Elcie Black with Patrick Williams, left, and Bob Fisher, at Deer Pen Park in Pittsgrove.
Girl Scout turns personal experience with visual impairment into a spark for community change. By Elcie Black
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to explore a place without being able to see it? For many people who are blind or visually impaired, something as simple as finding their way around a new space can be a challenge.
Nearly 168,000 New Jersey residents are blind or have serious difficulty seeing even when wearing glasses, according to the American Foundation for the Blind. Research also shows that people with disabilities, including those who are blind or visually impaired, continue to experience barriers when accessing New Jersey’s parks and outdoor spaces. As a person who is visually impaired, I made addressing the issue of public space access for people who are blind and visually impaired the subject of my recent Girl Scout Silver Award project.
Inspired by Experience: Many spaces around us have accessibility measures in place for people who use wheelchairs or mobility devices. It is not uncommon to see ramps in our area, or modified walkways that are designed to make it easier for people using wheelchairs to get around. However, that accessibility isn’t as developed for people who are blind or visually impaired.
In our small communities, many crosswalks lack accessible pedestrian signals, which make sounds or spoken messages to help people who are blind or visually impaired know when it is safe to cross.
Growing up, I experienced a lack of accessibility going to different parks and playgrounds. I specifically remember coming across a trail shelter during a walk at a park with my mom, twin sister, and our dog, Waffle. The wood of the shelter blended in with the ground, and my lack of depth perception caused me to miss the step up into the shelter; I tripped and fell. Experiencing a lack of accessibility for people like me gave me an idea to help bring change into our community.
Girl Scouts and Camp Abilities: My Girl Scouts troop began planning for our Silver Awards in 2024. The Silver Award is the highest honor a Cadette-level Girl Scout can earn. To earn this award, a Girl Scout must complete a Take Action project that addresses the root cause of a community issue, and requires a minimum of 50 hours to complete.
I began planning for my Silver Award after I returned from a week at Camp Abilities New Jersey at Rowan University, a sports camp for blind and visually impaired kids. At that camp, we did an orienteering activity where we had to find specific landmarks on the campus. Participants were provided with a tactile map to assist in the challenge and help navigate to the next location. That was my first experience with a tactile map, which is a tool that uses raised lines and sometimes even Braille to help the user navigate an area. These maps may be of a neighborhood, activity area (like a tennis court), or any area with landmarks that a person may need to navigate. Users feel the elements of the tactile map with their fingertips to help identify their surroundings in that area.
My experience with a tactile map was really fascinating because it was an interesting way to communicate that information. Traditional maps generally use colors that blend in and are difficult to read for someone with a visual impairment. Even in a space where you wouldn’t need a map, a person with low vision may not easily identify things like borders, water, sport fields, or trails.
When I started planning my Silver Award project, I was reminded of how interesting and helpful the tactile maps were at Camp Abilities, and I thought about how a tactile map could change how people like me and my friends from Camp Abilities experience a community park, for example. I decided that my project would be to create and install a tactile map at Deer Pen Park in Pittsgrove, where my sister and I had played all our lives.
Helping Near Home: Deer Pen Park is a favorite park in our area. It has a fun playground with a swing set and other equipment, and a big pond, stream, and gazebo perfect for relaxing. There is also a pavilion and lots of picnic spaces for enjoying time with friends and family. These things make Deer Pen Park a beautiful space, but they are also obstacles that could be dangerous for someone with low or no vision. A tactile map would create a permanent resource for people to identify things around the park and navigate the park safely and independently.
After creating my plan, my teacher at the New Jersey Commission for the Blind and Visually Impaired referred me to Michael Welter, one of the founders of Shore Consulting Training and Equipment. Mr. Welter took my ideas and pictures of the park and created the map. He also advised on the mounting and provided the map labels, all for free. Mr. Welter noted that the goal of Shore CTE is to make the world a more accessible place, and I thank him for working with me.
I would also like to thank the Pittsgrove Township Committee for voting to approve my project, and Mr. Charles Hughes from Pittsgrove Township for his support and assistance installing the map.
Thanks also to my Girl Scout troop leader, Ms. Kate Ortiz, for her support and the rest of my sister scouts and leaders. And you! Even if you are just now learning about me and my project, you are supporting me by reading and spreading positivity about accessibility in the community.
For many people in the blind and visually impaired community, it’s usually very hard to get around in public because most places are not visually accessible. I hope that my project might help some people understand why I wanted to create something accessible for people who are visually impaired at a park. I also hope that maybe my project could inspire other people to do things similar to my project to help make our community as accessible as it can be.
And finally: You can do anything you set your mind to. Whether it’s helping create more public places accessible like I did, or helping out a neighbor, just know that you can do anything with a little bit of confidence and a little bit of courage.
