Cuba graduates its first blind person from Ph.D. program

From the Cuban News Agency:

SANTA CLARA, Cuba -- Raul Gonzalez Peña, a professor from this city, in central Villa Clara province, has become the first blind person to have gotten a Doctor´s Degree in Pedagogical Sciences, following his successful research on the teaching of computer sciences to blind and visually impaired students.

His doctoral thesis is based on a psycho-pedagogical program to develop basic skills, including computing language, in first-grade blind and visually impaired elementary school students. In defending his work, Gonzalez Peña explained that the Braille writing and reading system has historically been the main instrument used by blind people to access culture and information, but information technologies now offer new
challenges.

The Cuban doctor recalled that blindness has been a permanent subject for researchers and scientists.

Gonzalez Peña has permanently devoted himself to professional studies since he began his university course at the Physics and Astronomy Faculty of the Felix Varela Higher Pedagogical Institute; he was an advanced student in Information Technologies.

In January 2008, he got his Master´s Degree in Pedagogical Sciences and at present he is working as a Special Education professor. He is also a radio amateur, who has contributed to maintaining communications during natural disasters and other events.