Program Data

Data Supporting the Significant Quality of NIU Visual Disabilities Programs in the Areas of:

 TVI, O&M, VRT, and Assistive Technology for Persons with Visual Impairments

NIU has a long history in training diverse highly qualified personnel to serve the needs of people who are visually impaired. The NIU Visual Disabilities Programs were founded 60 years ago, in 1963. The programs faculty offer a comprehensive, innovative curriculum that has earned National Recognition from the Council for Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP), the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC), and full approval from the Association for Education and Rehabilitation of the Blind and Visually Impaired (AER). Also, the NIU Visual Disabilities Programs have earned full recognition from the State of Illinois Board of Education and Higher Education Learning Commission. Furthermore, NIU’s prioritization of social justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion is imperative in supporting scholars and improving their achievement.

NIU has successfully graduated students in their Visual Disabilities programs, including students with disabilities, multilingual students, and students who are from racially, and ethnically diverse backgrounds. The number of students who have graduated from the NIU Visual Disabilities program in the last five years are described below and have been disaggregated by disability status, race, national origin(s) and primary language(s) to provide substantial evidence of NIU’s quality of programs and capacity for recruitment from underrepresented groups.

Over the past five years, the 50 scholars who began the TVI program, the 55 scholars who began the O&M program, the 25 scholars who began the VRT program, and the 25 scholars who began the AT for persons with visual impairment program successfully completed the programs and obtained employment upon graduation. Of these 155 scholars who successfully began and completed the programs in the past five years, there have been 21 students who self-disclosed their need for accommodations in their NIU coursework to support their disability status, 41 scholars who identified with ethnically and racially diverse backgrounds, 13 scholars who identified with national origins other than the U.S., 48 multilingual scholars (including 22 scholars whose primary language was other than English), and 9 scholars who are parents of children with disabilities.

Of the 155 scholars who successfully began and completed the NIU TVI, O&M, VRT, and AT for persons with visual impairments programs in the past five years, 132 of them identify with at least one of these underrepresented groups and 66 of these individuals identify with more than one of these underrepresented groups. Thus, most (85%) of the NIU Visual Disabilities Program scholars in the past five years include multilingual personnel and personnel from racially and ethnically diverse backgrounds as well as other underrepresented groups and many of these individuals identify with multiple underrepresented groups in our enrollment data from the past five years. When reviewing the past five years of scholar enrollment and performance data, it is evident that NIU and the NIU Visual Disabilities programs demonstrate highly productive programs for diverse scholars across a wide range of metrics that are tracked and updated accordingly on an annual basis.