Think Creative Issue 8

Juan is dedicated to working with companies to employ the visually impaired.

Zahra has moved her lessons from the classroom to WhatsApp.

Mobilizing COVID support for the visually impaired Juan Luis Sevilla

Juan Luis Sevilla has been navigating uncertain- ty his whole life. As a child, he was diagnosed with glaucoma, a condition that eventually led to blindness. However, Juan Luis has worked hard to not allow his disability to be a limitation. While studying political science at university, he connected with USAID’s Technical Voca- tional Education and Training Strengthening for At-Risk Youth (TVET-SAY) project, known locally as Aprendo y Emprendo. Through the project, he took a course to become certified as a community counselor to help people with disabilities find employment. Now, Juan Luis works for an organization called Ágora that places disabled people in jobs and partners with companies to build an enabling environment that supports all staff to succeed. “It’s been really satisfying for me to help people with disabilities get work, because this builds the self-esteem of the individual,” he says. “Helping them know that they not only have things they ‘should’ do, but also rights ... a right to work and a right to opportunities.” Since the pandemic began, Juan Luis has been leveraging his unique access to the blind community to offer a series of international webinars designed to provide visually impaired youth with clear tactics on how they can cope with COVID-19. Tackling issues from emotional health to specific hygiene considerations, Juan Luis and his team have mobilized to help youth with disabilities face this new normal. Juan Luis has also begun to analyze how Ágora can adapt its trainings and programs for when companies transition back to full-scale work and what that may look like for people with disabilities. n

Zahra Oussouss Enhancing distance learning with creative solutions

created a WhatsApp group and started sending lessons over the app to her stu- dents’ families. She used text messages, audio recordings and videos to encourage her students to keep learning and incorpo- rated their responses into her lessons. It was the first time she had ever done any type of online teaching. Zahra says she hopes that the group not only continues to be educational but also helps her students stay connected at a time when many might feel isolated. “Despite all the fears and waves of panic I’ve had about the future — for myself, my students and the world — I’ve learned that nothing is impossible,” she says. “I also learned from this experience that children have a superpower to keep standing up, not be underestimated, motivate themselves and have the self-confidence to succeed.” n

After 20 years as a teacher in Morocco, Zahra Oussouss had never faced anything like the COVID-19 pandemic. “The hardest moment was when the school doors closed,” she says. “My only concern was to find a way to keep in touch with my students.” Zahra teaches fourth grade in the southern province of Inezgane-Ait Melloul, one of the regions the USAID-funded Reading for Suc- cess – National Program for Reading serves. With support from the program, she created a dynamic, fun, creative classroom for her students to learn. She didn’t want to lose that engagement and relationship with her class because of the pandemic. Like many teachers across Morocco, she found her own way of keeping her students connected and learning. Zahra

Photos by Mounya El Asri (Zahra); José Collado (Juan)

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