Programs

Teacher of Children with Visual Impairments (TCVI) and Teaching Orientation and Mobility (O&M)

The TCVI/OMC Program is a collaborative program between the Department of Blindness and Low Vision Studies in WMU's College of Health and Human Services and the Department of Educational Studies (Special Education) in the College of Education. This program prepares students interested in working as a TCVI or O&M Specialist with Children, or a dual program of both TCVI and O&M. The focus in this program is on the specific skills required for helping children with visual impairments to learn to lead full and productive lives.

Many choose to become dually certified in both TCVI and OMC. This combination of preparation helps the professional to understand and meet the total needs of the child. The combination is also in high demand in primarily rural areas where the number of children with visual impairments is too low to employ professionals separately educated in TCVI or OMC.

TCVI's, OMC's, and TCVI/OMC's work primarily in public schools and residential schools for children with visual impairments. Personnel shortages exist in most states in the nation for people educated in these areas.
About the TCVI

The TCVI teaches children with visual impairments the skills they will need to lead successful lives. These skills fall into two major areas:
1) skills that are needed to support the full participation academic curriculum, and
2) skills from the "expanded core," or vision specific curriculum, that need to be specifically taught to students with visual impairments to accommodate their educational needs.

Responsibilities regarding support for the academic curriculum include working in multiple ways with the regular classroom teacher to assure that the student with visual impairments can access the regular curriculum. Duties include transcribing materials into Braille or large print, modifying materials so they can be read tactually, and modifying test materials to accommodate for information not available through the visual channel.

In addition to modifying the typical curriculum, TCVI's are responsible for teaching children with visual impairment in the expanded core skill areas, including teaching Braille, daily living skills, social skills, adapted computer technology, and recreation and leisure activities. These skills are typically learned incidentally from watching others and are not readily available to children with visual impairments without specific instruction. The TCVI (and OMC) will take the lead in teaching these skills to students with visual impairments and in helping parents and others to assist children to learn such skills.

About OMC

OMC professionals also assist children with visual impairments to attain the skills they need to live successful lives. The OMC's responsibilities center mainly on skills such as independent travel and daily living skills. In addition to the typical O&M sequence (see Orientation and Mobility for Working Age Adults), OMC professionals help children learn fundamental skills that support independence such as gross and fine motor skills, auditory skills, concept development, exploration and curiosity, problem solving, and environmental experiential activities.

The Curriculum

Many curriculum choices are available to the prospective student interested in working with children. The actual curriculum will depend on which of the three areas of preparation the student is interested in (TCVI, OMC, or TCVI/OMC), whether the student is interested in taking classes on campus or via the distance education program, and the background training of the prospective student. All students in the TCVI or TCVI/OMC program must have prior certification in regular or special education.

The TCVI curriculum consists of 56 credit hours. The WMU curriculum is believed to be the most comprehensive curriculum offered in TCVI anywhere in the U.S. Instead of one or two-hour lectures on topics such as Nemeth Code (Braille math), daily living skills, computer technology, and art and sport instruction, the WMU curriculum includes entire courses in these important areas. An on-campus sequence takes approximately four semesters to complete. The standard distance education sequence requires six semesters and requires that students attend courses on campus for one five to six-week summer session.

The OMC curriculum consists of 36 credit hours if the prospective student has had prior training in the area of visual rehabilitation. The on-campus sequence takes three semesters and the distance education sequence takes five semesters with one of the semesters being held on campus during the summer.

The TCVI/OMC curriculum consists of 63 credits. The distance education sequence requires students to attend two summer sessions on campus and takes eight semesters to complete. The on-campus sequence consists of five semesters.

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