Visually Impaired Graduate Overcomes Disability

AUC graduate, Abdel Ghany Barakat, who works at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), has been challenging his visual disability and excelling both in academics and extracurricular activities.

Yasmeen Haidara, a friend of Abdel Ghany Barakat’s and an AUC graduate, said that his determination to be the top of all his classes inspired her.

“I am proud to have met him and taken direct insight into his persistence to prove his ability to reach his goals. I remember that the type of conversations we had always proved that his way of thinking and planning for the future is far from being trifled with,” added Haidara.

Barakat believes that his visual disability is a part of his personality that will not be a factor that prevents him from achieving his goals.

The AUC graduate gets support and self-confidence from people around him. “I think my family is a unique one. They supported me and helped me to become who I am right now,” said Barakat, adding that they helped him become independent by allowing him to do things such as travel alone.

Traveling to the US in 2005 for a year through the Youth Exchange and Study Program made Barakat even more independent. He said that through that experience, for the first time, he went to public schools that had facilities for the visually impaired.

In the US, Barakat took a mobility course, where he learned how to use the white cane, a special cane for the visually impaired, which allowed him to go around AUC’s New Campus by himself.

“My university friends were surprised of how I overcame my visual disability and how I can get around very easily,” said Barakat.

The student added that AUC provided him with a number of facilities, such as the office for students with disability, where he received help with his studies. For example, he was able to get a letter of accommodation for his professors to understand that he needs extra time, as well as soft copy of printed materials, books and power point presentations.

Barakat wanted to achieve more by helping AUC in establishing a lab for assistive technology for visually impaired students. He negotiated with the administration and University Academic Computing Technologies (UACT) to establish a better-equipped technology lab.

“I conducted a research on how to improve the computer facilities in UACT and the latest technological assistive facilities,” said Barakat, who worked as assistive technology advisor for UACT.

Barakat graduated from Al Nour School for the visually impaired with a grade of 97 percent, highest grade among visually impaired students in the Thanawiyaa Amma non-science section and was the first visually impaired student to apply to AUC through the Leadership for Education and Development Program (LEAD).

Barakat was the assistant project manager of the Egyptian Student Union. He was also elected as the Senator for the Journalism and Mass Communication in the AUC Student Senate.

He studied political science and mass communication at AUC, and graduated with High Honors in Spring 2013. He is now applying for a Master’s Degree in Public Policy and Administration at AUC.

For his future plans, Barakat is interested in politics. “[One day], I will join a political party and maybe run for parliament elections,” added Barakat.