader that they can succeed, that they are being given the best tools available to ensure that success, that they are not merely a background concern to a paycheck for page counts but a central and important part of their community and the world at large—that their eventual contribution to society in their adult field holds the promise to be a grand one.

To be clear, that is not to say that is how I perceive those in the transcriber field or how they approach their occupation. To the contrary, I personally know many dedicated, informed, and caring transcribers. I also know those who seek out this work as volunteers, who approach transcription as a matter of sincere conviction, and who are dedicated to the mission to bring clean and accurate braille to students. Transcribers dedicate a large portion of their days—and even their cumulative life—to bring quality educational materials to students, and I certainly do not wish to minimize that in any way. Our burden is a principled virtue.

The Challenge of Uniformity

Virtue, however, prompts additional responsibilities for the committed transcriber, and one of the most important is acceptance of change. We have been in the midst of tremendous changes in both the braille code and in formatting guidelines these last few years. In short, it has been a challenging time, but we must stay abreast of these updates and incorporate them into our body of work. It is unjust to offer a student a textbook containing formatting based on misunderstanding, misapplication, or ignorance of current Braille Formats, from outdated modes in obsoleted formatting documents, or from a transcriber's whim or (supposed) adherence to what was done in some oblique past, only then to have the student receive a standardized test closely following all current formatting decisions but which stands in stark contrast to the (flawed) formatting to which the student has become accustomed. That is a recipe for failure. There is a pernicious discrepancy between school year grades and test scores of braille-reading students, and this hit-or-miss approach to formatting may be one cause.

Achieving fundamental uniformity is the central reason why the formatting documents exist and why they should be adhered to closely. More so, minimizing these discrepancies is why a transcriber must undertake every means possible to ensure their knowledge of formatting and coding documents remains up-to-date, fully ingrained, and complete. Not just sections briefly glossed over, but truly learned. It is not an easy task, but significant undertakings rarely are.

Dialogue and the Knowledge Base

When approaching unconventional print design elements, consultation within the field should also play a large role. Formatting decisions should be based upon a rounded body of knowledge that encompasses divergent viewpoints, differing perspectives or approaches, and works to ensure adherence to all available codes and formats. Where the formatting documents may have failed to account for an esoteric arrangement or formulation, the field can offer what may be considered as best practices for the braille reader. (As a whole, we are a welcoming bunch and are always happy to assist in any way we can.) Isolated guesstimates or spur of the moment whims do not best serve the student, being as they may contain unforeseen issues or present material in an unaccustomed way when a more valid and/or common approach may be at hand. Open dialogue can reduce such occurrences.

The Conscientious Approach

Diligence during transcription is of key importance. Mistakes must be minimized to an acceptable degree. To be fair, we are human, and humans make mistakes—especially when approaching a large transcription project such as a textbook, in which much of our job is essentially recoding a print document by hand. However, with one extra typo or braillo, one more inconsistency, one more self-devised layout with which the child is not familiar, we could give that student one more undeserved failure—and that child might never know the fault did not lie within themself, but without, with one more sloppy or rushed or tired transcription that failed to deliver what that student deserved: an equal chance. Hate every error in a transcription. Don’t hate yourself, but never stop hating the errors.

Just as It Is: On the Importance of Unencumbered Print

Our responsibility is braille equivalent to print—and nothing more. Extraneous digressions, asides, or "improvements" to the print text do not equitably serve the student. I once encountered a transcription that included a blue star as a transcriber-defined symbol. On the transcriber's notes page, the transcriber had chosen to explain in great detail the purpose of this star in print. The problem was, print had sufficiently explained the star's intent clearly and concisely, and that note—while well intentioned, I'm sure—proved a needless (and redundant) expansion upon the print. This highlights another transcriber's concern beyond formatting and exacting braille text: we are not to serve as copyeditors for the print text. Our role is to interpret the print to braille, not expand upon the print’s intents or perceived shortcomings. We put the blue star where it belongs. We translate the print description of the blue star and its purpose. We note the blue star on the Special Symbols page. We do not add more.

Likewise, we cannot account for the quality of instruction of the braille reader. For example, we should not describe in paragraphs the purpose of the Nemeth single-word switch indicator on the Transcriber's Notes page; if the student has not been taught it, we cannot teach it for them. Moreover, we cannot conceive of every possible potentiality or permutation and add additional, descriptive braille for it—that is both an unending proposition and a digression from equivalent print—and therefore unsound. More importantly, we should never simplify the braille to make it "easier" for the student.

A complaint was once made regarding a Nemeth textbook. A VI specialist for an upper- level high school student expressed concern that the fractions in a textbook were being done two different ways, with the one transcribed as simply a slash between numbers being incorrect, and this issue had resulted in the student needing additional assistance from staff members. I was tasked with determining whether the braille was indeed in error. After comparing with the print copy, I realized the print showed two different manners of fractions, the traditional offset fractions and linear fractions. The transcriber had correctly translated both forms throughout the textbook. I then realized the error was not in the braille, but in the braille instruction. This student, having encountered fractions for many years, had never been taught the differing forms of fraction presentation in braille. I could only assume that throughout the student's education, well-meaning instructors/transcribers had merely shown the Nemeth simple fraction indicators for all print representations, be they traditional, linear, or beveled.

As before, good intentions in a present moment poorly served the student in the future. While it is certainly a near-tragedy that this student had achieved this level of math and had never been taught a linear fraction, that is regrettably but unavoidably not our purview. We cannot account for issues outside of our professional realm or attempt to presume the quality of instruction the student has received. Perhaps more importantly, "simplifications" from the print text derive not from a place of equivalency, but from misplaced pity—i.e., condescension—and result in a deficient learning experience in comparison to print readers.

The Text at Hand: On the Importance of Immediacy

Braille transcription takes years to master—but only a wayward second to undo. A transcriber must stay humble, and never confuse proficiency for precision. More importantly, though, I point to a tendency amongst seasoned transcribers to become accustomed to the patterns of transcription and, in a way, lose sight of the immediate braille before them. The routine usurps interaction with the text and subsequent appraisal of the result. I speak from experience, as one of those transcribers. Acknowledgment of one's veteran abilities—whether deserved or not—can lead one to believe they are incapable of errors or poor formatting decisions. They breeze through a transcription, self-satisfied in the work being created while serving short shrift to the resultant braille. In these instances, expertise becomes a weakness. Rather, satisfied self-assurance of one's expertise allows a strength to become the greater weakness. In short, the greater you estimate your abilities, the greater the degree of errors that will invariably occur as a result. The completed work is the only testament to aptitude, and the living transcription is the only means of attaining that final measure.

The Work and the World

To be considered "completed," a transcription should represent the braillist's best work, polished and production-ready. That level of diligence is what the student deserves. Accessibility strives for equality, and that equality must begin with faithful transcription of the original text. The end result—the completed transcription—must prove itself equal in comprehensibility, readability, and print conventions—and with as few errors—as the textbook of the print reader. This criteria requires conscientious proofing of both layouts and all manual symbol formation, a true line-by-line, cell-by-cell proofreading. Laborious as it may seem, the work demands it. After all, our job is braille, that first doorway into the larger world. Will that doorway be shut by the obstacles of flawed transcriptions, bad braille, and condescending "simplifications?" Or will that doorway be thrust open (or better yet, torn from its hinges) by technically proficient, print-focused braille enabling a student's potential and offering the world the gift of their participation? Because that is the key: our job is not to bring the world to the student. Our job is to bring the student to a world which desperately needs them. The doorway doesn't exist for the student. It never did. The student was always there, waiting. It was the world that was in want, of one more human voice delivering insight. On being a transcriber, that much is clear.