Podcast Summary:
What does it take to step beyond comfort and truly build independence? In this episode of Blind Abilities, Louie McGee shares his journey from Minnesota to law school in Chicago, proving that curiosity—not perfection—is the real key to success. Born with Stargardt’s, Louie doesn’t just adapt—he explores. From completing a triathlon and rafting the Grand Canyon to studying abroad in London, he shows how asking questions and taking chances can open doors you didn’t even know existed.
For students beginning their academic journey, Louie offers a powerful message: your path isn’t about having everything figured out—it’s about being curious enough to try. Whether it’s learning new technology, navigating a new city, or simply asking for help, every step forward builds confidence.
This conversation is a reminder that independence isn’t about doing everything alone—it’s about discovering how to move through the world in your own way.
Links of interests:
To find out more about the services provided at State Services for the Blind, and what they can do for you, contact Shane DeSantis at shane.desantis@state.mn.us or call Shane at 651-385-5205.
Thanks for listening!
{Music}
Louie:
“The physical challenge of completing it was much harder than making it work for a Blind athlete.”
“And I do think sharing your story and human connection that’s where, that’s where it all starts.”
“Blindness on top of any story, often gives it another element of adventure, even if it’s mundane.”
“You don’t know the door’s there until you ask, and you don’t know if it’ll open until you knock.”
Jeff: Welcome to Blind Abilities. I’m Geoff Thompson. Today in the studio we have Louie McGee and he’s a student in Chicago and he’s finishing up his law degree there. Louie, welcome to Blind Abilities.
Louie: Good morning Jeff. Thank you for having us. I’m super excited.
Jeff: Well, why don’t you share us a little bit about your educational journey and what brought you to Illinois?
Louie: Yeah, I grew up in Minnesota and went to undergrad at University of Minnesota. And I had always, you know, in the background, knew I was hoping to pursue law. I had a passion for policy and serving my community from a younger age. And I loved going to college near where I grew up, both for friends and family being close and familiarity of navigating a city. But I journeyed to Chicago to expand my independence. Reach out to a broader network in the Midwest. Yeah. So I’m in my final semester at University of Illinois Chicago, right in downtown, and I’m on my spring break right now. So I only have a couple more weeks, then finals and then put my head down and start studying for the bar.
Jeff: Well, good luck with that.
Louie: Thank you.
Jeff: I’m sure you will do well. For our listeners, can you tell us a little bit about your diagnosis of Stargardt’s and how it has played a role in your life?
Louie: Yes. I was diagnosed with Stargardt when I was five years old, just at a regular eye checkup. And Stargardt is a progressive genetic eye disease, so it steals my central vision over time. It’s not linear, so it’s not like I lose the same amount every year. Sometimes it’s stable, sometimes it’s not. But I’ve lost vision over the years, so I can see with my peripheral vision, I navigate the world with a cane, a white cane. I use plenty of assistive technology, both for school, for work, for personal. But in Chicago, one of the main things that drew me was the public transportation. Obviously, I don’t drive myself or anything. And Anything. So being able to hop on a bus or a train. There’s stations nearly every block. It feels like that helps a lot.
Jeff: Oh, yeah. You know, when I was listening to your presentation a couple months ago.
Louie: Oh, yeah.
Jeff: I learned a lot about you and some of the activities that you have participated in, whether it be in running marathons or triathlons, skiing, rafting, all sorts of stuff. Tell us about that active side of your life and what drives you to take on those challenges?
Louie: Yeah, I feel lucky. I grew up in a super active family and we did a lot together as a family, but I also was encouraged to learn what I was interested in and go out and do things. And my family always provided great support to figure out how to make it work for me and if it was safe or how to make it safe. I really appreciate that because this love for action, you know, I still have my family still has. I think in my younger years, I was a big soccer player and skier in the winter time. I, I live in Minnesota, but so there’s not that great mountain skiing, I suppose, but we got nice short icy slopes, so it’s less easy for a blind skier to get lost, but not quite the same as the wide, sweeping slopes out west. But what drew me into triathlons in high school, I was a swimmer all through grade school. Swimming for me was always a good, lifelong, accessible sport. I’ve always had enough vision to be able to see the lane T on the bottom of the pool and most pools. It’s a reasonably high contrast. And so I know when the wall’s coming up from their lake, swimming is a little different because, well, a lot different. You don’t have a lane T on the bottom to follow, but I have plenty of friends from my teams or whatever.
And so we, you know, getting into triathlons, I remember my first, a family friend of mine had just completed his first Ironman. It’s like the big super long triathlon. And I was, you know, we followed him. We followed his dot throughout his course when he completed it. And it was so much fun to follow and watch and cheer that I signed up with him to do a sprint tri, which is a short, it’s like quarter mile swim, 12 mile bike ride, and A5K run. So it’s a it’s a shorter race, you know, but not something you can just do off the couch. You know, there’s training involved. But it was very, very fun. I did it with him in high school and he was my first ever guide for a race. And just I got the itch that day. I was it was so much fun. The community felt so supportive. And I just noticed right away that accessibility speaking. It was not a large obstacle I had to overcome. I think, you know, the physical challenge of completing it was much harder than making it work for a blind athlete. We wrote a two person tandem bike for the swim portion. We swam side by side and had a sort of stretchy tether connected by our ankles. So as we swim, our hands didn’t get tangled.
And then for the run, we had a waist tether between like one hip to another. I mean, out of pocket, probably $5. So very approachable. It gave me the desire to keep going with it. I signed up for another try the next year and then the Ironman of my own, my senior year of high school. And my goal with that was both to complete it for personal goal. But also, you know, as I mentioned, the barrier to entry for accessibility felt not as high as the, you know, low amount of people I was seeing out on the course using, you know, assistive tech or, or what. And so I aimed to get out there and speak about it and share my experience. And, you know, I wasn’t setting out to break any speed records or anything. I was just hoping to cross the finish line. But it was great. It was so much fun. The cheering and the community building when you’re wearing a shirt that says blind athlete. You know, everyone wants to come chat with you. It was great to share our story. Me and my guide and also to hear other people’s stories. Yeah. To this day, I get to use it to share with others and hopefully inspire and learn what other people’s inspirational, you know, personal goals that they’ve achieved.
Jeff: Yeah, I bet you that was quite the feeling crossing that finish line the first time.
Louie: Yeah, yeah.
Jeff: But then there’s some what I call a little bit of craziness here. You rafted the Grand Canyon with Leading the Way. Now, what drove you to do that?
Louie: Yeah, that was actually the summer leading up to the Ironman. So I often joke. I took a week off of training to raft the Grand Canyon. I had heard of leading the way, researching online, saw that they did such amazing trips. Pairing up sighted members of the community with visually impaired and blind high school kids and in doing these sort of leadership style workshops and trips. And so the Grand Canyon, you know, it’s one of the greatest landmarks in the world. And I loved it. I, as we’ve discussed, I loved outdoors and activity that was somewhere I had never been. But I signed up, sent in an application, and they chose me to be one of the team. And so we went out and we were down in the canyon for two weeks, and we had amazing, helpful guides. We traveled with these gigantic rafts. You could probably fit 20 people on each, you know, we had maybe 10 or 12 on each, but yeah, like 30, 35ft long going down these crazy rapids, you know, the waves are all the way up to like 30ft high. It was, whoa, hold on real tight. I’ll tell you that you did not want to fall out, but what amazing…
I still keep in touch with many of the friends I made. We’ve seen each other since, and each day it was a wake up on the beach, out on, you know, having slept under the stars and hop on the raft. Stop somewhere along the way at lunch time and go on these beautiful hikes. And it was great because I had done plenty of hiking with my family, but because this trip was organized and put on for and by blind people, they had all sorts of hiking poles. I could try and figure out which ones I liked, or new ideas of how to best guide me through rocky terrain. I remember coming back from this trip with not only crazy stories and fun photos, but new strategies to teach my family and friends of when I go hiking with them on how to best guide me through safely and in a fun manner. And yeah, it was unbelievable. We did swimming and the rafting just I don’t even know how to do it justice other than to say, look up some GoPro footage on YouTube.
Jeff: Yeah, experience is the best teacher and it seems like that’s what you’re doing. You’re getting out there, you’re trying these things and coming away. And the big thing is you’re sharing it like you do speaking to younger people who are blind, deaf, blind, low vision students about your achievements as well.
Louie: I’ve always tried to be a big storyteller. I come from a family that’s loud. We often joke, volume is rewarded, and I love hearing and sharing stories. Yeah. Throughout high schools where my speaking started taking off a little more, and I traveled mostly around Minnesota to schools and professional events. Sharing these stories we’re talking about today and, and others and how I move through the world. And I try and share stories I’ve been told after speaking engagements of how I’ve heard others moving through the world and navigating their disabilities. And it’s not just a story of being helpless or being a hero. It’s, uh, more often than not being a story of just trying to have a great weekend and, and what does that mean? And how can I help make someone else have an even better weekend? Yeah. Recently I got to speak to Carleton College in Minnesota. That was a great experience. They have very thoughtful and curious students that we had some good conversations before and after and nothing on the horizon yet. As I mentioned, I’m mostly studying the next few months, but once I’m done with law school, I’m hoping to ramp back up and get back out on the trail of speaking.
Jeff: I like that how you move throughout the world.
Louie: Yeah, I like to frame things in adventure terms because I think it is. I think blindness on top of any story often gives it another element of adventure, even if it’s mundane. And I think, you know, I like adventure in a lot of different contexts, but I think thinking about it like that can make some of the mundane parts of life feel, feel more fun and feel more exciting. And it often is a big deal. You know, you might achieve something small, but, you know, to someone else it might seem like a big deal. And I think a lot of times looking at life and looking at these hurdles we’re overcoming, it’s about how we, you know, frame them.
Jeff: Like Erik Weihenmayer, I hope I get that name right. You know, he’s climbed the seven peaks of the world, Mount Everest, all these big, huge climbs, which are, like you said, a hero kind of in a sense. But just like Timmy down the street that learns grade two Braille, that’s his Mount Everest. I like that you take that approach that everyone has their own challenges, and they’re as big as they are, and it doesn’t have to be Mount Everest. It can just be something, a task that they achieved. I like that.
Louie: Yeah. I think we look to the people getting the big news story, but realistically in our lives, there’s big moments that we just move right past. And so I think it’s important to keep tabs on them.
Jeff: Yeah. And you also did something else to me was another big story, but, you know, another task. You studied abroad. You went to London to study. Tell us about that.
Louie: Yeah. What an amazing experience. I’m lucky I even got to because it was towards the tail end of the pandemic, and so it was a little dicey that it would happen in the first place. But as I mentioned, I grew up in Minnesota and then went to the University of Minnesota. And so not to say I hadn’t traveled, but I’d been living in the same place my whole life. I knew for myself and for my own independence, it was important to me to place myself intentionally in a position where I would need to learn more about myself, how to navigate a world a little bit more independently alone, be more comfortable asking for help using my cane, that sort of thing. And London, I, you know, I’ve always had a fascination for I was a big Harry Potter fan growing up, so I love the British. That was my ticket into the British community, I suppose. And I didn’t speak another language fluently, so I thought, London can keep speaking English. Yeah, I went there the spring of my junior year through a program at our school called Capa, where they contracted local professors from London to sort of be a team of adjunct professors. So fortunately, I didn’t have to take any core classes. I got to take classes like a museum studies class where it was we traveled to museums and then wrote about them for a class.
I did an art history class in London. What a place to be for learning about art and architecture. And yeah, I also got credit doing an internship as part of my program, where I got to help and support and work with blind people overseas. I worked at a nonprofit called Blind in Business. It somewhat mirrors the state services for the blind in the US, where they support sort of transition age kids, maybe moving from school to work or work to more work. You know, developing interview skills, technology skills, finding jobs, that sort of thing, and navigating assistive technology skills that might be required for upcoming job. So that was super fun. I was similar age to some of the students I was working with, and we get to do some workshops. And it’s one thing to study and move in a new culture, but it’s another to really meet students and people in similar positions to me, but in a, in a different culture. And so I joke that often I, if I had to call a school, talk about a student, my American accent didn’t always, you know, they always thought, are you really based in London? You know, it was it was tons of fun.
Jeff: Yeah. We’re two countries separated by a common language.
Louie: That’s right. Yeah. And I learned so much about their government system of assistive technology support, accommodation, compare and contrast. Some is better, some is not. But it even more drove my desire to make this a central piece in my career, serving the disabled community that helped serve me growing up and moving around to museums. I’ll tell you if you have the confidence to ask at the front desk, there’s not much you can’t do. I remember at many museums getting almost personalized tours with guides. You know that I suspect another patron might have to pay for. Um. But all over Europe, you don’t see a whole lot of white canes at Renaissance art museums. And I had one memorable moment. I often tell at the Uffizi Art Gallery in Florence, Italy. I was there with a friend and one of the docent tour guides. She only spoke Italian, but she was a super smiley, older Italian lady, and she gave me a pair of latex gloves right when I walked in and, and I had never had this experience at a museum. And so it was so cool to put on these latex gloves. And she let me walk right up and touch some of the, you know, hundreds of year old marble carvings and sculptures and.
Jeff: Oh wow.
Louie: What a new experience for me. You know, I probably photobombed some family photos in the background, but what a cool experience. And you know, you don’t know till you ask. And that’s my biggest message I share is I think there needs to be more curiosity in the world and both of asking a disabled person, what might you need or want or how can I best interact? But also, you know, people like me that can ask more questions because I would never have asked for latex gloves. I didn’t know that was an option. And what an experience I’m never going to forget.
Jeff: Well, that leads into something you mentioned about meeting people on the streets, on the sidewalk, in museums, and stuff is leading with trust. That ability to feel free to ask questions. I really like that. When you were talking about that.
Louie: Yeah. As I move through big cities like London and Chicago, especially London, the streets are old and so none of them are straight and it’s hard to find the crosswalk. And I found myself out there needing to lead with trust. And what I mean is being comfortable asking for support not only on the street, but at these museums, at the front desk, asking your friends. I believe people are good. And if you ask for help and if they can, they will help. And so I think having gotten off at the wrong bus stop or gotten on the bus going the wrong direction a couple times, I’ve had to ask for support, you know, in somewhat stressful situations. And the more you do it and the more comfortable you are, it becomes a more of a community building opportunity. I believe in that in Chicago now. I’m familiar with some of the characters that can be seen regularly on a street corner or employees that, you know, my local fast food or local pizza place because I’ve, you know, I’ve gone enough now and they’ve seen me that, you know, I can say hello as I pass and if I need something, I know I can ask. And yeah, I like the local people at my grocery store. You know, I had so much fun to be able to walk in and, you know, the first couple of times that you have to walk in and say, is there someone that can help? You know, walk around with me and pick out some food. You know, it’s hard. It’s overwhelming to both find someone and worry. You know, you don’t want to come at a busy time when staffing might be short. But now I walk in and I get a bunch of hellos. You know, people are asking about school. I feel like I’ve made a home. And I think leading with trust is the is the critical ingredient.
Jeff: Sounds like walking into Cheers.
Louie: Yeah. You make it what you put in. And so I think like I said before, I think people are willing to help. And if you, you know, if you’re friendly and you ask, you know, it opens the door for them to share too. And you know, if you got time on your hands, hang on out. You know, you never know what story they’ll tell you.
Jeff: Well, you’ve had some powerful academic and professional experiences, especially the internship. What did your internship with Minnesota Disability Law Center? How’d that work out for you?
Louie: Yeah, that was an amazing experience. I worked there last summer coming into law school. I knew about their work. They’re a partner with the Minnesota Legal Aid, which they serve disabled people across Minnesota. And what they are is they’re rather unique agency, federally funded. Each state has one. They’re called a protection and advocacy agency. And what they do is they were born out of the deinstitutionalization movement in the 70s and 80s. And the goal is to protect disabled people from abuse and neglect across Minnesota. So, you know, they do this in a plethora of manners. They have a monitoring power where they can show up at facilities that serve disabled people like a school, a prison, a group home, you know, anything in between, and make sure everyone is treated safely and respectfully. But they also do direct representation. So maybe you have a guide dog and you were turned away at a restaurant because they said dogs weren’t allowed. MDlc may be able to support some representation in something like that. And then they also do education work. So they, you know, on their website, they have Know Your Rights, information, things like that, tons and tons of different topics. So, you know, if you have a legal question, but you, you know, may not need representation, but you need some more information. You know, they might have something on their website you can read about and get some basic knowledge on what to do next.
And I just loved my work with them. They had me in a rotation program where I got to spend two weeks in each of the different teams education, work, community service and integration work. Access to employment. As I mentioned, monitoring. It was such a fun. It felt like a full circle moment for me because while I had never utilized Mdlc services, knock on wood, I hadn’t needed legal support up to that point. But, you know, a lot of these things that they were supporting others in were events I had navigated. You know, finding an apartment, navigating a lease, navigating new services that I hadn’t received before, meeting with a school and doing an IEP meeting. You know, these were things I was familiar with. And now I was getting to sort of turn the page and read the background case law and the legal precedent that tells us what everyone is entitled to and how the processes work. Yeah. And I really hope to keep this focus on disability advocacy central to my legal career. I do it in my public speaking realm, but I really, you know, whether it means through pro bono work or through my job specifically, I really hope to keep that central.
Jeff: That’s quite the internship opportunity for you.
Louie: Yeah, it really matters. You know, I knew of this passion and I had the passion, but I think the attorneys and staff at MDL and I’m in Chicago for school. And so I haven’t gotten a chance to work there. But the Illinois version is called, Equip for Equality. And I’ve spoken with some of their attorneys. And boy, is everyone so driven. Everyone in the nonprofit, you know, public interest law space, so driven, so passionate, so interesting. It’s not only a great career path to build community and support, but also the people you know, I’ve met some of the most interesting and, and passionate people ever, you know, at these places.
Jeff: That seems like a big theme for you, whether it’s running, swimming, rafting or in London and all that. It’s meeting people, getting out there and actually communicating with them. So I really like that, one of the things that you really like to do.
Louie: Thank you. Yeah. I do think sharing a story and human connection. That’s where that’s where it all starts.
Jeff: So can you tell us, like at the University of Minnesota, you were part of the Student Disability Cultural Center. What is that an extracurricular type of club or something?
Louie: Yeah, my freshman year, my first year of college, I got connected with the Disabled Student Cultural Center. They have a, you know, office space at the student union, Coffman Union. And it’s, you know, it’s like in the same hallway as the Asian Student Union, the black Student Union. It’s sort of these cultural centers that bring a same identity group together and share experience, you know, build community, that sort of thing. And, and so in my capacity there, I was actually elected president after a while of volunteering with them. It was a challenging time to work with the Disabled Student Cultural Center. I was present through the pandemic. So navigating, you know, this changing Landscape with a community that often includes people with Amino Compromisation. So we had to navigate learning how to host events virtually. Hosting events in person that were up to a standard where disabled students could join happily. And so some of the things that we did and this community does is interact with school administration and teaching to help build the feeling of inclusion for disabled students. You know, there’s a disability resource center at the U. That brings accommodations to students that need them, but the desk was sort of in charge of the fund and the inclusion on more of a social level. So we hosted different events that other student unions and cultural centers could attend. We worked with this was sort of towards the beginning era of the E scooters. And so we worked with some of the local scooter companies on developing more strict guidelines on where scooters could be parked so that they weren’t, you know, laying all over the sidewalk waiting to be tripped on or run into sidewalk furniture.
Louie: That’s right. And so and that, you know, yielded some great results. We helped get them to create these sort of imaginary zones of parking where, you know, if you didn’t park in a zone, it kept charging your phone. So it’s not just unique to that campus. I think that’s somewhat common in plenty of cities. But yeah, something an achievable thing for our students. I think this community building through, you know, everyone there was a student, we had a wide range of disabilities represented. And, you know, not only did I learn different types of advocacy, but I learned all these new perspectives. I learned how other people approach an introductory conversation about disability. You know, we had some great debates. We had some great sob stories, You know, sharing, you know, it was it was a way for students to feel that they had a place and a home and didn’t feel as alone. Because I know as I’m sure some of your listeners know, if you’re the only blind person or person with a disability around, you know, you might not know there might be someone nearby or someone that, you know, but if it’s something that they aren’t comfortable sharing or what you don’t know until you ask and you don’t know until they tell you. And so it can feel very alone. And I know for me, myself, especially in a time like the pandemic where everyone was feeling alone, it, it made me feel like, you know, this was the right community for me, again, solidifying my desire to go to law school.
Jeff: Yeah, yeah, I have angioid streaks, which is similar to Stargardt’s in a way, the central vision and I remember, you know, 1100 podcasts ago asking that question of someone, you know, like we started out with your stargardt’s and you answered it. But I remember back in the day, it wasn’t. You felt uncomfortable asking a question like that. But today I think it’s changed a little bit. Today it’s, you know, you can disclose a little bit and because it opens up that area that shows that you’re willing to talk about it as well.
Louie: Yeah. My approach has been humor and I like to joke, not at my own expense, but at the expense of making my friends and family around me more comfortable. Being able to offer help, you know, I’m inevitably going to stub my toe. And so if I make a joke when it happens, then people don’t need to feel bad. Like, I should have moved that chair. I knew this could happen, you know, and it’s going to happen. Yeah.
Jeff: There’s six chairs.
Louie: It’s going to happen.
Jeff: I’ll find most of them one way or the other.
Louie: That’s right.
Jeff: How has state services for the blind of Minnesota supported you on your journey?
Louie: I fortunately got to work for and with them back in high school. So during my transition time when I was starting to get some of their services. As I look toward college, they started their peer educator program where students, you know, high school into college age are hired by state services, and then both facilitate plan, do workshops for younger students or students same, same age to build this community of around the same age. We understand each other maybe a little bit better than some of the older employees, but that was a great intro into their work and being able to impact it myself. But yeah, over the years, I certainly, you know, being an in state school got support from them both for mobility training stuff, support with school, even in through law school, you know, technology. I had always been a, an iPad user when I had more vision because I could use a Bluetooth keyboard and hook it up like it was a laptop, but I could also pull the screen closer to read. But as I’ve lost more vision and then transitioned Into a laptop SSD has helped get me started on Jaws troubleshoot technology issues. You know, that’ll stay with you.
Jeff: It’s really neat to have a team that has been there before and your Peer Ambassadorship with them. I think you were probably one of the first ones.
Louie: We were the first summer and it was so much fun. I’ve stayed in touch with a couple of them since. Yeah, just another great way to both build community and know like a another joke I often say that I think is valuable is blind people. It’s not like we’re going to run into each other on the street. I mean, we might run into each other, but you know, it’s not like you can just glance across and say, oh, there’s someone like me, you know, you’re probably not going to. And so I think finding these groups is important because it might not be serendipitous. You have to sort of go out there and claim it.
Jeff: Well, I’ve been on some of their canoe trips or their camping excursions and you know, there’s 15 to 20 students there and they get to meet each other and bond. And throughout those events, it’s just a great opportunity, like you said, to meet others.
Louie: I, something I’ll share that’s sort of silly. That goes with what I. My joke here is, um, I think I sort of did this to myself, but I as because I joke, you’re never going to run into someone. My first year at law school in Chicago, I did run into someone and I was just about a block away. There’s a sort of a corner bodega and it’s not my, you know, primary grocery store, but I go, if I just want a snack or milk or, you know, 1 or 2 things. And I walked in, it’s on my way home from class. And right inside the door was an older gentleman with a white cane. Right as I opened the door, he said, can someone help me to the front desk? And so I thought, well, I’m here. So I walked up with him to the front desk so he could ask for some help finding his groceries. And, you know, first of all, that had to be a good photo opportunity. Two guys with a cane holding each other’s elbows walking through the store. But as I stood there chatting with him, he was a retired blind judge. And I’m thinking I am in law school. What a crazy coincidence.
Jeff: Oh my gosh.
Louie: There cannot be very many blind students, let alone blind judges. And so I thought, wow, the odds that we literally ran into each other are nearly zero.
Jeff: Wow, what a coincidence. What a great opportunity, too.
Louie: Yeah, yeah, he’s a neighbor. And so yeah, we’ve been able to chat. So that that’s been really cool.
Jeff: So let’s talk about access. What assistive technology are you using to access your school and your work that you do?
Louie: Yeah. As I mentioned, I used to be an iPad user. So I, I’ve, I’ve now since transitioned to JAWS and that’s been my, you know, secondary education to law school. Sometimes I wonder which one has been a harder learning curve. I began work on it two summers ago. And so I’m somewhat fluent now. But yeah, I use jaws on my windows computer and that, you know, that gets me everywhere. I need to go on there. I’m an Apple user otherwise and personal devices. So I think they have the, you know, UI down pat very well. Before we hopped on the podcast together, I know we were talking about the, the new meta glasses. I’ve been experimenting with those and I’m excited to see where the technology takes us for that. And that’s been so much fun. Honestly, I’m working on ways to make it, you know, more regular in my life, but it’s been really fun to, to try and practice using it with, with the AI. Yeah. But for school and things, I think another, you know, big trend obviously is AI. And so as I started learning JAWS, AI really made a world of a difference in learning jaws. You know, it was a tool both the Freedom Scientific Companion tool or just like ChatGPT or Claude or something. You know, just being able to ask it a question quickly get a keystroke response and what I should do or troubleshoot.
You know, I do anything from asking it, you know, to summarize all the keystrokes I might possibly need when doing a certain task or like troubleshoot how to do a task on my computer with jaws. You know, as I learn what to ask, how to ask it, I’m getting better and better at getting the more polished responses, but that has made such a difference, especially learning a screen reader. It’s like when you learn Braille, it’s a whole new language on top of already challenging education, so I’m lucky that I have that type of support. I use these databases for research, both in school and for work like Westlaw and Lexis. They are legal databases with case law, statutory law, you know, secondary sources, law review and they both have great accessibility teams. I’ve been able to actually meet with a person over the phone and walk through workflows using Jaws on Westlaw, how they have certain elements tagged, that sort of thing. And so that makes such a big difference because it’s already a, you know, reasonably complicated website that, you know, it’s all about filtering and clicking and, and there’s lots of different clickable features that are different all side by side. And so knowing the flow and like shortcuts really cuts down on time. And so I’ve been grateful that you’re willing and able to support.
Jeff: Yeah. You know, with all the addition of assistive technology there is, I remember during your presentation, you made a statement that I thought was really interesting and it was put in a great way. So it went something like, that Braille has become something more of a preference than a necessity. I like how you phrased that.
Louie: I believe that because I learned Braille, you know, my middle school age, when I didn’t need Braille, I learned sort of in anticipation. If I were to lose all my vision and need Braille, because at the time I. I was still using vision, just in large text, but it was valuable, you know, and I, I use Braille, you know, maybe in an elevator or a restroom sign, that sort of thing. But, but it really is preference. You know, I’ve met blind attorneys. Some use a Braille display when they’re doing an oral argument, you know, some keep one earbud in. And so I do think with so many options for technology, I do think it’s a preference. I like having that preference because, you know, while one person might prefer one thing, it has certainly not become obsolete. I just like that, you know, you can you know, what if your earbuds break and you got to whip out the Braille display, or what if the Braille display breaks and you got to plug in some earbuds? I think having many options is it’s one of the beautiful things about the disability community is understanding that a variety is a strength.
Jeff: Yeah. If you don’t like triathlons, there’s always a Grand Canyon rafting, right?
Louie: That’s right.
Jeff: One way to get your fill of your activities that you do, I like that. What advice would you have for a student today who is in college or high school and looking forward to their academic journey? What advice do you have for them?
Louie: I think my advice to a college or high school student is really to be curious. I hope that has been a takeaway and some of the stories I’ve told today. I think asking more questions is one thing, but being curious can’t be taught. And if you can go out into your education, career or journey and be excited to learn not only the content of a course, but how to best approach your homework, how to best approach Office hours with a teacher. How to best approach. Making friends before and after class. I think curiosity is something that we need more in the world today. And you know, I think that starts with the younger generation. I’ve always thought, you know, the youth are obviously the next big group coming up in the world. And I think if people can bring more curiosity to their career, their employment, their education space, I think it’ll open a lot more doors. It certainly has for me. I know times when I have not asked questions when I could have. I feel I missed out on a chance, and so I really each day try and figure out what I should be thinking about, what I should be asking, how to ask those questions and who to ask those questions because you don’t know. The door’s there until you ask, and you don’t know if it’ll open until you knock.
Jeff: Mhm. I got an invitation. Sheila sent me a link to the convocation. I thought, mm. What’s this? So I clicked on to it, and I listened to the whole thing. I even asked the question at the end. It was the same question that you just answered. What advice would you have? And it was really interesting to hear other people talk about, you know, would you be the same person if you weren’t blind? And I was like, made me think. And on the spot you gave a great answer. So I’m glad you’re out there. I’m glad you’re talking to people, sharing your stories and doing all the adventures you do, because a lot of people wouldn’t believe that someone who is blind is doing that stuff. You know, you wore the Blind Runner shirt and all that, and you said it attracted attention just by people wanting to learn more. I’m glad you were able to come on the blind ability so people can learn more about the adventures and journeys that you’re going through and the challenges that you accept.
Louie: Yeah. Thank you again for having me. I’m always excited to share stories and hearing more. And you all have such a great platform for sharing these stories, so I’m honored to be part of it.
Jeff: thanks Louie.
{Music}
Jeff: To find out more about all the programs at State Services for the Blind, contact Shane.DeSantis@State.Mn.us
That’s Shane dot d-e-s-a-n-t-i-s at state.mn .us.
Be sure to contact your State Services for the Blind, your Voc Rehab and find out what they can do for you.
Live, work, read, succeed.
[Music] [Transition noise] –
When we share-
What we see
-Through each other’s eyes…
[Multiple voices overlapping, in unison, to form a single sentence]
…We can then begin to bridge the gap between the limited expectations, and the realities of Blind Abilities.