World Braille Day

Braille is the use of six dots to represent numbers and letters to represent writing for those that are visually impaired. World Braille Day is on the 4th of January as it celebrates Louis Braille’s birthday, the inventor of braille. It also aims to promote awareness that many facilities, such as restaurants, still do not have braille forms of writing and hopes to make this more common practice.

Who celebrates?

Everyone celebrates it – it’s a national awareness day.

How do people celebrate?

There is no specific way to celebrate, so be creative! If there are people within your organization that are visually impaired, you could ask if there is something they would like to do. Otherwise get educated and raise awareness.

What should I know?

• Roughly 2 million people in the UK live with sight loss and of the 2 million around 360,000 are registered as blind or partially sighted
• World Braille Day aims to raise awareness for those with visual impairments and encourage the use of braille in more facilities

How can I support others?

• Discuss with your team how to make the charity more accessible to those that are visually impaired
• Use the additional resources to find out how to increase inclusivity for those that are visually impaired
• Reach out to organizations and companies within your community to try and increase the use of braille.

National federation of the blind: https://nfb.org/blog/celebrate-world-braille-day-raising-awareness

Cultivating inclusive workplaces: https://blog.talaera.com/workplace-inclusion-blind-employees